#20: We Are On the Same Team: Union Relationships and Collective Bargaining in the Arts
What works and what doesn’t with union collective bargaining in arts and culture—and how we can make the pie bigger for all of us.
Cellist Ted Nelson served as chair of the players committee at the Cincinnati Symphony, and clarinetist Jessica Phillips served as players committee chair at the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. Both worked toward collaborative and creative agreements, and they share first-hand about their experience.
TRANSCRIPT
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Hi everyone. Welcome to the final episode of season two of this podcast. [00:01:00] I am still kind of blown away. I have to say at how this little pilot test project I started last year has taken off. So thank you to all of you who've been listening. I'm really grateful. It's bringing value to you as that's the whole point.
I just got back from vacation, if you've been following along, I am now rested, I'm recharged, and now I'm catching up on the news and happenings of the past two weeks while I was away, and You know what? The world keeps turning. This is what I'm reminded of, again and again. So for all of us workaholics out there, I have a few thoughts on this.
One, working a lot is okay, in my opinion, when we are finding purpose and fulfillment in our work. I tend to like the idea of work life integration over quote unquote balance. To me, the former is more achievable, more realistic, the idea of work life [00:02:00] integration. And you don't have to agree with me on this, but that's how I personally feel about it.
But this brings us to point number two, which is we all, no matter how much we enjoy our work, we all need breaks. This is what the research shows. We need short breaks during the day. We need longer breaks to refuel. And despite that research, if I'm being honest, any time I disconnect for a bit, even when I'm ready for it and wanting it, such as in the case of this last vacation, I still sometimes have a little apprehension, you know, what will I miss, what will happen if someone needs to get ahold of me, what if I'm not supporting my business online and pushing out content for two weeks?
And you know what? Like I said, the world keeps turning. It really does. And it's all okay because. None of it is that deep in the end. Maybe I'm still on Island Time or something, but those are my thoughts, du jour. I hope they are helpful in some way, and I hope your [00:03:00] summer is treating you well, too. And you do get a break, or at least some time to rest and time to disconnect to, at least for a little bit.
Now, we are all here. And as I said, this is the last episode of the season. Sniff, sniff. In many ways, though, I have saved the best for last. I really have loved every guest I've spoken to this season. That's why I brought you these conversations on how the narrative is changing for arts and culture. I felt they all had great insights and real thoughtfulness and expertise on their topics and I hope you all feel that way too and got as much out of it as I did.
And for this last conversation, when the discussion was first recorded, it was live streamed and. I share this because so many people commented that this duo that you're going to hear from today brought them hope. Hope. I think that was the word used more than any other, if I recall. Hope for the industry, hope for our [00:04:00] art form, hope for working together, musicians and management.
That's the topic today. So, while I really have loved every conversation this season, we are ending on a high note. Music pun very much intended. And as I said, today, the topic is artists and management. We know in this field, these relationships can be challenging, can be adversarial. There's a history of that.
Our history does not determine our future, I believe that now more than ever, and the narrative is changing, especially here on this topic, and we have two people with us today who have proven that it doesn't have to be the old way, the adversarial way, the us versus them way. We are going to spend our time in this final episode of the season talking about this, hearing firsthand about their experience, what works, what doesn't.
We can make the pie [00:05:00] bigger for all of us. And a final note, as we get going, season three is already in the works. If you did not see on social media a few weeks ago, I shared that I have a book coming out. That's my big news in early 2024. It publishes. And season three of this podcast is all brand new material.
Never before seen or heard and it is directly supporting and sort of an extension of that book you can think of it as Bonus material in my mind, so it stands alone completely separate in this podcast format But also expands and extends some of the topics I've written about I cannot wait to share more with you when we come back For season three, but know it's in the works and that'll be back this fall But for today, we've got some really great stuff on deck right here, right now.
Welcome to episode 11 of 11 of season 2 of the Offstage Mike. I hope this conversation has your mind and heart just soaring by the end as it did for me. [00:06:00] And I hope you are soaring through the rest of the summer in the best way. And lastly, I hope this energy and good vibes you'll hear in this episode carries you all the way to the coming season ahead.
Hey everyone, I'm Aubrey Burgauer, and welcome to my podcast. If we haven't met, I'm known in the arts world for being customer centric, data obsessed, and for growing revenue. The arts are my vehicle to make the change I want to see in this world, like creating places of belonging, pursuing gender and racial equality, developing high performing teams and leaders, and leveraging technology to elevate our work.
In this season, I'm bringing you conversations with some of my favorite experts from both inside and outside the arts. All to help build the vibrant future we know is possible for our institutions and for ourselves as offstage administrators and leaders, you're listening to the offstage mic.[00:07:00]
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I am so happy and pleased to introduce you to [00:09:00] our two guests today. First up is Ted Nelson. Ted Nelson is the Vice President for Artistic Planning and Operations at the Dayton Performing Arts Alliance. This is a fairly new role for him. In fact, he's taken on this role since we originally have this discussion because before this role, he was for many years, a cellist in the Cincinnati Symphony, almost 19 years playing in the orchestra there.
Also, Ted is artistic director of Concert Nova, which is a chamber music ensemble that's pushing boundaries. And speaking of pushing boundaries, that really tracks because Ted did so much of this kind of work, pushing boundaries, that is, while also wearing the hat of chair of the Players Committee at Cincinnati Symphony.
So he was chair starting in 2010. He led negotiations for the 2015 agreement and the 2020 union agreement as well. We will talk about this in our conversation. So to give some context, the 2015 [00:10:00] agreement was covered not just in Cincinnati, but also in the New York Times. Trey Devey at the time was then CEO of the Cincinnati Symphony.
And he said to the New York Times that A lot of the ideas and strategies that worked in those previous contracts were quote unquote unorthodox. Those were Trey Devy's words. And this most recent agreement with the Cincinnati Symphony and Musicians, this agreement was reached in 2022, maybe late 21. And when that agreement was finalized, it was also unorthodox in the best way.
I've heard it called landmark. I've heard it called revolutionary. Now, to be clear, Ted was not chaired through this most latest agreement, but the work that Ted and Trey did before those previous agreements, 2015 2020, set the path for the people who followed. In the current chair and current CEO, Jonathan Martin.
So we're going to unpack all of that in our conversation today. [00:11:00] Ted Nelson has also served on the board of the Cincinnati symphony, which means Ted brings the perspective of artist. Administrator and board member to this conversation. Also joining us today is Jessica Phillips. She is also a powerhouse Jack of all trades who has also worn many, many hats.
Jessica Phillips plays clarinet in the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. She was chair of the players committee. Also, for two cycles, 2014 and 2018, you may remember those contract negotiations because they were highly publicized at the time. Lots of media coverage, lots of opinions, and those negotiations were also unorthodox and landmark in many ways, which again, we're going to talk about a little.
We're going to unpack all that. In addition to all of those things. Jessica Phillips also teaches courses on topics of music business and entrepreneurship at Manhattan School of Music and Juilliard. [00:12:00] She has done a lot of marketing and branding work for other musicians and projects as well, which is all to say, Jessica also brings just so much perspective, a of so much of the offstage work we do.
She has incredible talent and lived experience as a musician, of course, as well, with really strong and commendable offstage leadership roles. And she's teaching all of those things to young players today. As I was pulling these bio points for both Ted and Jessica, it occurred to me that this well roundedness, this breadth and depth of roles and experiences, May just be the key to how they've been able to lead and move others forward, both in their organizations and also more broadly in the field through conversations like this one.
Jessica Phillips and Ted Nelson are both so forward thinking, thoughtful, smart, and believe we are all on the same [00:13:00] team. I believe that too. Thank you and welcome to you both.
Jessica Phillips: Thank you for having us. It's nice to have another musician in the room.
Aubrey Bergauer: Love it. We're going to get into it. So I want to start with what works.
So Ted, I'm going to have you go first. You have spoken very highly of Trey Devey, who I mentioned in my intro and bio of you. And you have talked to me about how he did a lot for positive labor relations long before that landmark agreement in 2015. So, and long before the landmark agreement that since he just recently came to, so, you know, kind of take us back.
What worked, what works in your mind? Well,
Ted Nelson: Trey's first day on the job. When he was hired in Cincinnati, it was actually to sit down at a negotiation session. I believe that was in 2009, which was a challenging time for a lot of orchestras for obvious reasons. And he started the negotiations with a lot of open [00:14:00] dialogue talking about the cash crisis that was facing us.
And It ended up, although it was a concessionary contract, being a very successful negotiations, I think, primarily because immediately after we sort of got through the what's going on right now, we started asking the questions of, how do we keep this from happening again? And I think it was probably a somewhat unusual thing to have go on that a lot of the questions were being asked by the musicians saying, how do we, how do we keep this from happening again?
What business practices can the organization adopt? To avoid this type of crisis in the future. And a lot of those fundamental principles that we adopted are still in place and are still creating a really stable structure here. We weathered the pandemic, I think in really good shape compared to a lot of orchestras.
We've seen steady growth. But I think that the collaborative nature of that conversation of Trey being open to hearing those questions from us and from the musicians, um, and we were led by Dick Jensen at the time, who's since retired from the orchestra, but the musicians feeling [00:15:00] empowered to ask those questions and to have that sense of engagement with the organization overall, that we're not just saying, what can we get back?
How can we make sure that everything is running well for all of us, realizing that we all have the same interests at
Aubrey Bergauer: heart? Yeah, I appreciate that. And I remember you also telling me, true or false, he was very transparent with the financials as well and just really tried to lay it out there. Yeah.
Ted Nelson: The musicians have access to the board financials that we get, both on the committee level and on the individual level.
So there's a lot of transparency and there's a lot of freedom to ask questions and say, why is there this disparity in the financial report, which I think is incredibly important. So that when we sit down. To negotiate. We're never in a situation of. Being surprised. If there are issues, if there are deficits, we're aware of them, we're talking about them well before we sit down to actually negotiate the financials of a
contract.
Aubrey Bergauer: Yeah, love that. Okay, so I'm hearing openness, transparency, listening to questions, responding to those questions, and not being surprised. We'll make that a fourth thing that works well. Not being [00:16:00] surprised works well. Okay, Jessica, your turn. In your mind, what works in a successful labor relationship?
Jessica Phillips: I think Ted summed it up so well, and I just want to pull out a few threads there.
Part of it is relationship building, right? So having those conversations, not surprising each other, you know, with certain things that do need to be talked about and do need to be transparent. Financials, an absolute part of it. number one key thing. This is something that didn't go well in 2014, but did go well in 2018 for us.
Another thing I would say is, you know, we ride on the shoulders of the committees that negotiated before us and also their relationships with management. So it's about also transparency within our own groups. And I think when we think about taboos and like this us versus them sort of really polarized situation that we [00:17:00] can sometimes find ourselves in breaking some of those stereotypes.
Really comes back to relationship building, right? And understanding what our needs are, understanding that management also has some needs and we've all had different pieces of information so that that communication transparency is crucial so that when you. do get to the table and you are thinking about the mythical fixed pie, which is a myth, right?
When we are thinking about creating value, we already have objective criteria upon which to think about how we cost things, how we value things, why it's important for management to have this piece, why it's important for us. So we're not fighting for our fundamental core values or our needs. As humans, right?
We're actually starting from a very different level of nuanced conversation. And that's crucial. You need to have that in order to think about principles in negotiations, right? You need to have that trust. And it's like [00:18:00] Ted said, if you don't have those relationships. That's what the committee is really empowered to do and should be empowered to do.
You know, I think what's so amazing in the musician world is we don't talk about it enough, and I encounter this in my classes all the time, is that I don't think that musicians are always Really prepared for that and we just pass it down. Anecdotally, right Ted? It's like, oh, you know, oh by the way, you have this legal duty of fair representation thing.
You know, like you need to represent people fairly. And people are like, no. So we do it within ourselves too. And this like us versus them is a very, simple way to categorize our fear, right? And if we can be more nuanced, have a more nuanced conversation, which really comes with the complexity of the situation and the situation in the arts is complex.
Aubrey Bergauer: Yes, it's, yeah, I think two things I are really are latching onto of what you said. One is this last piece of just adding nuance and I was [00:19:00] recently reading this book on change management and this is switched by Chip and Dan Heath for any forums out there. And one of the things that really stuck out to me is how humans want to oversimplify.
Big problems. And that's in our nature, but we have to allow ourselves to have complexity and nuance. And that's what you're saying. So I really appreciate that point. And then the other thing that I really am latching on to is what you're saying about standing on the shoulders or however you set it up, the people who had these roles before us, that can be good or bad, depending on how it went before.
And so, yeah, and, um, The nuance that I would add to that is you said that's true for players committees and chairs of committees, but also true for CEOs. I've definitely seen it work both ways that way too. I'm assuming Jonathan Martin's job was made a little easier to come in, given that there was a lot of goodwill toward trade.
Yeah. Ted is like, and then, and I've seen it of course happen. We've all seen it happen the other way too, where it's. It's so challenging just because there is so much history of [00:20:00] just, you know, pain and dysfunction and whatever else. So okay, on that note of pain and dysfunction, I don't want to dwell on the bad, but I think we have to address some of it.
So my question is, if you had to pick, what is your biggest frustration with the way things are currently done? Like biggest pain point of what needs to change? What would that be? And either of you can go first on this one.
Ted Nelson: I think that I guess it's not really a single pain point. It's more a perception of how the bargaining process often works.
And I feel like the issue, and I've said this to you before, I'll be, but I've had this image of both sides of the negotiation pushing on either side. Of a really heavy rock and trying to keep it from moving. And I think that the atmosphere that's created in a lot of negotiations in the orchestra world is really one where both sides are trying not to lose anything.
And so what we miss out on are the opportunities for growth and innovation [00:21:00] and for looking at structures within the industry that really don't function well and are maybe even dysfunctional. Working in an art form that does have a fairly long history. and has a history that points in certain directions and it's easy for us to fall into the trap of assuming that that means that everything that has come before is good and that we should preserve everything at all costs.
As I've been thinking about these issues a lot as I served as committee chair and since then looking at a lot of business thinking from outside the orchestra world is so enlightening and thinking about, you know, research that's been done into the role of good management. Oh, you are
Aubrey Bergauer: speaking my language.
Sorry to interrupt, but please.
Ted Nelson: And looking at research into what makes employees happy. And I'm not just talking about musicians here, because I think that there are tremendous issues facing, you know, structural issues facing the staff side of what happens in most orchestras, but this sense of trying to preserve mythical past rather than looking at ways that we can really change and innovate effectively, I think is, is my biggest frustration.
Jessica Phillips: [00:22:00] Absolutely. That's why I love having Ted in the room. It's like, Oh man, we're always on the same page with this. And I would just kind of like add to that, which is, um, that there, there is so much fear about change. You know, it's always about what we're going to lose, you know, and never enough about what we're going to gain.
And I think there's just So much social psychology out there about how groups can become super cohesive and create solidarity. And that's generally what we try to do. And those groups work together very well, but those groups, when they lack diverse voices, and I mean, like just different opinions, then they can also be come.
Enraged, right? Like that. It can become sort of mob mentality, and it's really difficult to deescalate those situations. So again, I think that there just needs to [00:23:00] be more understanding about The actual science of negotiation, right? Like the separating people from the problem, like we are all emotional human beings and that can, you know, it can get emotional, right?
Like I've definitely seen people lose it at the table. I've definitely seen amazing collaborative. Conversations at the table and I've seen people apologize at the table. Like there's a whole range of emotions. And one great lawyer told me once negotiation is theater, which is kind of true, you know, but it's not theater for musicians.
Like we are very much worried about what we'll lose. We're worried about our actual needs being met and our human like resources of wages and things like that, our bodies. We're musicians. We play a long time. These are really real issues for us. And they're not always understood by management. So we come [00:24:00] from different already sources of information.
So to me, the biggest frustration is lack of time to develop common ground, to develop those conversations. When you have 30 people in a room and basically everybody. Started on an instrument or something, right? Saying played piano, almost every single person. And if they didn't, they absolutely have love for it.
And yet there were still really interesting, delicate conversations that arose. from trying to find common ground. So whether that was around tenure or the future of diversity, equity and inclusion in our field, some of these really tough conversations that really need to be happening away from the negotiating table.
You know what I mean? So that we can actually move things forward with innovation, as Ted is saying. So it's time and we think of time is money. And this is my favorite science of [00:25:00] negotiating. The story of all time, which is that, you know, a big, uh, you know, MBA program did this experiment where they had two different groups.
And the first group, they said, time is money. Go get an agreement. And they basically went and got an agreement. And I think it was like 50% of the time. They came out with an agreement. And to the second group, they said, tell each other something likable, find a piece of common ground that you have with the person you're negotiating with.
And then they found that that group were able to successfully negotiate like 92% of the time. And that agreement was worth like 17% more value, right? So it is this understanding. that actually collaboration is rich. It is more rich. This is the mythical pie myth buster in that if you can build relationships and keep having conversations and keep thinking about value and innovation, even if you don't negotiate it this time, you may [00:26:00] next time.
And that long term collaboration is what really does. Create more value in the long run, right? This sort of like, you know, we're going to be stubborn and intractable and get what we need that happens in really traumatic situations and you make it what you want then. But the ramifications of that can last years.
So the long term way to create more value is this sort of collaborative process, and that's incredibly nuanced, right? That doesn't mean you're rolling over. Collaboration is not consensus, you know, so it's understanding everybody's position, and that is again in this lead up conversations.
Ted Nelson: I mean, you touched on this earlier, Jessica, but realizing that so many musicians are thrown into these roles with zero experience and zero training, it lends itself to a lot of fear and reactive behavior.
Jessica Phillips: Of course. I
Aubrey Bergauer: like hearing you say that. That's of course, that's human nature. I don't know. Therefore, I, there's fear that would be true for any.[00:27:00]
Okay. This is why I love talking to you both so much. It's so elevated and we're talking about change management. Ted was talking about inspiration from the business world. Jessica's talking about social psychology, behavioral psychology, the science of negotiations. I mean, you're just, you're such smarty people.
I love it. And what you're saying just applies. We're not talking about specific issues. That's why it's elevated. It's talking about. These bigger, broader things. So I just so, so appreciate all of this. So, I mean, I'm hearing all of this. Yes. The fear makes sense. The reaction to fear makes sense, even though it can be very hindering and damaging.
It makes sense. Making the pie bigger. That makes a lot of sense. Collaboration. That doesn't mean rolling over. I mean, all these things like make sense, but how do we get there is the question. So how do we do the work to build trust, overcome these real challenges that we've mentioned and I'll start with an example.
I remember, Ted, you were telling me about how you did the firing line, I think it [00:28:00] was called. That was when, I think, you can correct me if I'm wrong, you told, not just the committee, but the whole orchestra, you know, during the break, I'll be in the break room and, you know, come ask questions or yell at me.
I remember you saying that and just whatever it was, like you made yourself available was the point. And I remember that because you really had to be comfortable. Putting yourself out there in that public way among all of your colleagues. And I also remember that because I did something similar back at the California symphony.
I remember you called it firing line. I called it updates with Aubrey, but just, Hey, open to anybody. I'm going to be around. I've got some updates trying to be transparent on the financials and where we were be available to answer questions. So two similar sort of approaches in my mind, but what else can we do?
What else is necessary to be laying this important groundwork?
Ted Nelson: I mean, I do think that that aspect of accountability and communication is absolutely fundamental. And the way in which we're doing it among the orchestra, [00:29:00] I think, because Jessica spoke earlier to the, the fact that they're often, there's a lack of transparency, even within an orchestra in terms of communication between the musician leadership and the general orchestra.
And so putting ourselves on the line and just giving people free reign to ask questions, I think it's probably a pretty rare thing for managers to do the same thing. I mean, something that I don't think I've ever heard of, although maybe this is what you were doing in California is actually. Having that type of communication happening with musicians and staff and management all in the same room.
Aubrey Bergauer: I just want to stop and say yes, that what you just said is better. So
Jessica Phillips: thank
Ted Nelson: you. I had a conversation with our CFO just the other day. He was actually arguing with me because I was saying that the function of the staff in an orchestra, the function of senior staff, someone like a CFO, it's like, we literally couldn't do our job without him doing his job.
It's not possible. Yes. And he was saying, yeah, but you're the core of the whole thing. And it's not a competition. We don't need to decide who's more important. We can look at the different types of impact that all of us can have in an organization and place value and importance on everyone's role. And the fact that [00:30:00] a lot of workshops have such high staff turnover, which is a completely separate issue.
Maybe that would change if we had these sort of organization wide relationships and we weren't siloed. I know that's a pet peeve of yours. It really comes down to that willingness to communicate openly and be accountable. You know, if you make a crappy decision, if you represent someone incorrectly, that's something that you have to take responsibility for.
And making sure that there are the structures in place to encourage that communication, making sure that you're actually willing to take part in it. Given all the response, I mean, all the obligations that a manager has, you know, to afford to the public who is invested in an orchestra, there are all these difficult relationships that need to be managed, but I think that at the heart of it is the willingness to actually open yourself up in all of those relationships.
Jessica Phillips: Absolutely. I think transparency is such a interesting word and concept. Like people want to know what's going on. And you know, this is something I still am grappling with. For example, something that I've been really impressed with our current committee is [00:31:00] that they will send out a survey, right? Because they absolutely understand that they need to get information from who they're representing.
And not everybody will fill out that survey. And I definitely have you know, been in that situation or like, why aren't people participating and things like that. And the way that this current committee handled it is, is by saying 50% of you filled out this survey. So in trying to make our decision, we assumed that the 50% of you that didn't fill out this survey were neutral.
And that is how we informed our decision. So of those 50%, 83% of you were okay with the Met allowing people to come into the front row. So we will now inform them that we are okay with that. And I thought that was an excellent way for people to understand the decision that was made while not shaming anybody, but also saying like, if you don't participate, your voice isn't going to be heard.
And you know, I thought that was terrific. So that's a [00:32:00] really great way to then just encourage diverse voices because We also did like the firing line. We were like, you know, Saturdays in the lounge and nobody would show up. And also I think what happened was that people were like, well, I don't want to serve on the committee if you're going to get yelled at all the time, like hell no.
So, you know, the Met is just a more complex place. So there's like so many more like reasons that we had. suffered a really big trauma, you know, 2014 when you are threatened with a lockout, it is a trauma. And when reconciliation doesn't really happen, then people are scared and they're scared to come forward within their own groups as well.
So when we think about this concept, I come back and back and back again to being willing to admit you're wrong. Right. Like, as Ted said, like, if you did it wrong, like, Oh, okay, great. I'm learning. You know, we're [00:33:00] all learning and each situation is different. So really connecting with your empathy, you know, um, being a third party equalizer, a peacekeeper, all of these things are really valuable tools within a collective bargaining unit of a hundred people, you know, and it's a little bit like herding cats, but all these people are incredibly smart and they may not all have the same access.
to the same information. And that is really difficult. So we can't always be fully transparent either. Like if we're in negotiations, we're not going to always tell you everything as a committee to an orchestra, because it's going to be in flux and it's going to change and things, you know, so then you really have to also ask for trust from your colleagues.
It's so easy for a group to get riled up. Right. And we use that for leverage. Like, no, absolutely not. I cannot accept this agreement. It will not get ratified. And that has worked for me. You know, absolutely. Like this will not get ratified. But also I think we need to balance that with this like [00:34:00] idea of practicing civility, really like calming people down, deescalating, like that doesn't sound right.
Let's go to the source. Like, you know, in some of these like interpersonal kinds of conversations where people can develop long term grudges. You know, and then they come out, they come out in negotiations. So it really is about that bridge building within your own community. And the transparency is really important.
And each committee has its own language. And, you know, there's always going to be 10 people who don't like what you do too. You also like need the orchestra to understand that like you represent the group as a whole. And not everybody's going to get their own way, right? Like you are bargaining on behalf of a collective group, and they're not always going to agree on everything.
And I guess I would also say we can't always, at four in the morning, when we are deprived of sleep after, you know, 10 days of straight negotiations, compute all the permutations of how we screwed up something, [00:35:00] right? So... We don't understand as musicians. We're not really taught that the contract is kind of a living, breathing document and grievances and arbitrations, things like that are ways to actually define the document.
They're not necessarily conflict, right? So conflict resolution, training for musicians, understanding conflict styles, assessing where people are at are so crucial because when grievances arise, As they should, you know, we can't always in a contract delineate every single thing that will happen or we'll screw up on the last contract negotiation and we got to fix it now.
Great. That's fine. Let's work it through. Let's do it. Those are the things that actually become issues in the next negotiation where you can create more value. Right? So all of these left leftover things aren't necessarily, they shouldn't be blamed, right? They should be like moving forward. And I think we just tend to like shut down and not get all [00:36:00] the information because we don't have some of these conflict skills as humans, right?
And it's hard to be humble. Like I'm right all the time. I tell my husband, but you know, apparently not.
Ted Nelson: Can I just say I feel like it's borderline miraculous that I mean, because Jessica pointed out the Met and Cincinnati Symphony are very different organizations with very different histories of labor relations and that Jessica that you and that I end up at such a similar place in terms of our values and our priorities and what we look to in the future.
I think that's really incredible.
Aubrey Bergauer: Okay, to underscore some of these things, Ted, you really talked a lot about breaking down the silos. And aside from my own, yes, personal soapbox and excitement over that issue, it's exciting to me because I've, I feel like I've learned and matured so much around this issue.
And yeah, I did it differently having, you know, making myself available to orchestra. Separate from making myself available to the staff, I think in many ways is because that's what I had learned and observed and [00:37:00] it's squarely in the category of why do we do it that way. And so, yeah, I just want to, like I said, reflect back that it's so important if I'm going to say, and I do say we're all on the same team.
Then we need to be in the same room, and I think the more I mean, it's true in negotiations. There are representatives of us in the same room, but I mean, way before we're ever at the table, right? So for these kinds of things, these conversations, information sharing. So I just want to underscore that. Yes, my thinking has also arrived there.
And then let's see. See, Jessica, you talked a lot about the training and education that needs to happen for our players and especially players in these leadership roles. We're going to come back to that. So put a pin in that. And then just this idea of like expectation setting is what I heard from you of the way your current committee said, we're going to assume half of you are neutral and like really they were setting the expectations so well is what that sounds like of okay and this is how we're interpreting that and this is what we're going to do and it's like okay now you have the information and you know how they're proceeding so i just think all of those things are [00:38:00] just very practical and actionable points so wanted to underscore all that But I want to know, what else can we do to help make the pie bigger?
You know, Jessica, you and I say that all the time. I'm now also going to use this analogy that Ted gave of like, it's like pushing on the rock from both sides. Maybe quickly, what can we do? I think, and I'm hoping also, I said we would come back to the most recent agreement in Cincinnati. So if Jessica, you could talk about some things that maybe successfully worked at the Met.
And then Ted, how did that play out in the recent contract? That would be helpful to give like some specific
Jessica Phillips: examples. I mean, in the actual, like, science of negotiation, when we think about, like, everybody coming to the table hopefully has a BATNA, right? Like, their best alternative to a negotiated agreement.
So when you know what that is, right, then you can start to figure out what's called the, the zone of possible agreement. And what that means is that you need to do your work in terms of costing the math. On whatever it is you're [00:39:00] looking for, and then in a way, it's sort of all math, like coming to the common denominator of the scent value of something, right?
Whether it's health care or whether it's time or whether it's a personal day, like, you know what that. Specific for lack of a better word, widget is if you come to the table that way, you are not positional. You're not like, this is my stake in the ground. You can pivot. And so that means that you have interest.
Like, we have an interest in this, but we may need to give that. And when you do that, and you give, and you understand the other side, they come with their own BATNA, then that often means that, you know, people can understand that you're willing to walk away from the table, but you're also going to get a better agreement.
You have this zone where you can, you know, kind of understand that no matter what, anything that you walk away from the table with will be better. And if you didn't, so I think that's the most like [00:40:00] cogent way that I could explain creating the value. An example of that is that in 2018, for example, we agreed not to be in the press.
That was an agreement we made with management because it was so destructive in 2014 that we agreed, let's not do that. So that's just a simple thing, but it also helped to create trust and everybody thought we would break it. You know, but we did it, we kept it private in the house and because it was in both of our best interests.
So we understood both of our interests in that agreement. Another thing was, um, we were just starting to think about creating value around this community engagement idea and space. And so we offered volunteer hours. For things like going to a Young Associates meet and greet, or doing a Google hangout with students, or just something simple, little touch points of impact, where people wanted to hear from musicians, they wanted to meet them, [00:41:00] they wanted a unique experience, and that was of value to The Met, and in exchange for offering those volunteer hours, right, you didn't have to do it, The Met did take a wage cut off the table, so, you know, it was a way that We created a lot of value.
Very easy for us. And the Met said, yeah, that is valuable to us. And we continue to have that relationship. Now, looking in from the outside, you might think, oh, you're just giving away free time. And, but what we knew is that most of the people we surveyed were absolutely willing to do it for free. They didn't want to really get paid for it.
So, you know, that was a way for them to bring value and bring loyalty to the Met and to feel valued by the Met. So that's kind of like one of the best. ways to create value, like the value, like for example of of healthcare, right? If is that it may be very inexpensive for the person or the musicians to give a little tiny bit on health care, but it's an extraordinary savings on the management side.
And so, you know, it might be that you might do something [00:42:00] like that. And we've seen right, Ted, we've seen that kind of incrementally come up where we've been willing to get little, little tiny ticks of something in health care. Might be, um, just like a weekly, whatever, paying for the healthcare premium. And it's an extraordinary savings on management side.
So like that is like a way to create a tremendous amount of value. I
Ted Nelson: mean, this idea of value, and I like to think about sort of institutional impact as opposed to looking at, I've been a part of negotiations where the musician's productivity was being questioned. And that's very much sort of a old school business mindset.
And it's fascinating because. I mean, there's that famous example of the, you know, the math problem. You know, if you have half the number of musicians playing Beethoven 9, how long does it take them? It takes the same amount of time. There's a limited amount of productivity and, and, you know, Jessica also spoke about the fact that, you know, what we do is essentially an athletic activity.
And especially over the course of a potentially, I mean, I could potentially have a 50 year career performing in orchestras [00:43:00] over the course of 50 years. It takes a toll. I mean, it's a, it's a demanding activity. So looking at the impact of increased productivity versus looking at the value of what we bring to the organization or the impact that we can have on the organization.
I think that's an important distinction to make. And when we look at the agreement that Cincinnati just, the agreement that we came to last year, um, a lot of the groundwork was laid a long time ago. Not everyone knows that we are a, we are not only the Cincinnati Symphony, we also are the pit orchestra for the opera and the ballet.
And so we have some rules in our contract that fall under, under terms that are more similar to a lot of opera contracts, not yours. Cause yours is just amazing. But in during the summers, when we have split activity between operas and other activities, we were working under a structure where we had a 20 hour work week rather than a service defined work week.
During the COVID year, there was a lot of discussion about the type of digital activity we'd be doing and what, how that could be scheduled effectively. And management argued that it couldn't be scheduled effectively under a service definition, and that they [00:44:00] needed something more flexible. So for that year, we agreed to this different definition, and we've now adopted it for this current contract, which is an example of a way that we can make a concession, and there are a lot of guardrails in place.
You know, they can't call us in for 40 half hour services in a week, but with the proper guardrails, there is some additional flexibility for pursuing different types of activity. Digital activity, tech intensive activity that requires sort of different rehearsal schedules. And also included in this contract was a sort of an initial attempt at a set of defining, uh, how we can effectively do small ensemble work as part of our work as the orchestra.
In the community. And that's, it's very much a work in progress. I mean, all contracts are living documents. They're changing all the time. And it's important to realize that. Um, I mean, this contract has generated a lot of excitement. It's generated a lot of excitement among managers, and it's generated a lot of fear among musicians.
And I think both sides are a little unjustified. And someone should actually come and talk to us about it. Because it's not a radically different thing. It's a [00:45:00] subtly different thing, but it is a way that everyone looked at the current structure we had and looked at how the musicians could provide more value to the organization, to the community without necessarily undermining our quality of life and our working conditions.
Thank you both
Aubrey Bergauer: for being specific. I think that's helpful to get. Put meat on the bones here. And I want to also say that you're talking about negotiating in different currencies. If I could say it in different words, that's what I would say is like, it's not always a dollar minute for minute or service for, you know, whatever these very finite things are.
And you're saying, no, we can trade this thing that's valuable. And that helps us all get more what we're trying to do. So I really appreciate that. Do you have other thoughts on how to bridge the relationship between staff and musical personnel? In
Jessica Phillips: the lead cohort, all my lead cohort besties will laugh because I was like, I just feel like we need more mixers, you know, um, but I do think that [00:46:00] there aren't enough places where staff admin and musicians can talk about what they have in common.
So whatever that touch point is, if it's. Town hall meetings or something like that. And often there's so much turnover, um, on the admin. So then like we kind of go, Ugh, another person who was disgruntled and left, you know, we make all these assumptions. So it's like more of those touch points I think would be great.
Doesn't have to be a mixer, but that's what I prefer. Yeah.
Ted Nelson: I'll say that a really fascinating experience for me was fairly early in my time on the committee, we were doing a strategic planning process. And I ended up sitting at a table with the board president of the CSO and the opportunity to talk about the values and priorities of the organization in an informal way with another leader, you know, in a different silo was really incredible.
And so that type of opportunity, I think, as well as, I mean, purely socially, yeah, obviously, I mean, getting to know people as people is so vital, but getting to communicate across boundary [00:47:00] lines so that we're not. Assuming that there are boundaries there that aren't there and that we do have shared priorities.
I think that's essential.
Aubrey Bergauer: Yeah. Okay. I just got to say, I keep wanting to like reflect these things back because you're assuming boundaries, assuming a narrative of somebody who was disgruntled and left and you're both saying like, again, I'm putting it in different words, but you know, Brene Brown, throw another.
name out there we all love. Like she always talks about the story we tell ourselves. And so that's kind of what you're both are saying. Like if there's not information sharing, then we write stories. And again, it's human nature. So better relationships, more information sharing helps mitigate the stories we tell ourselves.
Given all the emphasis on innovation and working towards new things, how should musicians and management approach digital streaming? Ted, you spoke a little bit about that, but anything else either of you want to offer?
Ted Nelson: This is a really hard one to summarize, and so I'm not going to try to characterize any of the AFM agreements, which are many and detailed and very carefully worked out.
I'll let Jessica talk about the Met because what streaming means to them is [00:48:00] something completely different than what it means to many of the rest of us. Every orchestra is different. I think we are probably approaching a time when our digital work is just going to be part of our work. There's sort of this historical attempt to delineate the two and make sure that we were being compensated properly and getting royalties for everything, which I absolutely respect.
And I think, especially when we look at the history of the recording industry and the revenue that was produced historically. That concern is valid and it makes, it makes a ton of sense, but I think that we're probably reaching a point where that distinction makes less sense and the ability of an organization to engage the musicians and the staff and the production of digital product has to be seen as one of the core activities of the organization rather than as a one size fits all approach.
Something that's added on and represents an added expense.
Jessica Phillips: I would say the Met is very different. We're an organization that went differently like Philadelphia and brought that in house. So we have the HD [00:49:00] and many, many nuanced feelings that I have about that later insert. Um, I, I would say that this is really how Aubrey and I first started talking was about a desire to have an open conversation with all kind of parties involved in the digital space, the digital, you know, music space where we could talk without fear of those conversations coming back at us at the negotiating table where we could kind of create like an innovative think tank, right?
I just wanna give a huge shout out though, to a f m and Rochelle Skolnik, who heads up the s s d at, at, at, um, the symphonic services division, who did do a lot of really creative things with digital broadcasting, which helped musicians get paid during the pandemic. So like, they were absolutely crucial. I also wanna say just one quick plug for a f m in that Rochelle will also come and onboard any [00:50:00] new committee.
So all you need to do is go to AFM and say, Hey, we have a really new inexperienced committee. Can you please come and talk to us about all these issues? Because there is onboarding that should happen. Absolutely. Duty of fair representation. Absolutely. Wine garden rights. Absolutely. Everybody needs to know they have a right to have a committee member in the room.
Every committee member needs to know what to do with the complaint and how to investigate it. And those are nuanced things. So for example, no one should complain to a committee. The committee should not go into the management office and tell them that complaint. And then management calls in the person and they get a disciplinary hearing without the committee telling them first.
Right. And those are things that can happen. And it's just a simple thing, but AFM will come and absolutely on board. And should. And I think we forget that. We forget that. And I think that goes into this next question of like, you know, union and do the interests usually align? And I would say broadly, yes, they do align.
And the union's job is to make sure [00:51:00] Full transparency. I'm on the executive board of local 802. And so as a executive board member of local 802, I see how thoughtfully we go, okay, what is the committee saying? What are their needs, right? We are legally obligated to bargain on behalf, right? We hold the bargaining rights of contracts, but we are empowering the committees to give us this information, right?
So there has to be a relationship between the union and the committee and the committee chair. And if that's at risk. That's going to be where difficulties arise. So those values do need to align and they absolutely can. There may be situations in which, you know, something that the orchestra wants to do is problematic for other musicians, and that's where the union may.
But heads with you where they go, Well, we need to protect all the rest of the musicians across the country from from this decision, sparking off fear. And that brings me back to digital right where it's like, Okay, well, then let's create a space where we can talk about what we might [00:52:00] lose, but also what we might innovate and gain in a space that's not a negotiation space.
Thank you
Aubrey Bergauer: for being just thoughtful and balanced and tackling those couple of questions there. Have you all thought about or discussed changes to get away from individually negotiated title contracts?
Jessica Phillips: Are you talking about equity over scale, right? And the fact that the committee is only bargaining on behalf of like the base wage and a lot of principal players will go in and ask.
for an overscale race. It often shows up in orchestra 990s and everybody I knew and I grew up, we were going to guide star and seeing, you know, who's winning the, the, the overscale race, the oboist or, you know, the clarinetist and all of these things, you know, the trumpet player, who's getting valued the most.
And I have a lot to say about that in terms of gender pay equity, racial equity, things like that. Um, suffice it to say, as the daughter of an employment lawyer, and I am not a lawyer, so I'm not giving you any advice, but [00:53:00] I just think there should be objective criteria, even when it's subjective. So like, as an artist, how are we valuing you as an artist?
There should be objective criteria upon which we are evaluating something subjectively. And as long as that's happening and it's thoughtful, you know, then we should be valuing our players. I could go on and on and on. It's a little bit more complicated than MET because we have co principals. So, uh, Ted, I'll let you.
I've thought
Ted Nelson: about this a lot. As someone who has spent most of my career as a section string player, um, I had a title when I was in Kansas City, but neither of my other two jobs. And someone who has done a lot of committee work. Arguably. Has a lot of value to the organization. I can say that I think that there's the potential for musicians to have tremendous impacts in orchestra without playing a solo ever.
And I think that essentially the way that we look at individual contracts is who plays the most solos. And we'll pay them the most and also who's winning auditions in other places. And so I think that while [00:54:00] it's important to recognize the value of individuals, there's a whole chapter in work rules about that, you know, pay unfairly, you need to recognize your stars and you need to recognize the impact that a truly outstanding individual can have on an organization.
I think that it's also important to look at all the ways. In which an individual can have an impact on the organization. I have issues with the way that things are structured
Jessica Phillips: right now, for sure. I would also add exactly like what Ted is saying is that it also creates a lot of divisiveness within the orchestra.
And, you know, I am a person who like would rather lift everybody up, you know, lift the base wage up rather than the management constantly throw money at people who want to leave. And so it's like, well, then the message is, you know, there's money there and you don't want this person to leave to go to LA Philharmonic, but you're just going to throw some money at them and hope that they'll stay, but then not bring that money back into like the rest of the people who are there and who are doing the [00:55:00] work all the time and who are going in day in and day out and who are loyal and good citizens to the orchestra, right?
You know, so like we're valuing people who just want to jump ship and use that as leverage. And it's like, I really, really.
Ted Nelson: I'm going to toss a little bomb in just, and we don't need to talk about this at all, but I think it's incredible to think about the fact that essentially the only opportunity for professional advancement for most orchestra musicians is to jump ship.
There is so little opportunity for musicians to advance within an orchestra. And I think that we need to, as an industry, look at how we can create opportunities for growth and advancement for people who are loyal and who do want to stay with a certain orchestra who don't want to leave and want to have other opportunities for growth.
Aubrey Bergauer: Right. This is talking true for staff too. I think we're Works for musicians, but often you have to, you get a jump ship.
Jessica Phillips: Yeah. If we think about other industries, like Ted mentioned earlier, and we think about professional development and like lawyers are constantly have to kind of like re get educated, right.
Um, or even just like having a yoga person [00:56:00] in house, who's offering like health and wellness aspects for everybody. You know, those are ways to like use your money and create a line item in your budget, right? Like. You need to have E. D. I. In your budget, right? It has to be line out. We've all kind of learned that if we haven't learned that.
Oh, my God. You know, but, um, also, I would say that there needs to be a line item in the budget for health and wellness, right? Like, how do we think about value our people? We need to think about what we do. And then I'm really gonna bust it open. But Aubrey's gonna love me. We need to have a line item in our budget for data, right?
Like who is doing evaluations? What are we doing with the metrics? And then we could all just Spread it around and use it in marketing and fundraising and all this stuff. But that would be transparent. Right? Like we, but we need like to have a line item in our budget about data. Data. You both, you
Aubrey Bergauer: are thoughtful.
You are forward thinking you're so intelligent and I'm just so grateful. We were able to have you [00:57:00] share all of your thoughts with so many more people. Not all of your thoughts. This is why we need part two, three, four, five of this.
Jessica Phillips: Thank you. Thank you, everyone.
Aubrey Bergauer: Hey, Offstagers. One of the top things I hear from individuals all over, something people are increasingly wanting, is people who say, I want more connection with like minded colleagues.
If that resonates... I created a new community, and you're invited to join. It's an online gathering place for arts and culture professionals wanting a different, stronger paradigm for the industry. It's a place for those not satisfied with the status quo for arts and culture, who believe there is a better way forward, and that the future of the field doesn't have to be all doom and gloom.
It's a place of people trying to navigate the ins and outs of careers in the arts, and want smart, growth mindset type people alongside them. It's a place called the Changing the Narrative Community. I'm so excited by the folks who've already joined. And no matter your artistic discipline, geographic [00:58:00] location, role, or years in the field, you are welcome and invited as well.
Visit aubreybergauer. com slash community. The narrative is changing. And I hope to see you there soon. That's all for today, folks. Thanks so much for listening and keep up with more content like this by following me on LinkedIn or Instagram at Aubrey Bergauer, definitely hit that follow button to subscribe to this podcast.
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The narrative is changing for arts and culture, and I'm so glad you're here to be a part of it. This is a production of Changing the [00:59:00] Narrative.