So far, we’ve talked about really theater-y things–mainly who is going to be part of your company and what skills do they bring to the table? It would be easiest to next talk about aesthetic issues: theater spaces, design choices, play choices, and so on–the things that will go into the “empty space.” And believe me, it’s tempting to take that step, because we’d still be in the comfort zone of theater people.
But that would be a cop-out.
Because the most important thing that needs to be talked about is how your company is going to make and spend money. And that’s what a lot of theater people prefer not to think about. We just get excited about doing a show and believe that, if the show is just good enough, well, people will flock to it and we’ll make money. Talk about a “faith-based” approach!
No, if you’re going to create a company that will allow you to focus as much of your life as possible on creating theater, then before you even start thinking about plays and rehearsals and all that you need to be doing a LOT of planning. Not brainstorming; planning. And that means learning a new vocabulary.
I promise that, once you learn this new vocabulary, you’ll start to have very exciting conversations about strategies and productions and tactics and audiences and… But it won’t just be pie-in-the-sky stuff–it will have a chance of actually succeeding.
There are two books I think should be a starting point. One is Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers by Alexander Osterwalder, and the other is The Startup Owner’s Manual: The Step-By-Step Guide for Building a Great Company by Steve Blank and Bob Dorf. The first one you should buy as a paperback (it uses a lot of drawings), the second you can buy as an ebook of you want. We’ll be focusing on Business Model Generation first.
There are a lot of great online resources that go with this book (and the sequels). Do a search on Strategyzer (the company that grew out of the book) or “business model canvas.” There are YouTube videos and online courses that can help. But the concepts aren’t that hard, really. So to get us going, Steve Blank does a nice overview of the Business Model Canvas (yes, the two books work together). As you watch, consider how each box in the business model canvas would be filled in for a traditional theater production (we’ll be playing with each box later). I invite you to start asking questions of brainstorming in the comment box below, or by tweeting me at Twitter (@OldDramaProf) or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/walt828/. (Sidenote: do any of you think it would be a good idea to have a FB group of Discord group where you could ask questions and talk to each other?) Here’s the video:
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