Are you someone who understands conservation in a museum or heritage setting? Can you oversee the management and conservation of a huge variety of objects?
The Science Museum Group cares for an astonishingly diverse and internationally significant collection of 7.3 million objects, documents and photographs from science, technology, engineering, medicine, transport and media. In line with our Inspiring Futures strategy, we intend that the SMG Collection will be the best in the world for our fields: well-understood, well-housed and accessible (physically and digitally) and used effectively by us and others for research, display, learning and pleasure. This spring we start moving around 300,000 objects into a new facility at the National Collections Centre at Wroughton, Wiltshire, equipped with a new conservation laboratory and large object workshop.
To help lead on this work, we are now looking for a Head of Conservation & Collections Care to join us on a permanent basis. In this Group-wide role, you will lead the Conservation and Collections Care department across our five museums and two storage facilities, caring for everything from Roman ceramic votives to modern spacesuits.
You will lead the delivery of conservation, collections care, and management of hazards in collections across our sites, ensuring that strategic and museum priorities are delivered, while ensuring that standards of collections care and conservation are applied consistently and effectively across SMG. You will play an active part in the Collections Services senior management team, working closely with colleagues in Logistics, Registration and Digitisation, and in liaison with Curatorial, Masterplan and Exhibition teams across our museums. You will be responsible for leading a department of thirty staff, and the role requires regular travel to all of the Science Museum Group’s museums and collections facilities.
Joining us, you will have solid experience of managing conservation and/or collections care within a museum or heritage organisation, with good knowledge and practical application of current UK Health and Safety legislation relevant to museum collections and hazardous materials. As a senior leader, you will hold excellent interpersonal and leadership skills; with an ability to negotiate with and influence a range of internal and external stakeholders at different levels, as well as develop and manage a team. You will be confident managing complex projects and work programmes, with an ability to deliver within tight deadlines and budgets.
The Science Museum Group is here to Inspire Futures. As the world’s leading group of science museums, we share our unparalleled collection spanning science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine with over five million visitors each year. Joining us as an employee, you will have the opportunity to develop your career in a world-class museum group. We know work/life balance and wellbeing is crucial to our colleagues, so we currently offer up to 27 days annual leave in addition to bank holidays; BUPA medical and dental care; employee assistance programme; enhanced contributory pension; enhanced occupational sick, maternity, paternity, and adoption leave and career breaks.
‘Open for All’ is one of the Science Museum Group’s five core values and sets out our important aspiration to be a place for everyone. We are working hard to understand our organisation better and to foster a culture that recognises and values different backgrounds, mindsets, skills, experience, knowledge and expertise. By having greater diversity, we believe that we will be a stronger and better organisation and ultimately will be able to inspire more futures. We therefore welcome applications from those who bring difference.
Does this appeal to you? If so, click here to view the Vacancy Information Pack which provides you with details of the role and the application process.