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Leadership in Arts Fundraising

Learn effective leadership for successful fundraising and sustainable business development in the arts and cultural sector.

978 enrolled on this course

Female artist singing with a microphone

Leadership in Arts Fundraising

978 enrolled on this course

  • 3 weeks

  • 3 hours per week

  • Digital certificate when eligible

  • Intermediate level

Find out more about how to join this course

Explore techniques to lead effective arts fundraising

Effective leadership is vital for successful fundraising in the arts and culture; a sector that heavily relies on external funding as part of its income mix. It’s not just about meeting immediate financial needs, but also about fostering an innovative fundraising culture.

This three-week course will help you understand your role as a leader in developing and embedding fundraising within your organisation.

Discover how to analyse your organisation’s fundraising and make it central to its operations

To lead innovative fundraising, you will need to evaluate where it fits in your organisation.

You’ll learn how to identify key internal and external relationships and be introduced to models to help you assess their effectiveness. You’ll review industry examples and consider how you can put fundraising at the heart of your organisational structure.

Understand your organisational culture and how it affects change in fundraising

On this course, you’ll examine how your organisational culture and your stakeholders’ roles affect the fundraising performance and what you can do to change it.

To help you lead change, you’ll be introduced to tools that identify attitudes towards risk and innovation. By exploring case studies, you’ll explore techniques that aim to make your organisation resilient and adaptable.

Lead successful fundraising while navigating change and crisis

Unplanned change is inherent in the arts and cultural sectors. You’ll explore how to distinguish between crisis-led change and longer-term realignments that require changes to your fundraising approach, as well as how to deal with unforeseen changes to avoid disruption.

You’ll also consider emerging trends in fundraising and giving, and explore alternative approaches from around the world.

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Skip to 0 minutes and 4 seconds Effective leadership is vital for successful fundraising in the arts, a sector that heavily relies on external funding as part of its income mix. But leadership is not just about meeting the immediate financial needs. It’s also about looking to the future and fostering an innovative fundraising culture. At different levels in your organisation. This online course will help you understand your role as a leader in developing, embedding and supporting fundraising within your arts organisation. You’ll be introduced to leadership practices and explore models that can enhance the effectiveness of your fundraising processes. You learn how to employ strategies that foster good relationship management and economic development in support of your creative goals.

Skip to 0 minutes and 45 seconds The course will help you to critically assess your organisation’s attitudes towards risk innovation and change. It introduces methods for mitigating the impact of economic disruption, surveying new fundraising trends and drawing inspiration from international examples. If you want to lead successful fundraising in your arts organisation, then join this course today.

What topics will you cover?

  • The relationship between organisational structure and fundraising, and the role of executive and non-executive leadership in relation to fundraising
  • Analysing the impact of an organisation’s key relationships, cultural mission and attitudes towards risk and innovation, on fundraising practice and performance
  • The relationship between an organisation’s learning culture and its fundraising practice
  • Effective evaluation strategies to support fundraising activities
  • Dealing with the impact of rapid and unforeseen change within the arts and cultural sector on fundraising performance
  • Trends in ethical fundraising and individual and digital giving, and alternative fundraising models from around the world

When would you like to start?

Start straight away and join a global classroom of learners. If the course hasn’t started yet you’ll see the future date listed below.

  • Available now

Learning on this course

On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.

What will you achieve?

By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...

  • Understand their role as a senior executive in developing and maintaining their company’s fundraising strategy and culture.
  • Identify and enhance fundraising processes in their organisation through clarification of senior leadership roles in building an effective fundraising culture and supporting key relationships.
  • Identify and assess the implications for fundraising performance of their organisation’s cultural mission and key stakeholder relationships, by using a range of strategic and analytical models and techniques.
  • Investigate strategies to support and enable the development of fundraising through the enhancement of the organisation’s learning culture and evaluation practices.
  • Identify organisational attitudes to risk and innovation which can impact fundraising practice.
  • Evaluate the value of different strategies which draw inspiration from international examples and trends in giving, in mitigating the impact of recent economic and social changes and disruption on fundraising performance.

Who is the course for?

This course will be of interest to leaders in the arts and cultural sector. You may be working or aspiring to work as an executive or an artistic director, a CEO, or a general or a financial manager.

It may also interest you if you are a board member or senior fundraiser throughout the arts and cultural sector.

Whatever your specific role, if you are a senior cultural leader this course is for you.

Who will you learn with?

Lecturer in Creativity & Enterprise in the School of Performance & Cultural Industries, University of Leeds.

Who developed the course?

University of Leeds

As one of the UK’s largest research-based universities, the University of Leeds is a member of the prestigious Russell Group and a centre of excellence for teaching.

Arts Fundraising & Philanthropy

Arts Fundraising & Philanthropy transforms the fundraising knowledge, skills and levels of success of arts, culture and heritage organisations. Funded by Arts Council England, Arts Fundraising & Philanthropy provides programmes in strategy, fundraising, training and innovation.

Endorsers and supporters

funded by

Arts Council England

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Ways to learn

Choose the best way to learn for you!

Subscribe & save

$349.99 for one year

Automatically renews

Develop skills to further your career

  • Access to this course
  • Access to 1,000+ courses
  • Learn at your own pace
  • Discuss your learning in comments
  • Tests to boost your learning
  • Digital certificate when you're eligible

Cancel for free anytime

Buy this course

$104/one-off payment

Fulfill your current learning need

  • Access to this course
  • Learn at your own pace
  • Discuss your learning in comments
  • Tests to boost your learning
  • Printed and digital certificate when you’re eligible

Limited access

Free

Sample the course materials

  • Access expires 14 May 2024

Find out more about certificates, Unlimited or buying a course (Upgrades)

Learning on FutureLearn

Your learning, your rules

  • Courses are split into weeks, activities, and steps to help you keep track of your learning
  • Learn through a mix of bite-sized videos, long- and short-form articles, audio, and practical activities
  • Stay motivated by using the Progress page to keep track of your step completion and assessment scores

Join a global classroom

  • Experience the power of social learning, and get inspired by an international network of learners
  • Share ideas with your peers and course educators on every step of the course
  • Join the conversation by reading, @ing, liking, bookmarking, and replying to comments from others

Map your progress

  • As you work through the course, use notifications and the Progress page to guide your learning
  • Whenever you’re ready, mark each step as complete, you’re in control
  • Complete 90% of course steps and all of the assessments to earn your certificate

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