Leadership Journeys: LSU Museum of Art’s Sarah Cortell Vandersypen Says Nonprofits Must Blend Mission and Business For Success
An outreach program in high school from an art museum showed Sarah Cortell Vandersypen some of the career possibilities that were available in art museums, and she was hooked. “There’s not only the curator, but marketers, educators, fundraisers — it’s a really complex system that everyone works together in to create something amazing for the public,” she says.Vandersypen has worked in cultural institutions across the East Coast and Midwest, as well as London, before marriage brought her to Baton Rouge, where she works as the associate director of development for the LSU Museum of Art.Vandersypen hit the ground running when she started there in July 2014. A few months later, the director announced she was leaving, just at the beginning of a major campaign; in May 2015, the curator left. “Within a few months of starting, I lost the operational and artistic visions for the museum,” she says. “That’s really difficult when you’re trying to fundraise.”The museum brought in guest curators who work on individual galleries for permanent displays. On the operational side, the organization took a group approach to getting things done, and used the museum’s renewed focus as the largest comprehensive collection of Louisiana art in the state to inspire donors and the philanthropic community. “It became apparent to me that a single organization is bigger than one person,” she says. “It’s about harnessing everyone’s contributions to make a community impact.”
Embrace Community Service
That idea of serving the community is key to Vandersypen’s approach, which mirror’s Robert Greenleaf’s idea of servant leadership. “It works around the idea that if you’re people-centric and care about creating a just world, you can create a really wonderful organization,” she says. It’s a view she’s gotten from mentors in her past as well, as they shared wisdom and guided her to become a leader herself.“I take that with me by serving on the local fundraising professional chapter, and also taking on interns,” she says. “I can give them meaningful work, and it frees me up for other tasks. It helps create that next generation of nonprofit professionals who can think about the work we do in a different way.”
Don’t Fear the Business Side
Vandersypen says that the mission is important, but that the business side is important as well — an approach that some nonprofit leaders lack. “Many don’t approach it with a business attitude,” she says. “They lack program evaluation and fundraising, the foundation that helps a nonprofit operate at a high level. If you lack that knowledge, it’s hard to build an organization in a way that creates the greatest impact in relation to your mission.”She says she sees that changing, however, with the rise of academic programs for nonprofit management, continuing education and leadership programs. “If you don’t have that baseline, you can’t create a robust, functioning organization that frees you to do the mission-related work and have a bigger impact. But there’s a desire to learn these skills so they can do a better job for the organization.”Looking for ways to build leaders at your organization? Contact us to learn about our leadership development and coaching offerings.Success Labs is a leadership development and management consulting firm in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. For more than 25 years, our expert team of consultants has worked with hundreds of companies to explore their business potential and improve their company and cultural performance. Contact us to get proactive about your people strategy
