William Tregaskes, the museum co-ordinator at Cynon Valley Museum in Aberdare and co-founder of the Front of House Museums blog, says that some early-career museum professionals change their view of front of house (FoH) roles when they begin working in them.
“FoH is often seen as a good way in to the sector,” he says. “But some people end up actually enjoying FoH. I would include myself in that group. When I started working in FoH I saw the importance of it and the human element of the museum that I hadn’t really been fully open to before. That kind of experience can alter people’s career path.”
FoH can undoubtedly be valuable preparation for collections-focused roles. But there is a growing feeling in the sector that it can be a rewarding choice in itself, as well as providing a launchpad for a career in museum and heritage operations.
Tamsin Russell, the Museums Association’s professional development officer, says that FoH roles are as legitimate as any others within a museum.
“A museum is a complex machine with multiple moving parts and outputs,” she says. “Whether the moving part is working in conservation and conserving objects for display, or working in facilities management or estates, ensuring the fabric of the building is fit for purpose, all can be rewarding careers in their own right.
“The concept of reward varies from individual to individual, so it is important to understand what rewarding means for you,” says Russell. “If it is about working with people, staffing events and creating an enjoyable visitor experience, then FoH may be the right area for you.”
Russell says that FoH positions tend to come up frequently, partly because of the number of posts. There also tends to be a high turnover in FoH, in part because many roles are seasonal.
This can provide an excellent opportunity for people that have worked in customer-centred environments such as retail or hospitality to try out working in museums and heritage. When recruiting for FoH roles, museums may see skills gained in other sectors as more valuable than educational qualifications or heritage experience.
Rachel Mackay, the operations manager at Kew Palace (part of Historic Royal Palaces – HRP), who leads a team including more than 20 seasonal FoH staff, says that a background in catering (her own route into the sector) can be particularly valuable.
“It teaches you so much in terms of staying calm under pressure and customer service and time management,” she says. “When I am looking for staff I will always look for a catering background.”
Mackay says that the right personal qualities are probably more important than knowledge about the content of the museum.
“You can teach people about the history of the building, but you can’t necessarily teach somebody not to lose their head in a crisis,” she says.
She firmly believes that FoH and operational roles should be seen a career path in their own right, and not just as a route to other types of work.
“For a lot of people, FoH is a first step to doing something else within the sector,” Mackay says. “But I hope that more people are now seeing that operations is a specialism – there is a professionalism to it and it can be a career in itself.”
Terms are used differently within organisations but, generally speaking, FoH positions are directly visitor-facing roles that fall under the broader umbrella of operations. For those that do want to move on from FoH, it provides the ideal background for taking on responsibility for wider operations, says Mackay.
“Operations is just making things work – and the only way you know how to make things work in a museum or heritage setting is by having done the job on the floor,” she says. “ If you haven’t done that, you’re not going to have any idea of how to operate buildings. So, one leads into the other”.
Museum professionals working in operations need to work closely with colleagues in other parts of the museum, although with a different focus. With the recent restoration of the Great Pagoda in Kew Gardens (which is reopening this summer), Mackay says that the key moment for the operations team came when colleagues on the project team considered the job almost done.
“You can restore a building but if you want to breathe new life into it, it’s the operations team that will come along and do that,” she says.
For this kind of co-operation to work, people need to understand that museums are comprised of people working in complementary professional roles that require different skillsets.
“Not everybody can be a collections manager or a curator, but at the same time, not everyone could do operations,” says Mackay. “Operations is one of those things that people think they can just jump in and do, but actually a lot of people don’t have the temperament or the organisational skills.”
David Hingley, the chief operating officer at the Landmark Trust, who was until April the head of operations at Hampton Court Palace (also part of HRP), wrote a blog for Front of House Museums earlier this year questioning the tendency to divide museum posts into “specialist” roles and “ops”, arguing that “we underestimate the level of expertise that exists in operational teams”.
If colleagues suggested that operations isn’t a specialism, Hingley urged readers to “hand them your duty manager radio, or the keys to the place they work and wish them the very best of luck for when the lights go off or the toilets block.”
Hingley says that during his time at Hampton Court Palace, the venue made efforts to offer FoH staff career development opportunities in whichever part of the sector their ambitions lay.
He describes the venue’s message to FoH as: “If you want to progress into other areas, you need to let us know what they are, and then we can look at opportunities to get you involved in projects with other teams, where you can show off what you can do.”
This included involving FoH staff in meetings with exhibition teams, where they could share their knowledge about how visitors used the space and what common pitfalls were. This approach led to some FoH staff moving on to roles in areas such as membership and interpretation at the end of a season.
Hampton Court Palace also offered FoH staff opportunities to give tours and talks, and develop their people and management skills if they were interested in moving on to more senior roles within visitor experience. “There were different opportunities to progress, depending on what people wanted to do,” says Hingley.
He says that of the FoH staff who moved on to roles in other heritage organisations, about 40% moved on to back of house roles and about 60% went on to FoH or operational jobs.
Ultimately, museum professionals need to gain experience in whichever specific area they want to work in, but because operational staff tend to get pulled into all areas of museum work, Hingley says that “it’s a good place to be to find out where you want to go”.
The anonymous author of the Attendant’s View blog, who now works in a primarily exhibitions-focused role, says that the practical skills gained through working in FoH have been invaluable preparation for their current role.
“I really appreciate the time I spent working FoH,” says the author. “On a very practical level, when you’ve worked in FoH, you understand how visitors behave a little bit more.”
Tregaskes, of the Front of House Museums blog, says that he plans a career trajectory focusing more on people than collections. “If you look at my Twitter feed from when I started to now, you would see a general move away from archaeology towards museum policy and access and so on.”
But in his view the visitor-focused ethos of FoH teams should permeate all parts of the museum.
“I see FoH as any role where you come into contact with people or your role impacts the public’s experience,” Tregaskes says. “I would argue that everyone should consider themselves FoH.”