ZITA V.: Dear Tamsin, introduce yourself to our readers.
Tell us, what was your path, how did you discover this position, the realisation of your potential through such activities?
T.M.: I’m Tamsin Mendelsohn and I support artists and entrepreneurs to make leaps in their creative direction and careers. My path started as a musician trying to establish a career after completing my music degree at Edinburgh University in 1997. I just knew that I didn’t want to become a school music teacher – probably rebelling against my Mum! I’d done a module in Community Music as part of my degree and was really interested in how music could make a difference to people’s lives. But I had no clear plan and didn’t know how to make a living. So I had to experiment!
By following my inspiration, the first part of my career did involve some fantastic experiences.
I was part of a small team re-establishing the charity Drake Music Scotland https://drakemusicscotland.org/ creating opportunities for disabled people and musicians. It was hard work, travelling with instruments, music samplers and assistive technology, giving workshops in schools and community centres, training musicians and raising funds.
As a student, I had an unusual opportunity to travel to Bosnia on two occasions after the war ended in 1995, to work with children in primary schools, led and pioneered by the composer Nigel Osborne. He then invited me to join an international team with https://www.warchild.net/history/ as part of a post-conflict project in Albania and Kosovo, creating music, art and drama workshops with refugees and returning children and families.
After this incredible year, I completed a diploma in Music Therapy at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and worked as a music therapist for the charity https://www.nordoff-robbins.org.uk/ …and then I BURNED OUT!!
The peripatetic work and travel was exhausting. I was stressed, and the passion had gone. In hindsight, I could have benefited from guidance on how to balance my career at that time and take a break.
But while I searched for direction, I went to lots of music gigs in Edinburgh – mostly jazz – a new found interest. This paid off, because when a role came up at https://www.creativescotland.com/ (formerly Scottish Arts Council), I was amazed to get the job. I learned how to assess grant applications, analyse business plans and devise strategies for the music sector in Scotland. I loved it and stayed for 10 years until I moved with my family, working at Arts Council England https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/ focusing on music education.
Remember my love of jazz?! Well, I had wanted to work in the live music sector for a while, and when a role came up at Jazz South https://jazzsouth.org.uk/ I was excited to be appointed Manager with the task of pulling together all of my skills in strategy and business to launch a programme across the south of England. The coronavirus pandemic forced us to change plans, and I ended up producing new music commissions giving artists funding and focus during this time.
At the end of the project, I decided to mentor musicians to navigate the industry and funding opportunities. However, once I started, I noticed that the career problems that artists brought along seemed to really be about confidence, lack of self-belief, and unhelpful ideas that limited the opportunities they would go for or create.
So I trained as a person-centred, transformational coach to enable me to work more deeply. Because coaching can support anyone, (in theory, I could coach a NASA scientist!) I realised that I could work more widely with other kinds of artists and creatives.
Being a coach excites me, because it brings together everything in my career experience so far and all the aspects of me too. Although I didn’t become a professional musician, I have kept up my music learning, developed skills in vocal improvisation, and I love bringing this intuitive, creative side to working with clients, and growing my coaching business.
ZITA V.: With you, we open a new section of our magazine, Art & Business. These seem to be incompatible things. But looking broadly, are there incompatible things in the world? After all, the very holistic nature of the world allows us to realise that everything is connected, that the presence of connection is very important in everything, and this is a fundamental thing in order to realise and open up one’s internal resources, universal coexistence and harmony. But what really causes us that attitude of contradiction?
T.M.: On a practical level, the connection between art and business is still not something that many student artists are taught when they train at university or college. If there are optional modules, students may not participate because they are focusing on developing their creative skills, finding collaborators and first opportunities. Then it becomes hard to find information and implement good habits to run as a business. If artists are self-taught, then they also have to search for guidance. The emerging artists I’ve worked with often struggle because they are trying to get established and make income from different jobs. They don’t have clear step-by-step goals or any knowledge of how to budget projects, set aside money for tax and insurance, let alone have a longer term business plan for themselves.
Then, there is the huge culture of beliefs that are typically shared by artists and creatives, including:
‘I’m creative, I don’t have a business mind’
‘I don’t need much money’
‘No-one makes much money doing this’
We do it for the love of it’
‘I just need someone else to manage my career for me and I will be a success’
These have become ingrained as if they are true for everyone. If artists are struggling, then one of these beliefs could seem very real.. Exploring contradictions comes up in coaching sessions, where clients are very successful in one area but struggle in another. For example, a musician client explained that she was fantastically organised delivering other people’s projects, but couldn’t do this for her own career goals. We explored what might be getting in the way, and figured out what was different between the two situations so that she could create the conditions to bring her skills to all of her work.
ZITA V.: You are an artist’s coach. Coaches and mentors provide comprehensive support and advice to help you achieve your goals, but in reality, there is probably no path that someone can point to, there is one path for everyone and the mission of the human creator is to discover exactly this authentic path and no one else’s. What is your role as a coach in this process?
T.M.: Absolutely, there is no one way or one career path for an artist or creative, especially over many years and decades. It is dependent on a person’s interests, their connections and the opportunities that arise. There might be structures involved at different times, such as record labels, galleries, publishers or management teams, but these may not be permanent. Many creatives do a lot themselves with varying or no outside support.
As a coach, my role is to help a person identify a path that is unique to them at whatever career stage they are at, allowing them to be creatively, financially and personally fulfilled. While a mentor generally offers specific guidance and advice, coaches support clients to find their own solutions. It’s really, really powerful to discover things yourself.
So I offer a non-judgemental place to explore and ask questions to open up someone’s thinking and look at things from different perspectives. It can be challenging and hard work. But it allows ideas and inspiration to emerge which can be really exciting. All the small leaps and insights add up to really help someone create new plans and better ways of working towards them.
ZITA V.: In the life of an artist, next to creativity, the business aspect is very important – financial income, time coordination, marketing issues, connections in the creative, supply chain and business world. This often becomes a challenge that consumes most of the creative’s time and energy and very often leads to a state of burnout. What aspects prevent artists from successfully solving business and career issues?
T.M.: There is such a lot to think about and it can be really difficult to manage everything. Especially when the creative industries have changed so much through technology, the demands of the online world and the impact of the global cost of living crisis.
These are typical problems relating to burnout that clients express when we start working together:
Confusion
Overwhelm
Lack of direction
When we explore further, it may be because they don’t have a clear vision, clarity on their purpose, or a plan with priorities. Without these, it becomes easy to get distracted and feel frustrated because it feels like going from project to project without really progressing towards a creative direction that is truly fulfilling.
Not creating clear financial goals can result in creatives taking all kinds of offers that might be interesting or available but do not always pay properly – which is exhausting and unrewarding.
Comparing to other people (especially on social media) can cause stress and the pressure to create too much work, leading to burnout.
Like everyone, clients bring their patterns, habits and unhelpful beliefs – such as not being good enough, not having luck or being bad at business – that can cause procrastination and get in the way of taking steps forward or solving their problems.
Finally, clients often tell me that they find it hard to ‘switch off’ from work, because they are not incorporating enough rest, family and social time for their mental health balance.
An event producer client wanted to shift her career and we took time to explore why she kept getting distracted by the short-term exciting things that actually took away her energy and focus for the future. Once we had these insights, we developed strategies to put into place to say ‘no’ and create a new vision to work towards.
ZITA V.: How can the mentorship of an art coach change an artist’s trajectory and propel them to success and successfully create a thriving career in the art world?
T.M.: I am so passionate about this! An artist or creative’s trajectory changes because the focus of the coaching is unique to them, to get clear on what they really want and gain insights into what is holding them back. We all develop our own beliefs from our family, education, community and cultural experiences.
So one size of coaching does not fit all. In each coaching session where a client gains more awareness about their inner world, they can start to create new plans empowered by what they have learned. They find that they can take more risks, find solutions, and put in place good habits to carry them forward in their career.
It’s not just about having a better plan! It’s about creative, career and personal growth. This is such a strong base to thrive in a career because you have solid self-understanding and clarity in what you want, what you don’t want and how to face challenges.
As an example, several of my artist clients have been exploring their leadership. It’s really exciting, because they begin to realise that even though they don’t have a job title of ‘director’ or ‘manager’, they have developed fantastic skills in different areas of their lives and their art, and can use these as they raise their ambition for their careers and collaborations.
ZITA V.: What was your biggest career achievement or event that transformed you?
T.M.: Without a doubt it’s my early career experiences working in the Balkans with the composer Nigel Osborne, because I experienced the impact that the arts can have even in the most difficult of places and situations. I’ve carried those memories with me for over 20 years.
Next was producing all of the Jazz South music commission during lockdown, because we filmed and recorded them, which was an unbelievable achievement during such a chaotic period of changing rules, travel restrictions, covid testing and keeping personal distance on stage! I absolutely loved supporting all of those composers to keep creative during such a difficult time. You can listen and watch them all at https://jazzsouth.org.uk/current-projects/jazz-south-commissions/
ZITA V.: Art coaching is a profession that requires specific qualifications and ongoing training to effectively guide people in their artistic pursuits. What challenges do you face in your personal development?
T.M.: Having supervision is essential as it brings a more experienced, outside eye if I feel that a client has got stuck or I feel challenged. It supports me to continue to open my own thinking so that I can offer the best possible service to my clients.
I also have my own coach, because just like my clients, I need to keep exploring my blind spots, unhelpful beliefs and habits in order to stay motivated and develop my business.
Our subconscious mind’s job is to keep us safely in our comfort zone and it’s a challenge for coaches too. Ongoing professional support and training helps to develop our depth of coaching. This includes building up more client and supervision hours and additional learning though globally recognised coaching accreditation bodies such as the Federation of Coaching and the European Mentoring and Coaching Council.
Personal development is such a wide field, there is always something to learn. Recently I have been exploring how we develop our beliefs around money and wealth, because this is such a common cause of stress for artists and creative people.
ZITA V.: And now let’s return to the very idea of art and business.
The career of an artist is very complex, often an artist is expected to perform so many different roles, and artists are rarely taught about the business side of things, business, marketing, accounting, sales, inventory management, etc. What are the most common questions for an artist and what helps to improve his career?
T.M.: There are four common questions that artists and creatives come to me with:
How can I get more creative fulfilment?
How can I increase my income and financial stability?
How can I get more recognition for my work?
How can I get more support?
And these are typical areas that we work on together in coaching:
Getting clear on what is really important and devising a dream career or situation – the one the artist really wants
Gaining clarity on defining success for their work, money and personal life.
Designing a roadmap of goals and milestones.
Learning to recognise and understand the patterns, habits and beliefs that get in the way of taking steps or success (for example procrastination, distraction, lack of self confidence, being bad at business, needing luck to succeed).
Creating new strategies to create the best conditions to move forwards.
Holding clients accountable to take the actions they commit to
It isn’t a linear process – more like unpeeling an onion along the journey, gaining more insight and putting new, supportive conditions in place.
My client is a musician but wanted to start a second career as a visual artist. He felt overwhelmed and unconfident and would get distracted from his vision. Within three months, he identified and achieved a major goal of putting on his first solo commercial gallery show, pushing through procrastination, reaching out to gallery owners and marketing the show to friends, family and online connections.
ZITA V.: Business consists of creating value and selling value. To make this possible, we look for a problem, convert it into an opportunity, and create some value for its solution. It would seem that the world has solved the consumer’s household problems, so there is more time and space for other things. Art and culture products should easily find their place, but this is not the case. We willingly consume art, but creators face implementation problems. Why do support funds, sponsors, patrons and other similar things exist, why is such a system created that art needs to be supported?
Why do you think art can’t live on an equal footing with other businesses?
T.M.: It’s incredibly tough in the current climate with changing digital technologies creating issues such as loss of income as audiences can access work for free – e.g. streaming platforms, and there is more competition for opportunities to perform or show live work. The live performance sector is certainly still suffering from post-covid ticket buying behaviour and shows being rescheduled. And of course everyone’s costs have gone up.
Countries value the arts differently (e.g. through public subsidy or artist tax breaks) and there are ongoing problems with access and inclusion in the arts by people of different diversities and socio-economic backgrounds.
So I think that it’s extremely helpful that grants, sponsors and patrons continue to exist, because they can support artists to take greater risks with projects that might be bigger, more expensive or more experimental. Fanbase platforms allow artists to bring in regular patron income in exchange for exclusive access to them or special material.
This will be so important as AI develops, so that artists can get support for being unique, experimental and humanly expressive.
Having said that, I observe that it can also create a climate where artists and creative producers are extremely reliant on grants and funding, which can stop them from fully developing their creative entrepreneurialism to develop unique services or grow their own markets/fans/audiences. Essentially, it’s a whole part of their creativity that is lying untapped for them.
ZITA V.: We live in times of change, how do you feel about the current situation? What is important to artists today? What should they consider when creating their career guidelines?
T.M.: These are my top tips for artists today:
Have clarity about your uniqueness, vision, purpose and message – whether you are part of a team or working by yourself, it will help you connect with audiences and industry to develop opportunities for yourself. As you consider different ways of making income remember how creative you can be – can you design something amazing that supports your bank balance and gives you more headspace for your artist practice and career.
Be part of a community that is is inspiring, aspiring and entrepreneurial – no dragging you down with unhelpful beliefs. When you want to shout at social media, remember that a lot of the online world is a free resource to make new connections – who knows what collaborators might be out there or who might become an audience or super-fan
Talking of which, check out fanbase platforms where you bring your new online connections, friends and family too. What can you easily offer that they would love to subscribe to each month?Of course, I also suggest getting a coach to support you!
ZITA V.: Thank you, Tamsin.
