Drawing on the recent successes of the Experience & Digital Team at ACMI, this paper will explain how the team is using product management methods to strategically transform the organization’s culture from one of irregular, exhibition-driven change to one that is constantly and continuously evolving. Using Simon Wardley’s Pioneer Settlers Town Planners concept as a framing tool, this paper will discuss the first year of a new process implementing product management practice and conclude by giving a series of recommendations able to be adopted by museums large and small.

1. Transforming a museum
through product management
Museums and the Web 2017
Lucie Paterson, ACMI
@luciepaterson

3. But not always …

8. Digital finding its place in the organisation

9. Ambitious Digital Strategy and
programme of work

10. Project Manager doing Scrum in a waterfall
organisation

11. The Glass Box in Royal Festival Hall

13. Running multiple
projects in parallel leads
to dependencies which
can slow things down.
Better to start small and
build up experience and
trust by delivering
iteratively.
Focus on addressing
user needs, not the
needs of your Executive.
Digital skills should be
distributed across the
organisation.
Need strategic support
from above to work in
new ways.
A single product owner
with decision-making
authority is important.
Use what methods work
for your organisation.
And I learnt I’d
had enough bad
weather to last a
life time …
WHAT I LEARNT AT SOUTHBANK CENTRE

17. ACMI

18. Video

19. 3 galleries
2 cinemas
2 production/education studios
1 co-working space
1 cafe & bar
1 shop
1.4m annual visitors

20. Mission
To enrich our lives and foster our
creative industries by illuminating the
moving images and technologies that
define our age

21. “ACMI celebrates and explores the moving image —
and in this rapidly evolving sector must become an
organisation that is constantly evolving itself. The
challenge for us is to build an internal culture that is
resilient and risk taking, active and accountable to
ensure we not only remain relevant to our visitors
and communities but stay ahead of the curve in
content, process and delivery.”
Katrina Sedgwick, Director CEO

22. Experience & digital team

23. Seb Chan
Chief Experience Officer
Andy Serong
Developer
Shelley Matulick
Content Producer
Me
Product Manager

24. Brand &
Marketing
Exhibitions
& Collections
Public
Programs
& Education
Film
Programs
Development Commercial
& Operations
Experience & Digital

25. People spending a lot of
time emailing.
A lot of long meetings
without agendas.
Not much cross-team
collaboration around
problem solving.
Information was
exclusive to certain
teams or levels of staff.
People missing
important information
they needed to do their
jobs.
Information in Word
documents and on
network drives.
A resistance to change
because they had been
working the same way
for so long.
Flexible working was
encouraged but not
practical.
Staff not putting
visitor needs
first…
WHEN I STARTED AT ACMI, MARCH 2016

26. How can product management help?

27. “it’s important not to think of your needs — for
example, your desire to make a profit or be
successful. You need to think carefully about what
the user actually wants”
Simon Wardley, 2015

29. What we’ve delivered
in the last 12 months

30. Scorsese exhibition audio guide

32. Section of Visitor Journey Map (Meld Studios, 2015)

33. Putting the shop online in four weeks

34. Flexibility to incorporate fundraising campaign

35. Take advantage of the many integrations and API

36. Nightingale and the Rose exhibition
long form

39. Given significant staff
and budget resource.
In depth requirements
gathering resulting in a
detailed brief and
technical specification.
Lengthy procurement
process.
Considerable time and
resource spent building
the product from the
ground up.
Or significant bespoke
customisation to existing
internal systems.
And then time
integrating the product
with internal systems.
No agility to add in new
features. These would be
seen as another project.
No oversight to consider
the whole visitor journey.
Many features built no
longer relevant to users.
Technical debt and
legacy sites to maintain
and eventually
decommission.
Not enough time
spent with users to
find out what they
need from the
product or service.
IF WE TREATED THESE AS PROJECTS

40. New ACMI website

42. Focus on the needs of
the 80% of our website
visitors. We identified
three key user journeys.
Optimised it for
transactions and
navigating content to
facilitate a ticket sale
and a physical visit.
Mobile first front end —
50% of our website visitors
are on their phones.
Pattern library for evolving
the structure and front end
design over time.
New content management
system, infrastructure and
hosting.
Support new content
types such as long form
articles and collection
items.
Distributed authorship
model and updated
internal processes.
Reflect updated brand
with clear distinction
between museum &
cinemas.
Build up internal skills and
knowledge.
At launch we would
go into a state of
‘perpetual beta’
NEW ACMI WEBSITE BRIEF

51. Internal processes needed to change

52. Automated processes
Ticketing
(Education do their events)
Marketing
Programs
Deadline for submission
ahead of on sale date
* Allow 4 weeks before the event date for promotion
Ticket is built with
info from Trello
card
Production ID is
added to event in
CMS & synced
Web Team reviews
event in CMS
Ticketing info entered
into Trello card & EBMS
schedule attached
GL/Designation/GST, holds,
selling capacity, booking info
required, promo pricing
Event info entered
into CMS, sent to
Trello & assigned
to Web Team
member
Event
scheduled
in EBMS
Venue, date,
start & finish
time
Tessitura updates
event with dates and
times
4 weeks for complex events
A multi-session event with up to 10 separate sessions or screenings and
additional features
2 weeks for simple events
A single session screening with standard pricing and no additional features
Publish event &
close Trello card
Amends process
1. Create a NEW card in ‘Post live amends to events’ list on Trello board. Include title of the event and the type of
amend ie ‘Session change to The Rehearsal’’
2. Detail changes in Description field and any attachments ie EMBS export if it’s a change to scheduling
3. Assign to Ronan - he will make the changes and publish.
NB: all non-ticketing amends can be made in the CMS by programmers.
- Review for
style
- Add metadata
for SEO
- Publish
- Close card
- Build tickets &
passes
- Check
occurrences
- Publish
ticketing
changes
- Syncs
Event info from CMS goes into a
Trello card & Web Team are
pinged on Slack to review event
New event published
(not set up yet!)

54. “We will develop our digital culture by having modern
IT. We need to find ways for people to use more of the
digital skills they have developed in their out-of-work
lives. Having modern and flexible IT equipment, as
set-out in our IT Strategy, is transformative to how we
work and of huge importance.
From The National Archives Digital Strategy

55. Email has reduced and
Slack is used by 200
staff.
Fewer meetings and
they are more
structured and more
collaborative.
Slack and Trello have
opened communication
between teams and
departments.
Information is being
shared more widely and
all parts of the museum
are providing feedback.
Modern tools are being
used across the
museum allowing us to
work from anywhere
with an internet
connection.
People are more open to
change because we
have demonstrated the
value it can bring.
People are
actively involving
our team and
thinking user
first.
STATE OF PLAY AT THE MUSEUM, APRIL 2017

56. Key takeaways

57. Put the user-first focus at the
heart of the organisation with
representation at the top
table.

58. Evangelise for user first all
the time — in every
discussion and at all levels.

59. Don’t complicate it. Use the
parts of methodologies that
work for your organisation.

60. Small, cross-functional
teams with autonomy
to make decisions.

61. Regularly talk to your
visitors and observe
what they do.

62. Talk to your visitor services
staff on a daily basis. They
know your visitors best.

63. Consider the whole visitor
journey — before the visit, at
the museum and post visit.

64. Don’t reinvent the wheel —
use commodity products
and services where possible.

65. Prototype early and
quickly, get feedback
and iterate.

66. Learn by doing instead of
running formal training
sessions and writing
documentation.

67. Tell people what you are
doing. Be transparent
and share news.

68. Don’t forget about the
internal processes —
deliver the whole service.

69. Make it fun! Slack and Trello
have two things Microsoft
Outlook doesn’t have and
that’s emojis and giphy.

70. Thank you
@luciepaterson
lucie.paterson@acmi.net.au
labs.acmi.net.au @acmiLABS