Martin Pople - Course Coordinator, FdA Arts Management and Director, Bath Spa Live, Bath Spa University - looks at what the specialists say about this particular career.

So what are the characteristics that define one? What makes the Arts Manager special? Here the experts are divided.

One commentator explains - 'The skills of arts administration are practised in a curious realm midway between artists, the arts and people, and fuelled by an extraordinary and variable span of skills, involving art and arts criticism, politics, psychology, information science, economics, sociology and education.'

Peter Bendixen, Minister of Culture in Schleswig-Holstein, says that 'the emphasis of his/her training and education is or should be on social competence, cultural imagination and knowledge of the arts'.

Hugh Adams takes the view that '(Arts Managers are) literate, critical, well-informed, capable of independent thought and intelligent discourse with artists, commentators, audience and patrons alike'.

The job is then clearly about a) the arts and b) management, but in what proportions? Which is more important? Can you be an Arts Manager without skills or experience in either one of these areas?

Janet Summerton and Madeline Hutchins of Sussex University state that 'managing in any arts or cultural setting involves a number of key skills such as:

making value judgements

working with peers and public

good personal management

developing and monitoring plans

prudent management of resources

attending to the tasks and issues related to specific contexts and situations.

Like every successful manager in any type of business, Arts Managers need the confidence and acumen to run a flourishing enterprise, to plan and negotiate, take risks and make key decisions. They also need the skills to make and develop a huge variety of relationships with all kinds of people - staff, artists, performers, audiences, boards of management, funders, sponsors and - if there's money from the state - the tax-paying public and politicians as well.

I think Jeanette Siddall, ACE's Director of Dance, hits the nail on the head when she says that 'The individual manager is faced with a complex array of quasi-commercial tasks in the relatively chaotic, creative atmosphere that prevails in many organisations. The apparently conflicting demands of accountability and creativity have to be reconciled.'

Here we have it - it's about managing creativity and creatives. Not, it is generally agreed, the easiest group of people to handle; comparisons have been made with herding cats. What sets Arts Managers apart from other managers and what keeps them going through the tough times, is their passion for the arts.

If you want to be a good and successful Arts Manager you must care passionately about what is produced. Chris Smith, Minister for Culture and Director of the Clore Leadership Programme, talked about the difference between the Chief Executive of BP and that of a leading theatre. Both want to see their organisations prosper and grow but the Chief Executive of BP will not have a deep interest in oil and petrol per se - they are simply the means whereby his company makes money. On the other hand, the whole focus of the theatre executive's work will be what is presented on stage.

For anyone involved in working in the arts there are no clear career paths. Remuneration, job security, terms and conditions in the arts - in comparison to other sectors of the economy - are frankly poor and are not likely to get any better. But if you are doing what you love and truly care about, this will give you greater job satisfaction than many others.

And Arts Managers need not be just good organisers, they too can be creative and entrepreneurial - 'alchemists of the impossible', as a recent Arts Council England publication dubbed them. The Arts Manager who can combine management skills and artistic awareness can evolve into a higher being - the producer, one of the most powerful and influential roles in the arts.

Producers choose the right people, the right place, the right time, the right resources and bring them all together to realise an artistic vision. Quite some challenge, but also immensely rewarding and personally satisfying.

If you enjoy the performing arts, of whatever kind, and want a key role in their creation and promotion, then an Arts Management course might well be for you. It could provide you with a great foundation in the skills and experience you will need to help you realise your own artistic ambitions - and if you have ambitions, then think big.