My takeaways from MuseumNext 2016

As conferences go, there are those classed as ‘have to go’ others as ‘boss told me to go’ and then the rarer ‘can’t miss it!’. MuseumNext is the latter for me, and I just returned from my sixth! This year it was in Dublin, a city commemorating the 1916 Easter Rising and also one celebrating a long and rich culture with a variety of museums, galleries and experiences. A few thoughts which have come from my time at the talks and networking during the three days. 

Diversity remains a hot topic and various examples were covered on how to attract audiences like millennials, ‘older’ people and families using museum events, collections and art workshops. Some good ideas and successes, however my observation is whether every museum can expect every person in their area to be interested in visiting in the first place? Is it okay not to have every person visit? Employment diversity was considered by several presentations, a workshop on future issues in museums, audience engagements and @monica_muses from Museum Hue shared their approach of taking action to raise awareness and address the lack of people of colour attending and working in cultural organisations.  Another oft repeated phrase was ‘soft power’ following the release of Lord Cultural Resources book in Geneva last year Ngaire Blankenberg was in Dublin to clarify what that meant in her presentations and feedbacks. From her presentation it looked like soft power was the same as relationship building, but for big museums, to help them find the shared win-win outcomes with city planners, governments and businesses and finance projects. It has jumped up the must-read book list so I can better understand their theory.

The future of museums was also discussed, as one expects at a conference with “Next" in the title, this time Laura Crossley covered key areas at a workshop asking participants to consider the future for distinct areas like funding, diversity, collections etc. At this session I met some tremendous people on the table as we discussed sustainability, covering topics like curatorial algorithms and workforce behaviours. Laura is going to write up the session and share it round which is something I am looking forward to reading as the rest of the groups had some positive ideas for the future. The biggest take away I had was from the last day, in fact the session after lunch on the last day which had three presentations all about money.

Those who have spoken with me of late will know I am wrestling the idea of how can museums be sustainable in the UK when the country is accelerating towards a 100% capitalist model based on short term performance and reduced social responsibility from central and local government. Such an economic growth model is leaving any organisation which relies on central contributions to meet the deficit between grants, income and donations and operating costs deeply worried. Museums were not created to make money but to deliver knowledge, experiences and as a place for discussion and wonder. Jim Broughton gave an excellent presentation of the huge Natural History Museum and how they are deciding what to deliver based on six ‘levers’ to generate income and value for their limited resources. Silvia Fillipini-Fantoni delivered an honest assessment of what happened when admission charges were introduced to a large art museum in the USA and Jessica Litwin shared four reasons corporates engage with culture and therefore how museums can find sponsorship, it is not FREE MONEY!

After three days of input and three evenings of networking meeting fascinating folk from all round the globe leaves me exhausted, inspired and filled with ideas for the first week back in the office. Taking time out for the 50,000 feet view of the sector and my museum's situation is important and worth the costs, however it is the reminders one, three and six months later which probably led to change and results happening. To catch up on the conference which was recorded check out www.museumnext.com. I shall be tuning in again after one month to remind myself of the great people and their presentations and become energised by their experiences, all over again.