Principal author Morrie Warshawski is a consultant who has specialized in working with the nonprofit arts sector over the past 25 years. His planning experience includes nine years as a consultant and regional coordinator for the National Endowment for the Arts' Advancement Program, where he helped many organizations conduct 15-month planning processes that culminated in long-range strategic plan documents. He recently created Lessons Learned: A Planning Toolsite for the NEA—a collection of essays and case studies on planning. His other clients include foundations, state arts agencies, nonprofit arts organizations and individual artists throughout the country. Warshawski is the author of a book on fundraising, Shaking the Money Tree (Wiese Books); numerous articles on culture and the arts in publications throughout the U.S.; and handmade artists books in private collections and museums internationally. More information on Warshawski, his services and clients can be found on his Web site.

Contributing author Kelly J. Barsdate is the information services director at NASAA, where she has worked since 1991. Barsdate directs NASAA's evaluation, survey research and database development activities, provides information management and planning consultation to arts councils, and manages NASAA's interagency research and technology partnerships. Prior to her tenure at NASAA, Barsdate analyzed multicultural education paradigms for Educational Research Services, Inc., and studied clarinet performance and music education at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. Barsdate edits NASAA's Research Briefs series, and has authored publications including Measuring Your Arts Economy, A State Arts Agency Performance Measurement Toolkit, The Education Commitment: State Arts Agencies' Arts Education Activities, and Educating a Culturally Diverse Student Population.

Contributing author Jonathan Katz, Ph.D., is chief executive officer of the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies. Before heading NASAA, Katz was awarded tenure as a full professor of public policy and administration at the University of Illinois at Springfield, where he directed the masters degree program in arts administration from 1978 to 1985. He also directed the Children's Museum in Denver, Colorado, and was executive director of the Kansas Arts Commission, one of the first state arts agencies to focus its resources on the development of a local arts agency network. Katz has consulted extensively in cultural policy planning and organizational development with state, local, federal and private cultural groups. His clients have included the Ford Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. While at NASAA, Katz has authored Building Coalitions for a Creative America and Report to the Task Force on Cultural Pluralism, and edited Presenting, Touring and the State Arts Agencies and Serving the Arts in Rural Areas: Successful Programs and Potential New Strategies.