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Alumni Spotlight: Allan Waite
Allan Waite’s experience at Columbia had a profound effect on his career path. Entering Columbia as a performing arts management major, after receiving his BA in Theater and Communications, Waite’s experience as Paulette Whitfield’s graduate assistant introduced him to a whole new area of arts management. Whitfield is in charge of research and data analysis for the AEMM Department, and, as her assistant, Waite became involved in research, learning how to use SPSS software and other tools of the trade. During his second year, AEMMDept began work on a project with the Chicago Children’s Theatre (CCT) (see AEMM news and information) and Waite was hooked. “Working with Paulette and working on the CCT project, I learned that market research was something that I wanted to do professionally and I started to shift my focus,” he explains. “My end goal is to work in nonprofit market research, eventually pursuing my doctorate in research and statistics and teaching arts related research and statistics at the collegiate level.” Waite explains that currently only a small group of organizations are doing market research for the nonprofit sector, and those are usually working with large nonprofits that can afford the cost of market research. “There is a need for people who are specially trained in data analysis, but who also have an education in the arts – people who can cross over between the left-brained analytical world and the right-brained world of the arts. My training has prepared me to talk both languages so that I can relate to arts organizations, but also have the statistical and data analysis knowledge.”
Currently, Waite is pursing his interest in research by working as a research associate at Richard Day Research. Richard Day Research works with the financial industry, conducting research surveys to determine client satisfaction across all their product categories. “We conduct surveys for clients four times a year. It is an ongoing process. We are always designing, analyzing data, and redesigning surveys,” says Waite.
Waite is also pursuing his interest in teaching, serving as an adjunct faculty member in the AEMM Department, teaching data analysis and statistics at the graduate level. “I enjoy teaching,” says Waite. “I have a passion about market research and it makes me happy to express this passion about what I do to the students in the class room. Sometimes it is challenging to make students understand how beneficial data analysis is, but it is rewarding to see when they finally get it.”
Waite found his experience at Columbia to be instrumental to his professional career. Besides helping him to determine his career path, he found the mix of classes to be important. “I see all of the management areas in my job. My classes exposed me to the different functions within a company and now, being in a small company, I can see how they all come together in the real world and I am able to talk about the different aspects within the company. Columbia challenged me to think, to challenge myself, and gave me a drive to try new things and do them well.” |
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