And another thing: our cultural workforce crisis

For those living (or leaving) the national cultural workforce crisis currently being experienced – deeply and distinctively – across Australia’s arts, cultural and for-purpose organisations and sectors, the language of ‘crisis’ isn’t hyperbole, nor something that’s up for debate.

But the last few weeks have reminded me that there are some gaps in this understanding – unfortunately (though not unsurprisingly) from some of the people with the most power to affect change, including board members who aren’t meeting either their fiduciary duties or their duty of care.

Ignorance is never an excuse when it comes to discharging our governance duties, but particularly not at a time when we have so much access to quality data (even if the story those stats tell is pretty grim).

So for them, and anyone else who needs it, my final ‘and another thing’ vlog for the year provides a quick summary of four significant studies published in 2024.

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This episode draws from or references:

• Parliament of Victoria’s Inquiry into the cultural and creative industries in Victoria
• TNA’s response to Parliament of Victoria Inquiry on LinkedIn
• Artists as Workers: An Economic Study of Professional Artists in Australia by David Throsby and Katya Petetskaya for Creative Australia
• Major report shows economic conditions for artists at odds with the value we place on the arts, Creative Australia
• Australian Cultural Employment: An Analysis of the Australian Census and Labour Force Survey Data by Ben Eltham and Justin O’Connor for Reset Art and Culture
• This Is How We Do It: Report on the Working Trends of Independent Artists and Creatives in the Performing Arts in Australia, TNA
• Arts Workforce Scoping Study interim report, SaCSA
• Post-COVID or post-burnout: less is necessary, me in ArtsHub

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