Carolyn Ehman

Carolyn started her career as a musician before falling into the wonderful world of venue hire. Having worked with large cultural venues and small community arts organisations alike, she is uniquely positioned to understand the balance of commerciality and values-led practice.

Carolyn specialises in strategic development of venue hire models, using sector-specific knowledge to analyse and construct strategy for space-led income streams with a focus on margin analysis and scalability. With expertise in streamlining digital systems, she is skilled at finding bespoke solutions that improve inter-departmental communications and that capture both financial and values-based data. This in turn allows organisations to better understand their audiences and opportunities in order to strengthen impact reporting and save time and money on systems efficiencies.

After working with venue hire and events at The Cultch Theatre and the British Library, Carolyn returned to university to complete a masters in Arts Policy & Management where she specialised in research pertaining to business practice in the UK cultural sector. Her paper Gatekeeping at the Intersection of Time & Care: Exploring the Role of Hire Managers in Charitable Performing Arts Organisations received the 2019 runner up Lorraine Lim Prize award and has inspired much of her follow-up work and writing. She’s recently contributed a case study for the Theatre Green Book on sustainable operations at the intersection of business and engagement at the Albany, and published the article The Value of Venue Hire with Arts Professional.

By understanding the practical needs of space hire, the potential for income growth, and the possibilities of further development alongside hospitality, cultural, and engagement offers, Carolyn uses a wholistic approach to find solutions that are right for each organisation.