And Another Thing – Page 3 – LARSEN

And another thing: SLV as the example you don’t want to be

As a critical friend to the arts and cultural sector, I try not to ‘out’ organisations who haven’t already made headlines. Unfortunately, after a year of record fumbles and fails in response to Palestine, that still leaves a lot from which to learn from (with new ones seemingly added every day).

So it’s been deeply disappointing to witness an organisation so many have held in high esteem become the high-profile poster child for poor practice. I look at the example of the State Library of Victoria in the latest edition of my ‘and another thing’ vlog.

And another thing: organisational ethics and deficit areas

It’s unsurprising that these polycrisis times have led to lots of conversations about how organisations are coping and responding: what we do, how we do it, and how we behave when doing so.

My latest ‘and another thing’ vlog ties together three key themes or deficit areas that have come out some of these recent conversations, observations and my ongoing governance reading.

And another thing: the golden rule of governance

Pulling all my governance reading together for my move back to Naarm reminded me of the golden rule of arts, cultural and non-profit governance (spoiler: there is no golden rule).

And another thing: on cultural safety

Arts boards and organisations, stop using cultural safety as an excuse to make your programs, spaces and business practices less culturally safe.

And another thing: how to chair a meeting

Just finished reading How to Chair a Meeting by MI Puregger, an endearing Australian governance artefact from the 1950s with a lot to teach us about how much still needs to change.

And another thing: governance and menopause

For International Women’s Day 2024, my ‘and another thing’ vlog talked about menstruation and menopause in the context of governance and duty of care, as well as a logical extension of occupational health and safety.

And another thing: the politics of publishing

As I mentioned at my Warrane/Sydney launch of Public.Open.Space. in November 2023, the sad state of the world makes it uncomfortable to talk about book stuff right now, which has made me even more grateful that my book is about control and protest, silencing and speaking up.

Because writers, artists, anyone with a platform, and anyone living on or benefiting from unceded land have an obligation to use our platforms to do so, to listen, learn, interrogate that learning, insist on media justice and speech free of bias and hate, and to recognise and act on our responsibilities.

Board members, we need to talk about Palestine

Like everyone else at the moment, Australian arts and cultural organisations have been making headlines for what they are or are not saying or doing about the daily and devastating breaches of international law and human rights happening in Palestine and Israel right now.

And another thing: on profiles and platforms

Preparing to teach a recent workshop on building an artist or author brand made me realise how much my approach to my own brand and online profile has changed over the last several years.

That feeling has been exacerbated over this last awful month, in which the social media spaces I have held in such esteem have become sites for both community making and lonely making, action and distraction, truth-telling and shadow-banning, finding and losing of trust.

It’s been a timely reminder that our online profiles are political – regardless of whether we using them to share political content or politicise our silence.

And another thing: duty of care

Our arts, cultural and other for-purpose sectors are designed to put others first – but we’re much better at doing so for our audiences and constituents than we are for ourselves.

This month’s ‘and another thing’ vlog for my Patreon followers uses the examples of the Voice to Parliament referendum, ethical fundraising and our ‘post’-pandemic workforce crisis to talk about Board members’ duty of care to their organisations, teams and each other.