Museums need to move beyond the project trap
By Matthijs Leendertse & Laurin Ivetic
Few topics have garnered so much attention at museum conferences in the last years as the challenges and opportunities offered by digital technology. Advocates of digitization see it as an opportunity for museum to reach audiences beyond the physical buildings and exhibitions, to become more innovative in knowledge dissemination and as a means to pursue their educational mission on much broader scale. Skeptics see digitization as a threat; challenging their position as key knowledge sources and diminishing the value of the physical objects. Whatever your position is on this scale, digitisation is here to stay and museums have recognised this and invested heavily in digital platforms.
A key question that has received relatively little attention by researchers and museums is the extent to which these initiatives have been successful. We argue that most museums have fallen in the project trap that many media and advertising related business fell in during the early days of the internet. Rather than seeing digitization and the internet as a key component of the strategy that needs to be addressed holistically, museums have financed or asked grants for digital initiatives for specific projects. In a world where user journeys comprise of a multitude of channels - from social media, websites, apps and messaging services to books and the physical building itself - museums need to ensure there is a seamless and consistent experience for users. In addition, museums need to balance their public mission with the needs of a digital savvy audience.
Museums that want to embrace the digital environment, need to pay attention to the following five principles:
Continuity: ensure that your strategic goals are leading in all your digital efforts.
Transparency & accountability: ensure that your strategic goals can be measured in all your digital efforts.
Connectivity: ensure your digital initiatives are connected and consistent amongst platforms.
Continuous creation: move from project-based financing to long term process-based financing as the success of digital educational endeavours is marathon, not a sprint.
Balance: to engage tech savvy audiences, it is crucial to strike a balance between the needs of users to be entertained and wowed and the public educational mission.