Quotations From Business Leaders About the Arts

“Arts availability in a community enables local employers to attract and retain higher skilled employees.”
– Warren Satterlee, President and COO, Great Plains Natural Gas Company, Fergus Falls, MN

“I’m a great admirer of people who can ‘think outside the box’ – people who have a unique vision of the world and are able to create something valuable from that vision. Artists, as well as talented business people, have that quality.” – Eli Broad, Chairman and CEO, SunAmerica, Inc.

“The new workplace needs highly skilled people, people who have learned how to learn, to solve problems, and to think – people who can learn a specific job, and then learn another one. Cutting edge corporations are learning they must look to the arts to find the employees they need.”
– James Houghton, Chairman, U.S. Labor Dept. National Skills Standards Board

“The arts have been a valuable component for creating a healthy business climate, and the NEA has been a critical catalyst in this growth.”
– Philip M. Condit, Chairman and CEO, The Boeing Company, 1998

When we’re out recruiting businesses, they look at the whole city. “They do, in fact, want to know if we’ve got a symphony, an opera, a ballet. It’s just good business for the city to have alternatives to sports.”
– Hugh L. McColl,Jr., Chairman of the Board and CEO of NationsBank Corporation, 1997