Training & organisational design

British Council Egypt

Commissioned by the British Council’s Cultural Skills Unit and British Council Egypt HVM designed two strategic planning mentoring workshops, the first for Ministry of Antiquities Senior Management, and the second for managers of historic and archaeological sites and museums from around Egypt. In the first set of mentoring sessions HVM facilitated participants’ discussions on how to shape a strategic plan tailored to their situation. It was clearly a relief to everyone to be given the space to take a step back, breathe deeply and apply new thinking away from their highly pressured to do lists. 

In the second mentoring programme we again used exercises to support learning and inspire new thinking. We also modeled action learning as a tool for peer learning, for sharing across departments, for finding practical actions which would work back at people’s desks and for establishing a network of people with whom they can share daily challenges and celebrate successes.  

British Council

HVM was invited to co-produce and facilitate the most recent of British Council’s biannual Global Management Away Days. Through a series of engaging sessions with Regional Arts Managers, the group worked together to explore effective cross-arts working in the face of a challenging funding climate.

For the second year the British Council's Cultural Skills team called on HVM to co-design and facilitate their away days to lay the foundations for continued effective strategic planning.

“This is to say thank you very much for facilitating our recent away days in Cardiff. We are not the easiest group to work with in many ways and had set ourselves a complex agenda which you helped us navigate.”

— Stakeholder, British Council

HVM have also supported capacity building programmes for the British Council in other countries:

Russia
Anita van Mil was invited as a Guest Speaker for the Museum Leadership School. The aim being to help Russian museum professionals broaden their expertise, acquire new knowledge and skills and get an insight into the work of the best Russian and foreign institutions working in the cultural, arts and educational sectors. Anita gave two lectures and took part in a panel discussion on community engagement and exhibition interpretation and design. 

Azerbaijan
HVM was asked to undertake an in-country scoping study to identify and prioritise the training needs of the museum sector in Azerbaijan. As a result HVM returned to Azerbaijan to work with a group of 40 museum professionals to support them as they develop marketing strategies for their individual museums and the sector as a whole.

Greece
HVM designed and developed a six-day training programme to form part of the British Council's International Museums Academy. Gathering together up to 50 museum professionals, half in Athens, half in Thessaloniki, HVM provided training on fundraising and income generation, an issue of particular relevance in Greece where museums must urgently think about ways of moving from a government funded to a self-sustaining model. HVM produced a fundraising and income generation toolkit which is now being used internationally to support this work.

Auto Italia

HVM has designed and facilitated two visioning and planning sessions for staff and board members of Auto Italia South East, an established artist run organisation that commissions and produces new work - collaborating directly with emerging artists. The first session was part of Auto Italia's preparation of a successful uplifted Arts Council National Portfolio Organisation application. It ensured the team agreed on a shared vision for the future  and a clear road map to achieving the vision, outlining implications for products, services, communications and resources. The second consolidated this worked providing a clear future direction. 

Museum Development North East

The purpose of this commission was the design of the Building Resilience programme for Museum Development North East, a capacity building programme for income generation. It resulted in close working with:
- Sunderland Museum on the design and testing of their Young Friends scheme
- Woodhorn Museum to develop a strategy for setting up a commercial arm for the learning team's advisory work.

Museum of London micro-consultancies for income generation

This programme was initially intended to be a short intervention to support six museums. Due to over-subscription for the first programme HVM was recommissioned to run it with a further three museums and then a third cohort of six museums. The programme comprised site visits, training sessions, team workshops with integrated action planning. It has been important for the success of the programme that HVM has worked with the museum teams to develop their own income generation and business planning activities so that they 'own' the work and can continue with its implementation now that the programme has ended.

Hampshire and Solent Museum Development Team

HVM supported the Museum Development Officers in Hampshire and Solent to develop a detailed capacity building plan for submission to the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) as part of their successful application for 3-year Catalyst Funding. As a result the Inspiring a Culture of Philanthropy programme was designed by HVM. It aimed to inspire a real step change for both the museums and the philanthropic community in the Hampshire Solent area. As part of this process HVM consulted with both museums and philanthropists to understand their needs. This was essential to the success of the HLF bid.

Clinks

Clinks, which supports voluntary organisations that work with offenders and their families, has staff working all around the country. They asked HVM to facilitate team away days to bring them together, share views on the national landscape and test new ways of working given a challenging and fast moving social climate. 

Dorset Archives Trust

HVM ran visioning workshops to define the purpose of the Dorset Archives Trust and create a vision reflecting the views of staff and trustees in preparation for new lottery funded programmes of work.