When we speak about the cultural and creative industries, the conversation often gravitates toward the visible work — the festivals, the films, the finished objects — while the leadership that shapes the sector’s policies and sustains its institutions remains in the background. The Leadership Programme in Cultural and Creative Industries, convened by the Royal Academy of Management with Awj as knowledge partner, was designed to correct that imbalance. It prepares a generation of leaders equipped to steward the sector through an understanding of its economic instruments and regulatory frameworks, not through passion alone. I contributed to the programme as a Creative Industries Advisor, supporting the shaping of its knowledge content and steering its discussions toward the questions that matter most to the sector’s future.
Objectives
- Build specialised national leadership capacity to manage the cultural and creative industries on firm, knowledge-based foundations.
- Bridge the gap between creative ambition and sound governance by equipping leaders with the tools of policy and institutional management.
- Establish a practical understanding of the creative economy as a productive sector contributing to economic diversification.
- Encourage creative entrepreneurship as a sustainable path to value and employment.
- Develop knowledge content rooted in the Gulf and Arab context rather than imported from outside it.
The programme treated policy, governance, the creative economy and creative entrepreneurship not as separate topics but as one integrated system. Its deeper value lies in moving the conversation from generalities to practice — cultivating leaders who share a common language and can build a more mature, more sustainable creative sector in Oman and across the region.