Victor Patterson Is the Overture Center’s First Chief People Officer: A Lasting Legacy
Victor Patterson, a native of the greater Chicago area, has worked for Fortune 50 companies during his career and now wishes to make his work at Overture the legacy of his work experience.
by Jonathan Gramling
Victor Patterson was in the right place and right time of his career when Overture and he crossed paths. Patterson was named co-CEO and chief people officer last April. It seemed that the evolution of Patterson’s personal and professional life led him to this point in time. And he grabbed hold as a king of crowning achievement of his career.
Patterson grew up in Aurora, Illinois’ second largest city some 40 miles west of downtown Chicago. While he had challenges growing up in aqn urban setting, he also took advantage of the positive elements of the area.
“I had the pleasure and the privilege — literally when you think about the Rat Pack or for some of us, The Little Rascals — of hanging with a White males, a Black male, a Mexican male, a Puerto Rican male and a first generation immigrant from the Philippines,” Patterson said. “We literally were with each other every free moment that we had outside of school. So early on, I had the pleasure of authentically being in those homes just as they had the opportunity to be in my home. And so when you talk about a doctored orientation to culture, I had it. I had it up until the point that I went on to college. It was real world.”
Patterson grew up in a tight-knit family that gave him a strong moral foundation. It also exposed him to the arts.
“As the energy in Urban America is — right, wrong or indifferent — I had uncles and cousins who enjoyed jazz,” Patterson said. “And so I became a fan of jazz and live jazz through them. My mother enjoyed plays and musicals, specifically gospel plays and musicals. So whether they were taking place locally or in McCormick Place in the city of Chicago or someplace else in downtown Chicago,”
But as the case with many Black youth who grew up in an urban environment, it was basketball that powered him through his high school and collegiate career.
“My first year of college, I ended up at Bemidji State, in Northern Minnesota, which is about an hour south of the Canadian border,” Patterson recalled. “And yes, it is extremely cold in Northern Minnesota. And then I ended up at Norfolk State in Virginia, which is a historically Black college and university. And finally, I came back to Illinois and finished at Rockford University in Illinois playing basketball.”
Patterson earned an undergraduate degree in finance and economics and a master’s degree in business administration. And he spent most of his career working for Fortune 50 enterprises as he lived in milieus from coast to coast.
And he was working in the Atlanta, Georgia area when he began to ponder how he would finish out his career.
“I was actually in the space where I was looking for a new opportunity,” Patterson reflected. “And as you may well know, the South and the Southeast is going through a population boom right now. I was in the Atlanta area. And so, there were so many people coming down, opportunities were plentiful and people tend to stay. I thought, ‘Let me explore the reverse trend.’ And the reverse trend was there are places, probably in the Midwest, where there are talent gaps right now and let me see if I can potentially fill one of those gaps. And so, I put some feelers out and the good people in Madison found my resume. And as the story goes, we had one conversation that led to two conversations that led to me being here.”
Patterson is excited to be in Madison for it is rising to become a trending destination as it experiences growth in the high tech and other fields. According to the state of Wisconsin, it recently hit 300,000 residents and the population boom is expected to continue. This bodes well for the arts in the community. Patterson wants to make sure that the communities of color are an intricate part of Madison’s future and shaping what it becomes.
“No matter how attractive Atlanta, Nashville, Charlotte or Birmingham are, the truth of the matter is your circle is only going to be a subset of that mass,” Patterson said. “And even in that, you’re going to have to find what it is that moves you most. And so you have the arts here. You have a really vibrant sports culture within the greater Madison area, whether that is pro sports or college sports at the U. But also, much like you would do in Atlanta if you took a road trip to Charlotte or Birmingham, a road trip to Chicago will fill you in a way that maybe Madison can’t. And so, you get a nice balance there. But you get a nice firm foundation as an adult here.”
Overture Center has the potential for being a positive force in keeping Madison’s youth of color here as adults.
“We want that legacy of programming like Kids in the Rotunda,” Patterson said. “I think we call it from the cradle to the grave. And so our goal is not just the kids in their early formative years, but we want to maintain them in junior high. We want to maintain them in high school. And to the point that you made earlier, for that group of children from those culturally diverse communities, we want to bring them back to Madison. I know how influential and warm that Southeast corridor is. I think everyone needs to experience it. But there’s a foundation for being an adult that seems solid in this Madison community. And it can only optimize its potential by making sure that its sons and daughters of all hues come back home.”
And Patterson will be in a unique position to help facilitate that development at the chief people officer. Overture’s top leadership is structured as a collective decision-making body.
“I have supported revenue-generating businesses in multi-unit structures with the companies that I have worked for,” Patterson said. “In each of those opportunities, there’s been this collaborative approach to decision-making. Granted, there’s generally been one person in that environment who has the overriding decision. And so this is the same way. It’s just formally defined. We have someone who oversees artistic excellence. We have someone who oversees our financials, the CFO. And someone who oversees marketing. We have the chief development officer, artistic experiences, myself and the chief operations officer. And so we spend a lot of time bringing enterprise decisions, enterprise opportunities to the table and doing a really solid job of caucusing over them. We still have a little bit of room for growth. But it is a unique model that has, in my opinion, a high upside. It really is a matter of strong communication, humility at its core, making sure that everyone is aligned for a shared purpose and then making a decision that aligns with the mission and supports the community.”
As the chief people officer, Patterson’s area is human resources as well as the culture of Overture. He will be working with the Community Advisory Committee as well as with community organizations..
“I would say the culture of the organization is also under my responsibility,” Patterson said. “A lot of that is working with my peers to lead initiatives or get their support for initiatives. And then a lot of the work that I am doing in the community will probably be another one that falls under my sphere of influence as well.”
It is Patterson’s mission to make Overture feel like home to everyone.
“Making everyone feel like they belong is sometimes harder than it sounds,” Patterson observed. “But what we do and what we will be doing is aligning ourselves with the mission and then aligning ourselves with our cultural beliefs. And our cultural beliefs are welcoming, learning and developing and taking responsibility. I just had a meeting with my team. And I really over-indexed on that to get everyone set and ready for what we have ahead of us. I think the other thing with that is how we communicate the level of transparency. People may not like the decision in the moment. But if there is a way that you communicate that and a rationale that resonates with them, then ultimately they come on board. It’s kind of the Pied Piper effect, if you will.”
And this approach will permeate to the other levels of the organization.
“It will also be how the organization evolves internally in creating that cultural competency so that it’s not just at the Executive Leadership Team level, which is my peers, but also our directors, which is the next level of leadership and ideally will succeed us at the right time,” Patterson said. “It’s creating that cultural competency, that awareness, and that level of empowerment to be voices in that effort as well because ultimately, it will line up with our mission. And ultimately, it will line up with our cultural beliefs.”
The Overture Center could very well be Patterson’s last stop on his professional career.
“I do envision myself being here a long time, as long as Overture will have me, as long as the board will have me and as long as the community will have me,” Patterson said. “I do admit that this was a very strategic and intentional move on my behalf. The weather from January to December is very different in Georgia than it is in Madison. But I’m a Midwestern kid. At some point, my blood will readjust. But I do think that this is a long-term run for me. I can get back to Atlanta when I need to. I can get back to Southern Cal when I need to. I’m a golfer. And so there are as many good places here in the Midwest and up north as there are in the South and the Southeast. So I think that will help keep me around.”
Patterson knows the impact that the arts have on people’s lives.
“What we know about the arts is that as much as basketball evolves the person, the arts does the exact same thing,” Patterson emphasized. “We’re committed to creating the whole person as much as any other sector or space, some seemingly more popular than others.”
The Overture Center is here for the community. Patterson urges everyone to check it out.