Rowman & Littlefield Publishers / American Alliance Of Museums
Pages: 162
Trim: 6¼ x 9¼
978-1-5381-3832-8 • Hardback • April 2023 • $85.00 • (£65.00)
978-1-5381-3833-5 • Paperback • March 2023 • $36.00 • (£30.00)
978-1-5381-3834-2 • eBook • March 2023 • $34.00 • (£25.00)
Brian Alexander has worked in museums for over forty years. Among other positions he has been the president & CEO of the National World War I Museum, president & CEO of the Historic Annapolis Foundation, executive vice-president & director of the Shelburne Museum and director of the museum program for the State Historical Society of North Dakota. Currently he is visiting professor of museum administration at the Cooperstown Graduate Program of the State University of New York.
Chapter 1: Understanding Museum Finance
Chapter 2: Surveying Triumphs and Challenges
Chapter 3: Blending Money and Mission
Chapter 4: Diversifying with Care
Chapter 5: Expanding When Ready
Chapter 6: Taking Care of Business
Chapter 7: Making Finance Everyone’s Job
Chapter 8: Moving Forward
About the Author
This book is a must-read not just for every museum director but for every employee. Through excellent case examples, Brian Alexander brilliantly captures the range of financial challenges facing both paid and volunteer leadership of our most treasured institutions and outlines the risks and returns of steps to tackle them. It is one of the most relatable books I have ever read when it comes to museum leadership. It should be required reading for boards and executive leaders.
— James E. Donahue, president and CEO, Old Sturbridge Village/Old Sturbridge Academy/Coggeshall Farm Museum
Brian Alexander’s invaluable book is a must read for anyone responsible for constructing budgets, managing finances, or planning for a museum’s future--in other words every member of a museum's professional staff. Offering both cautionary tales and entrepreneurial successes, it illuminates financial pitfalls to avoid, as well as offering positive ways that museums have overcome financial challenges to successfully blend money and mission and sustain healthy institutions.
— Gretchen Sullivan Sorin, director and distinguished professor, Cooperstown Graduate Program/SUNY Oneonta