Presentation to the Collections Trust's OpenCulture 2013 conference on the integration of Digital Asset Management and Collections Management in museums and galleries

1.
Is Digital Asset Management the new
Collections Management?
Nick Poole, CEO, Collections Trust

2. The challenge
The creation, management, use and preservation of digital surrogates and born-
digital material is now the core business of any type of organisation.
The range of ‘input’ types – the intellectual, digital & physical assets the
organisation manages has increased hugely in the past decade.
The range of output channels, platforms and formats has also increased hugely.
The challenge is to manage all of this material as effectively and productively as
possible to support the strategic aims of your museum and the needs of your
users.

3. Learning to COPE
“Get your content ready to go anywhere, because it is going to go everywhere”
COPE is about future-proof, platform, device and use-independent content
This is not new in theory, but in practice COPE is always ‘the next project after
this one’
The push for COPE is about integration – integrating workflows, procedures,
systems and policies to promote maximum re-use and future-proofing of today’s
digital investment.

4. A process model for museums
Discover Refine Manage Deliver Engage Improve
Acquisition
Strategic
Planning
Research
Interpretation
Collections
Management
Facilities
Management
Environmental
Control
Integrated Pest
Management
Integrated Risk
Management
Collections
Development
Disaster Planning
& Resilience
Conservation
Loans & Mobility
Exhibition
Planning
Digital Content
Web/mobile
Audience
Engagement
Strategic
Marketing
Outreach
Education/
Learning Support
Commerce/ retail
Fundraising
Business
administration
Key Performance
Indicators
Process
improvement
Cost reduction
Collections Trust
core competencies
Digitisation
Digital Asset
Management
Licensing/IPR

5. What are we managing/creating?

6. What are we managing/creating?

7. Collections-focussed Institutional
If it is to be scalable, future-proof and useful to the organisation, an
integrated DAM Strategy ought to be able to offer solutions which reconcile
these bodies of assets....

8. Definition...?
Digital materials created or owned by your institution. Digital assets exist in a
variety of formats, and can include text, web, audio, video and image files.
Digital images of objects in your collection are digital assets, as are logo
image files, corporate Powerpoint presentations and any other digital
resources created by your institution that generate revenue or that provide
valuable content to employees or clients.
Digital assets may be used in many contexts, including sales, marketing,
education, web development, collections management and digital
preservation. Sometimes you will see the term 'media asset' used to refer
more narrowly to audio or video content.
Canadian Heritage Information Network

9. Benefits of DAM Implementation
Primary benefits:
• Improved discovery of information, both internally and externally
• Providing organisation-wide access to digital assets for all staff/departments
• Supporting more rapid approaches to innovation and prototyping
• Promoting collaboration between different organisational functions
• Improved rights management within your organisation

10. Benefits of DAM Implementation
Secondary benefits:
• Promoting the sustainability, longevity and accessibility of your
organisation’s digital outputs (including created digital content)
• Reducing the opportunity costs arising from lost or inaccessible information
• Improved visibility of value and impact of digital assets
• Improved compliance with legal or statutory responsibilities

11. Organisation’s Mission Statement
Collections Management Policy
Care Use Learn Develop
Users Politics Funding Culture
People Processes Systems Info
Evaluation & improvement
Rich, meaningful experiences for users
Strategic Collections Management

12. SPECTRUM as a framework for DAM
A SPECTRUM-based environment gives you:
• The integration of collections (and collecting activity) into your strategic plan
• The development of policies for collections management
• Procedures and workflows for collections management
• Training and development of staff in collections management practices
• Development of a culture of knowledge capture and management
• Deployment and use of systems for collections management
• Performance or value indicators for your collecting activities
• Policies for collections development (accession and deaccession/disposal)
• Underlying business processes for the loan and transfer of collections
• Integration of collections care and preservation into management processes

13. SPECTRUM DAM
• Strategy
• Procedures
• Systems
• Policies
• Formats

14. DAM Strategy
• Change management!
• Mission – clearly aligned to the mission and vision of the organisation
• Short, medium and long-term goals (eg. 1, 3 and 5 years) – aligned to the
broader strategic objectives of the organisation
• Roles & responsibilities of the people who will be responsible for the strategy
• Characterisation of the user community/stakeholders of the strategy
• Success criteria and how they will be evidenced
• A schedule/period over which the strategy will be reviewed and refined

15. SPECTRUM Procedures
• Pre-entry
• Object entry
• Loans In
• Acquisition
• Inventory control
• Location/movement control
• Transport
• Cataloguing
• Object condition checking
• Conservation/collections care
• Risk Management
• Insurance
• Valuation
• Audit
• Rights Management
• Use of Collections
• Object Exit
• Loans out
• Loss and damage
• Deaccession and disposal
• Retrospective documentation

16. DAM & SPECTRUM Procedures

17. DAM & Collections Systems
Creation/
curation layer
Integration layer
Presentation
layer
Aggregation/
distribution layer
Integration
tools
CMS DAMSCollMS
API
Web SocialMobile Gallery
BBC GoogleWMUK Euro
Culture
Grid
LOTS OF HAPPY USERS

18. System implementation
• Your technical capability and knowledge
• Your capacity to manage the specification, tendering and selection
• The short-term implementation costs
• The long-term cost of ownership, management and updating
• Management responsibility & staff capacity for the running of your DAMS
• The IT capacity in your organisation
• The number of users onsite and offsite
• The benefits which you are seeking to achieve
• The other systems with which your DAMS will need to interoperate
• Whether you have an existing body of digital assets that need to be transferred into the
DAMS
• How you will provide technical support and training to end-users

20. SPECTRUM/DAM Policies
• The extension of Collections Development (Acquisition & Disposal) Policies
• The expansion of ‘conservation’ to incorporate digital preservation
• The development of the Procedural Manual & staff training
• The inclusion of DAM in Key Performance Indicators
• The extension of awareness of the broader legal context to include DAM
• Inclusion of DAM in plans for resilience, risk, security & disaster recovery
• Extension of Rights Management Policies to include DAM
• DAM metadata & cataloguing/descriptive standards

21. Conclusions
The integration of Digital Asset Management & Strategic Collections
Management (structured around SPECTRUM procedures & related
Collections activities) offers a partial solution for the Collections-focussed
assets and outputs.
A viable strategy might therefore include:
•Development of Collections Management policies, procedures & systems
•Integration of SPECTRUM-structured (collections) DAM
•Development of Records & Information Management
•Implementation of institutional DAM Strategy
•Reconciliation of collections-focussed & institutional DAM

22. Take it further!
http://www.collectionslink.org.uk/spectrum-resources/1688-spectrum-digital-asset-m
Nick Poole
@NickPoole1