Naked AmbITion online

 When we appointed social anthropologists from the University of Cambridge to evaluate AmITion, neither of us thought we were doing anything unique. AmbITion was a three-year project using “digital opportunity” to enable organisational change. We’d seen from other sectors how major shifts in business practices could come from adopting digital ways of working, so why not in the arts sector? Dr Lee Wilson and David Leitner were involved from the start of the project, as we worked with 15 arts organisations of all sizes and art forms, to confirm a ‘proof of concept’ – that by changing its digital mindset an organisation could also change itself to become a truly 21st-century arts organisation.

 Our approach was a straightforward one. The arts organisations would go through a process of auditing where they were, deciding where they would like to be, developing a business case and then implementing it. This would lead to a critical mass of organisations which could become digital exemplars for the sector. They would receive funding and consultancy, supplemented by online materials, training and networking opportunities. We were interested in working with anthropologists to evaluate not so much what has changed, but why and how things changed. Their approach would be an ethnographic one: “ethnography is a practice of describing human social relations and cultural assumptions…(using) close observation and participation in order to elicit data.” Wilson and Leitner used a “critical ethnography” approach, which is “a more reflexive and participatory process with the explicit aim of intervening in and transforming the local context,1” where they would look at arts organisations’ experiences of the project and whether it met their expectations and self-defined needs. They looked in depth at a sample of our organisations, attended AmbITion events, and spoke regularly with the project team. Our arts organisations were generous in providing their time, speaking regularly with the researchers whose findings were collated in two interim reports.

OUTCOMES AND BENEFITS
The ethnographic evaluation wasn’t a regulatory add-on. It was a useful resource, giving us the evidence we needed to adapt the support to our cohort of arts organisations. AmbITion Scotland starts in early 2010 and will benefit from the Wilson and Leitner final report. However, their first interim report made for some difficult reading, as a range of frustrations were voiced by participants. We’d always said “it’s not about technology”, but disseminating that message was more difficult, and we had to find ways of making this happen. “What became clear from our research,” wrote Wilson and Leitner, “was that there was already considerable knowledge…and innovative practice within…the project constituency. AmbITion could perhaps have better keyed into this expertise at the outset.” We could only agree, as the organisations had been chosen because of their readiness to become involved. Yet, once the project began, there were some inevitable delays as we appointed consultants and set up our processes. The project team, with our consultant proxies, had to learn more about the organisations we were working with, in order to be able to engage better with them.
It took several months from our kick-off meeting to beginning implementation, and this perceived lack of momentum fed through into that interim evaluation. We looked at how we might improve networking opportunities and respond more quickly to a diverse range of needs. We invited participants to attend relevant events; organised events on digital marketing and digital content; and in partnership with Writers’ Centre Norwich and Dada ran seminars on innovative writing and web accessibility respectively. In addition, we provided funds for individual training and commissioned a series of highly focused video podcasts.

FORWARD THINKING
When we started, we were looking for arts organisations to change their artistic, operational and business practices, but we did wonder if we’d just end up with a lot of new websites. Well, we did. But the website developments were part of an ecology of change as organisations looked deeply at all aspects of their operations and artistic and business practices. We also found that organisations were able to do other innovative digital work through having being exposed to the project. The most difficult outcome, the change in the digital mindset of an organisation, was actually taking place. Going forward, Wilson and Leitner’s final report provides recommendations for future digital change projects. “Technologies are specialised tools, not panaceas. There is no one-size-fits-all solution,” they conclude, emphasising that people’s interactions and experience are key to successful digital development. AmbITion was a complex project, with sophisticated aims, and its impact on the organisations will continue to be felt in the months and years ahead. By opening up the project to this “critical ethnography”, publishing it online, and incorporating its recommendations into the AmbITion Toolkit, we hope that the arts sector can approach digital developments with much more confidence.