CBCA 2026-2029 Strategic Plan

As we celebrate CBCA’s 40th Anniversary, the organization has been working behind the scenes to imagine what the next 40 years might look like. We continue to stay grounded in our mission, vision, and core values honoring the symbiotic nature of arts and business – a partnership proven to build prosperous and exceptional communities in Colorado.

Our 2026 – 2029 Strategic Plan centers your voice: CBCA’s loyal members and the hundreds of Coloradans who volunteered their time by participating in focus groups, completing robust surveys, and meeting 1:1 with the CBCA board and staff throughout 2024 and 2025. The Strategic Planning Committee met every month for a year and a half to analyze quantitative and qualitative data. This culminated in two full-day retreats for the CBCA board to spend time ensuring we had enough feedback and buy-in to support a robust and future-looking plan. Our takeaways resulted in a focused, holistic, and visionary plan that will enhance our efforts in three key areas:

• Focusing more attention on the business community; specifically expanding ways in which business can engage with our creative and arts organizations.
• Intentionally cultivating a larger statewide presence with businesses and creative industries in service to all of Colorado.
• Centering financial stewardship and stability to build an even stronger fiscal foundation. This ensures our ability to make good on our promise and stay relevant in the years to come.

Please enjoy exploring the CBCA 2026 – 2029 Strategic Plan below or download the summary one-pager. As with many Strategic Plans, this is a living document – likely to be modified with time. We would love to continue to get feedback from our communities and hear your suggestions on how we can strengthen this plan and our message into the future.

GOAL 1: Align business model and organizational capacity to ensure sustainability, impact, and relevancy.

• OBJECTIVE 1.1: Develop and execute a plan to improve organizational efficiency, culture, and optimization.
• OBJECTIVE 1.2: Analyze the value proposition of CBCA membership, how it is delivered and how we define success.
• OBJECTIVE 1.3: Create a financial plan that prioritizes sustainability.

GOAL 2: Foster and expand business engagement in support of arts & culture in Colorado.

• OBJECTIVE 2.1: Identify what the business community wants and needs from CBCA.
• OBJECTIVE 2.2: Leverage CBCA’s value proposition to create and expand opportunities for business engagement with arts & culture communities.

GOAL 3: Cultivate statewide presence through awareness, advocacy and activities for and with Colorado communities.

• OBJECTIVE 3.1: Increase arts, culture and creative industries advocacy activities and awareness in service to all of Colorado.
• OBJECTIVE 3.2: Identify needs and expectations from a select number of Colorado communities to expand CBCA activities that balance organization capacity and community willingness.
• OBJECTIVE 3.3: Create and execute an activities expansion plan for pilot communities.

Through the leadership of CBCA’s Strategic Planning Committee, the board has developed initial set of strategies and tactics to implement this plan over the next four years.

The Strategic Planning Committee will continue to meet regularly to steward its implementation. The Committee will take the lead on key initiatives and bring in additional expertise as needed. The Board of Directors will have regular progress reports and opportunities to make updates and adjustments to the strategic plan.

CBCA will continue to gather input from constituents and stakeholders to inform our direction and next steps.

All operational plans, meetings agendas, programming, and communications will be crafted in alignment with the strategic plan’s top-level goals.