New Course in Leadership in the Arts Prepares Students for Successful Creative Careers

Conwell Worthington, MBA ’16 wants Bentley students to know they don’t have to choose between making art and making a living.

A lecturer in Management with more than 20 years’ experience in theater production, Worthington acknowledges the starving artist cliche exists for a reason. Achieving and sustaining success in the creative arts industry is notoriously challenging: Just 20% of all Broadway shows break even, only 11% of independent musicians earn a living solely from their music and most professional ballet dancers retire by age 35.

But Worthington believes Bentley students are “uniquely qualified” to thrive in the arts world. “The industry sorely needs people with business acumen,” he explains, noting there are many administrative or ‘backstage’ roles — such as producers, general managers and artistic directors — that require expertise in financial management, marketing and strategic planning. “Most people in these positions don’t have a strong business background,” he says. “There’s a huge opportunity here for Bentley students to carve out a niche for themselves.” 

Bridging the Gap Between Creativity and Commerce

Worthington speaks from personal experience. After 15 years working as a stage manager, touring nationally with acclaimed Broadway shows like The Lion King and Book of Mormon and running performances as often as six days a week, he was looking for a change. “I wanted something more stable, ideally on the administrative side of theater, but I didn’t know what that was, exactly,” he shares. Aware of the business responsibilities associated with higher-level theater management, he enrolled in Bentley’s MBA program.

“I knew I needed to learn more about things like budgeting and finance,” Worthington explains, “but the program offered so much more.” Alongside required courses in managerial statistics, micro- and macroeconomics and financial reporting, he studied consumer behavior, stakeholder management and ethical and responsible leadership.  

This holistic approach to operations management gave Worthington a competitive edge, he says. After completing his MBA, he began getting calls from employers about jobs that, when he’d applied to them previously, had led to dead ends. Soon after graduating, he was hired as associate general manager of the acclaimed Huntington Theatre Company in Boston. 

Managing, Marketing and Monetizing the Arts

Recognizing that the next generation of business students could benefit from his real-world experiences, Worthington returned to academia (and his alma mater) in 2019, as a lecturer in both Marketing and Management. This fall, he debuted a new course — Leadership in the Arts (MG 299) — that encourages Bentley students to explore the arts through a business lens.

“My goal was to provide an understanding of the overarching business models and operational strategies within specific creative fields,” such as theater, film, music, dance, visual arts and fashion design, he explains. Throughout the semester, students examined the challenges and opportunities associated with each discipline. They also learned how to engage in entrepreneurial activities to create and fund projects, develop and implement marketing plans to attract new audiences and effectively manage diverse workforces.  

Students also delved deeply into current events. In one notable example involving union-mediated labor disputes, Worthington separated the class into three groups to represent the concerns of producers, actors and writers during a formal debate. And he invited industry experts into the classroom to share their perspectives about topics ranging from the economic setbacks of COVID-19 to intellectual property rights in the age of AI. 

Transforming Passion into a Profession  

For many of Worthington’s students, the course was a revelation. “I’ve always had a deep appreciation for the arts and have done theater my entire life,” says Ashley Daigle ’25, an Accounting major with minors in Computer Information Systems and Earth, Environment and Global Sustainability. “But having grown up with not a lot, my primary goal coming into college was to a find a career that was financially stable — and the arts industry has always had a stigma of being underpaid.”  

Before taking Worthington’s course, Daigle was content to channel her passion for performing through extracurricular activities, including Off the Clock, Bentley’s competitive a cappella group, and APO (Arts & Performance Organization, established in 1976 and formerly known as Alpha Psi Omega). But what she learned through Leadership in the Arts has shifted her perspective.  

“Without the businesspeople behind the scenes, your favorite Broadway shows, museums and even movies wouldn’t exist,” Daigle explains. “That creates a kind of job security for business students like me, who are passionate about the arts and capable of finding ways to keep them alive and profitable.” Now, she shares, “my long-term goal is to work on the business side of the house, either in film or on Broadway.”

Mama Darboe ’26, agrees that coupling creative vision with business savvy is a recipe for career success. “There are so many skills that artists have that are underrated,” says the Management major, who aspires to a career in fashion. “Being able to pivot, innovate and think outside the box are all qualities that creative minds have — and skills that benefit business leaders, too.”  

“Simply put, you cannot have business without art, much like you can’t have art without business,” says Lily Glewan ’27, a Film and Media Studies major with a Psychology minor. She chose Bentley instead of a traditional liberal arts university because “art majors who come here already have a leg up from their peers. We’re seeing new and exciting courses being offered that allow students to tap into their creativity a bit more, in conjunction with their business education, to solve complex problems.

“The knowledge I’ve gained from Leadership in the Arts is truly invaluable,” continues Glewan, who plans a career in the film industry as a post-production editor. She’s thrilled to note that Worthington’s course has become a permanent offering and will run again next spring. “There’s so more to business than just crunching numbers,” she says. “Classes like these ensure that future arts leaders can develop the skillsets they need to break barriers in this industry.”