About the PWG Team
The Palmer Westport Group focuses on strengthening and developing the fundraising and leadership capacity of theatres around the U.S. We have assisted historic theatres and other performing arts venues, arts councils, arts service organizations across the country with fundraising feasibility studies, capital campaigns, annual operating campaigns, solicitor training, strategic planning, board development and retreats, organizational assessments, business plans, master plans, and leadership development.
Instilling residual strength into client arts organizations
During consultancies, we work strategically to enhance the knowledge and skills of organizations’ staff, board, and other key leaders to strengthen the ongoing planning and fundraising capacity. We believe that successful outcomes also require a successful partnership between client and counsel. We form enduring partnerships with our clients, which has often led to subsequent engagements as the organizations we have served build on their successes and prepare for new phases of growth.
The Value is in the Planning
We specialize in guiding planning efforts that:
- Energize those involved – staff, volunteers, communities, downtowns, and regions
- Give confidence and experience to new generations of leaders
- Elevate a community’s sense of what it is capable of accomplishing.
We are best known for an integrated approach to that uses the planning process itself, whether it be strategic planning, business planning, or master planning to fully engage supporters and volunteers in a systematic process that results in enduring, committed relationships
More than raising money
Our approach is holistic and intuitive, logical and analytic – and grounded in the belief that successful fundraising requires the development of authentic relationships. We help our clients build and manage these relationships with a methodology that envisions the whole process in a systematic, sequential way.
Although we approach our work systematically, our product is custom designed to the unique circumstances of each project and organization. Planning efforts are based on the realities of your community. Fundraising campaigns are structured based on characteristics and capacity of your constituency.
Leadership Mentoring
Capital Campaigns for historic theatre restorations often demand the most substantial fundraising effort ever undertaken in the community. Overall need is often greater than any previous community campaign, and potential asks will likely be much larger than many donors have previously given. Confidence in the organizational leadership becomes one of the most crucial factors in determining success or failure of a campaign of this magnitude.
The “face” of the organization must evoke assured, mature confidence in his or her every step. The Palmer Westport Group will work one-on-one to develop leadership perspective, judgment, habits, and presence, such as that which is required to inspire confidence in your staff, constituents and the community you serve.
Unique, hands-on experience
While the Palmer Westport Group works with a wide range of non-profit arts organizations, we have an unusual range of experience and extensive expertise in addressing the needs of projects to revive once-abandoned, or long-neglected, theatre facilities; the type of project and facility that typically has little or no staff, but is driven by a dedicated group of volunteers with a commitment to restoring an historic structure to its once-held position at the center of community life.