ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
CultureThrive helps organizations flourish.
Whether it is diagnosing current challenges and charting a path for the future, supporting advancement in a single realm of your work, or undergoing a comprehensive planning process with you, CultureThrive helps organizations flourish.
Denise Montgomery's background leading and managing organizations means that she brings firsthand experience in what it takes to move organizations forward. She is innovative, collaborative, and strategic.
A proven success in refining; advancing; and reinventing organizations; we can work with you to affect meaningful change and make real progress toward your mission.
“Denise Montgomery was the best boss I ever had. She brought intelligent and thoughtful leadership to our agency, and her example inspired us to do our best work.”
—John Grant, former Director of Public Art, Denver Office of Cultural Affairs
Examples of organizational development work:
Revitalization of the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs
Overview
When Denise Montgomery was appointed to serve as the Director of Denver Office of Cultural Affairs in 2003, the office was an underperforming agency of city government that was not viewed as particularly relevant by many in the arts and culture community. She had a mandate to improve the agency’s effectiveness in the context of limited resources as the City was $70 million in debt. To inform her approach as a new director and as a foundation for the strategic planning process, Denise conducted an assessment of the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs’ policies and programs, researched best practices and new thinking in the field of arts and culture programs and policy, secured community input, wrote and published a comprehensive strategic plan, and initiated implementation of the plan.
Linking the strategic plan to the City of Denver mayoral administration’s five core goals was integral to the plan’s success. Denise designed a process to secure input from a range of stakeholders, which was important to the agency and City leadership and resulted in valuable contributions.
With a broad range of possible directions and activities, it was essential to stay focused on the overarching goals while thoroughly researching, identifying, and prioritizing possibilities. Denise was able to strike a balance of innovation and new initiatives that energized the agency and resulted in heightened community engagement while operating within the context of the office’s budget and staff resources. She also strategically grew the agency’s funding and staff.
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Innovation based on trends in the field of arts and culture policy:
Denise significantly advanced creative economy development in Denver through policy, programs, and technical assistance by being the first in the United States to embed an Economic Development Specialist position within a municipal arts agency. This idea was the result of strategically identifying how to strengthen the commercial arts elements of Denver’s arts ecosystem based on research into creative economies and activities in both United States cities and international cities. The resulting signature program, Create Denver, is a multi-faceted program that has generated substantial positive change in the community and is frequently cited as a national model.
Outcomes
The resulting programs and initiatives from the strategic plan have been highly successful, engaging hundreds of thousands of community members and establishing the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs as a model municipal arts agency.
During Denise's tenure at the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs, the research firm and think tank RAND ranked DOCA as one of the most effective city arts agencies in the United States (sharing top ranking with the City of Chicago’s Cultural Affairs Department), as published in their report Arts and Culture in the Metropolis: Strategies for Sustainability. This independent ranking as part of a major research study was strong validation of the quality of Denise's work and accomplishments at DOCA.
Citywide surveys have documented that Denver residents view the city as having increased cultural vitality and believe that there are more opportunities to experience arts and culture.
The strategic plan served as the agency’s guiding document for years to follow, and the majority of programs and policies that came from the plan remain in place today.
Recreating Colorado’s Statewide Arts Advocacy Organization
into a Sustainable, Effective Organization
Overview
The Colorado Arts Consortium was a struggling statewide arts advocacy organization with unstable finances and weak participation by cultural organizations and arts advocates. Denise worked closely with Anthony Radich, Director of WESTAF, to re-envision a sustainable statewide arts advocacy organization and to ultimately launch the new organization, Arts for Colorado.
Denise collaborated with arts advocates to plan Arts for Colorado from its inception. She focused on building statewide support for the emerging group through meetings with arts and culture leaders and supporters, elected officials, and lobbyists. She also managed the transition to the new 501c4 organization, recruited board members, developed advocacy strategy, and established organizational communications and operations.
Outcomes
For two decades Arts for Colorado played a critical role in helping to reinstate funding to Colorado’s state arts agency’s budget as well as securing incremental funding for the agency. Arts for Colorado employed the services of a respected lobbyist, proactively cultivated support for the arts, and maintained year-round communication with arts advocates with a primary focus on preserving and expanding public support for the arts.
Assessment and Redesign/Refinement of Colorado Business Committee for the Arts’ Programs and Policies
Overview
Colorado Business Committee for the Arts (CBCA) was a well-functioning organization with a commitment to excellence and a desire to consider new possibilities. This work occurred during an economic downturn, which also necessitated some changes in programmatic offerings.
Denise conducted a thorough assessment of CBCA’s programs and made a series of programming recommendations focused on meeting identified needs while eliminating less effective offerings.
CBCA then launched a number of new programs that have effectively served the organization’s mission, its constituents, and the community. Strategic partnerships were one component of this work, and CBCA forged a partnership with the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce, collaborating to advance cultural development of the metropolitan Denver area.
Denise collaborated with the Colorado Council on the Arts to create two public art information tools: an award-winning website, www.coloradopublicart.org, with public art policy and process information and resources, and a related brochure, Growing Public Art in Colorado.
In tandem with the assessment of CBCA’s programs—and in some cases driven by the programmatic work—Denise analyzed the organization’s policies. Through her research and recommendations, CBCA strengthened its organizational structure and processes via the adoption of a number of policies.
Outcomes
The programmatic changes resulted in a higher level of engagement among member companies, board members, and the business and arts communities. Membership revenue grew 38%, and CBCA reached thousands more community members with information and programs.
The new and refined policies created a smoother operating environment for the organization and generated efficiencies by establishing clear policies.
These programmatic and policy initiatives formed the cornerstone CBCA’s evolution as a thriving, respected arts service organization. Related to this work, Denise strengthened CBCA’s finances during her tenure, growing cash reserves and overall revenues.