ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — Noting internal turmoil and high turnover, an audit of operations at the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts shows big changes are needed to help keep employees and protect the $500 million investment.
The report notes though the Center is a “place the public and customers love to be, it’s not necessarily a place where people like to work.”
The report states “internal turmoil and strife is an obvious threat to the long term sustainability of the organization,” and “may threaten its ultimate long term success when the luster of the new bright shiny community object wears off.”
CEO Kathy Ramsberger could not fit investigative reporter Karla Ray into her schedule to talk about the report, but told us in a statement by email she "commissioned the consultant in May to do a strategic review of our operational structure. Our team has been working for months on plans to effectively integrate Phase I and Phase II and to identify the resources needed. As we transition out of the start-up phase, I want to be sure we are adequately prepared and have an optimal business model for years to come."
Ramsberger is hailed as “smart, relentless, and a visionary for this project” in the report, but she’s also described as “headstrong” with a “control-and-command micro-management style.”
The consultant from Strategic Leadership Collaborative wrote about “high senior management turnover.” 9 Investigates reported in January 2015 that five vice presidents within the organization abruptly left. The report suggests that turnover may also be attributed to an “initial poor selection.”
The Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts is adding an Executive Vice President of Operations, who will report directly to Ramsberger. In email, she told Eyewitness News that person will integrate departments and report directly to her, to allow her to focus on fundraising, programming, sales and marketing.
The consultant noted the Center ‘must get its current house in order while preparing to literally build another one,’ referring to Phase II and the addition of Steinmetz Hall.
“We are running this arts center as a business, which has allowed us to accomplish much more in our first two years, delivering quality programming, revenue growth and increasing audiences. The report calls this a ‘critical juncture’ in our life, and that’s exactly why I commissioned it in the first place. We are simultaneously running an extremely active arts center and building an expansive new performance hall and attaching it to something that already exists, which is a significant undertaking. We want to examine everything and give our team the tools to succeed. We anticipate the good and the bad and look at it all as constructive. We want to be the best that we can be, and these studies are vital steps in our process,” Ramsberger said in a statement.
Cox Media Group
