Approaching the distributed museum
In the past few years I have proposed that an ecosystem view of the museum is helpful when implementing new work practices and developing new work cultures that allow for embracing digital tools, technologies and channels. By this I mean that museums need to strategically plan for presence, dialogue and adapted content at all touch points where the organisation meets the audience. And that the experience delivered must be seamless and exponential, growing with each step.
My starting point for this argument is that museums need to overcome current silos that prevent a holistic approach to public offerings (such as relying too much on traditional formats, embracing strict professional boundaries and allowing territory-mindedness across departments). This in turn a prerequisite for adopting a “digital mindset”, which means among many other things thinking digital already from the very first stages of planning a museum experience (or even digital only), in order to cater for a growing potential audience online. Museum organisations are often still rigidly structured around collections, exhibitions, programming and education. This poses a challenge when producing experiences for the ecosystem, as it requires cross collaboration and the use of multiple skills.
Recently we have, at Västernorrlands museum (Sweden), received a grant that will allow us to examine how we can lay the foundations for a seamless museum experience around the prehistory of the region. The funding is for a very short time span giving us space to briefly experiment around connecting a patchwork of content and products into a museum universe that is as relevant and obvious online as it is onsite, and that makes the most of the ecosystem perspective.
Before describing further our upcoming work I would like to circle around the term “The distributed museum” that Ed Rodley has recently already summarized in a very comprehensive and thoughtful way in his essay The distributed museum is already here — It’s just not very evenly distributed. Here the term is referring in short to organisations that see themselves as part of larger networks, that are conversational, that keep transforming and adapting, that are reflective and embrace agile/lean. Most importantly, as Ed Rodley emphasizes, the transformation of the museum in itself requires deliberate and strategic design, and must encompass work culture.
I do agree with Rodley that work culture is at the top of this list (which in turn must be aligned with and supported by the museum brand). And I would like to add constant experimentation as a close runner up. This is part of the lean and agile approach to producing museum experiences, and as is my experience from the past decade, very helpful when making a shift towards a new culture. Experimenting with content, format, touch points and engagement, and above all examine how this patchwork can become a universe that draws the audience further into the experience and builds sustainable relationships with the museum. But how do we actually get there? What is the “glue” that ties the pieces together to a meaningful experience? And how do we know we have succeeded? We are hopefully now on a journey to get more insight.
Creating a regional prehistoric museum universe — from thoughts to action
In the upcoming months our museum has decided to look at three cultural historical sites in the region of Västernorrland, and how the museum can build the founding parts of a prehistoric museum universe. The sites are all connected to events and places spanning from around 4 000 BC to 2 000 BC.
A starting point for these three small pilot initiatives is that the museum was already planning to explore different formats of mediating the three sites and events in connection to revising and updating the current permanent exhibition about the region’s prehistory. This extra grant has allowed us to explore a sustainable model for mediating the region’s cultural historical sites as a distributed museum.
The different formats span from short film for children, podcast for a more initiated audience, web and social media content and teacher guides, to media guide content available onsite at the museum and at the actual prehistoric site, creating a 3D replica of a neolithic skull (as a first step towards reconstructing the person) and animated rock carvings. Every piece of content and format has potential to be delivered online as well as in the physical space.
A dedicated external resource will be monitoring the process, interviewing staff and partners, and analysing the results in order to help us with a sustainable model for long term mediation of cultural historical sites in the region, with the museum building, website and social media channels as a central hub for the experience.
Some questions that we will attempt to answer during the process are:
- At this point we are using extra grants for experimentation, how can we build this into our ordinary business?
- For this pilot project we start with chunks of content that we would ordinarily produce anyway, that will be parts of an exhibition and online resources, how should we start planning for holistic experiences in upcoming projects? How can it be done in a way that is aligned with our (normally quite limited) resources?
- What types of content and initiatives should we prioritize in the future?
- How do we create engagement and dialogue with our audiences around the universe and across the ecosystem?
- How can we connect these pilot initiatives to the upcoming revised permanent exhibition about the region’s prehistory?
- How can we expand this universe? We start with bits and pieces now, how can we work long term with content dialogue and engagement? How do we keep it “alive”?
- How do we connect this new model with our brand (that is currently being revised and updated)?
- How can we match our ambitions with current staff and resources? What competencies do we lack that we would need within a couple of years time?
- And — of course — what is really a distributed museum? What are our goals? How do we define success? Is becoming a distributed museum our next step?
There is certainly a need for further discussions around the two different terms, ecosystem and distributed museum, that of course imply different things. One is a system of touch points, or a network, the other is a more complex term that encompasses work culture, organisational development, work skills etc. They are both terms that deserve further attention when discussing the future of museums.
This post will be followed up by conclusions and reflections at the end of 2020.
