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our guest today is Julian sega's
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director of the University of
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Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and
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anthropology also known as the Penn
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Museum and we're going to talk to him
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today about reinventing museums for the
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21st century Julian welcome thank you
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for joining us today in knowledge at
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Wharton it's my great pleasure I wonder
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if we could start with something that
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I've found quite paradoxical museums are
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institutions that are that excel at
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preserving the past but as a leader you
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have to focus on preparing the
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institution for the future so how do you
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as a leader how do you manage this
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balance between the past and the future
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right what do you think well it's a very
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interesting question I mean as you say
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this museum has around a million objects
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and it contains the whole past human
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story from you know two million years
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ago from the beginnings of the evolution
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of our species but really what we do as
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a museum is we bring that to life and we
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show the museum go earth through our
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exhibitions for a permanent galleries
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and pre-programming the relevance of the
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past to the present and that's something
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that's a sort of a lens that we filter
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everything through and you can you know
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you can see it particularly in our new
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galleries of the ancient Middle East
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where we we look at a story that seems
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to be a very distant one the first
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cities but as you go through this
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exhibition you see how in fact so much
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of what we're showing you is relevant to
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us today as city dwellers so it's that
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the ability to connect the past to the
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present is really what we're we're
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trying to achieve and so many of the
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different things that we do so that's
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really interesting so when you think
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about connecting the legacy of the past
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to the present one thing that becomes
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really important is how you engage with
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with your audience or audiences and
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increasingly it seems to me that a big
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challenge that many museums seem to face
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is how do you connect with younger
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generations who go beyond sort of the
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the cultural elite but who are the
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Millennials or Generation Z or whatever
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you know acronym you choose to call them
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would you say this is one of the biggest
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challenges that museums face today it's
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certainly one of the big challenges that
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we face and you know as as you look at
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what's available to Millennials I mean
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there is the marketplace for your time
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gets bigger and bigger every single year
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also the actual the notion of a museum
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has has changed then you know museums
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now not necessarily automatically
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considered to be a voice of authority
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and so in engaging younger audiences is
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a really important part of what we do
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but it actually often means we have to
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change how we work and how we program
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and it's usually a more consultative
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process where you're actually asking
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younger generations what do you want to
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get out of the museum experience you
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have to design galleries with them in
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mind I actually have a great deal of
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faith in Millennials I mean they are
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they're a very engaged generation and
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they're looking for content and they're
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looking for authenticity and of course
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that's really what we do so as you think
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about how museums are trying to cope
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with this challenge what are some of the
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more innovative strategies that you have
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found museums practicing in engaging
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with Millennials and younger audiences
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well I think even more diverse audiences
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right well I think the key thing to
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remember here is you just can't program
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for an audience without their
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involvement and so I think what museums
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are doing increasingly is being more
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aware of the communities that they want
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to serve and that means often
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partnerships of those communities where
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they become actively part of the
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programming process themselves you're
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essentially asking them what they would
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like and we're about to open a series of
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galleries that highlight our African
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collection and we have set up a steering
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committee of community members to
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actually get it what are the issues that
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you would like to explore in a gallery
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with content like that and I think I see
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that with museums all over the world now
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that it's no longer here's our content
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that we we've curated for you it's
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mr. joint curatorship but at the same
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time you know museums contain this
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enormous pool of intellectual capital
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which we want to give as an act of
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generosity almost to the people to which
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are some of the more innovative museums
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in your experience around the world that
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have figured out ways to overcome the
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limitations just of serving people in
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their immediate region but using say
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digital strategies to engage more
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broadly with other audiences the to the
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release prince mine the Brooklyn Museum
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has done some amazing work with their
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digital content they have a whole team
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of basically content producers much like
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yourselves and they actually program for
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a level of membership that's purely
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digital and so there's new programming
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there are podcasts there's you know deep
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dives into the collection and I think
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they've done an amazing job the British
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Museum did an interesting thing they
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want it to be the classroom to the world
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and so they put a great deal of their
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collection online and would put on a
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range of teaching resources that are
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really first-rate and that's one of the
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things that that we set out to do about
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eight years ago is we have these million
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objects most of them aren't on display
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but now we've digitized around 700,000
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of those and we also put all of our
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contents lectures we filmed them and we
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put them on our YouTube channel and it's
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it's amazing I mean so we can have a
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lecture in you know one of our lecture
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halls it could be on something that's
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reasonably esoteric like the early
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cities of of Mesopotamia and we found
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that you know within a year that lecture
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has had in thirty thousand views from
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all over the world and you know we get
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we get contacted by people in Australia
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who are using there are content in their
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classrooms as well as for their own
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personal edification some of the lessons
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you think other museums can learn from
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some of the strategies you described
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well Mike Khan def who's the head of our
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website his strategy is more is more
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and er the more material that you put up
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the better and it just it tends to build
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on itself and so I think this idea of
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like record everything have everything
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available to everyone everywhere and
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also make it free and that's something
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that I think a lot of museums are
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realizing we used to you know charge for
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images of our collections we used to
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actually not let people take photographs
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in our gallery but in fact what you're
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doing is you're missing this potential
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advocate to go and post your material on
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social media download your images from
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your website and use them in ways that
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you couldn't have even figured out and
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it's a wonderful marketing and free
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marketing for for museums and getting
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our message out so as you think about
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implementing some of these digital
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strategies what would you think are some
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of the biggest obstacles that museums
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face in trying to implement digital
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transformation it's not easy and and and
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so any thoughts on what are the biggest
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challenges well a couple of thoughts
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being putting material online is is time
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consuming and it's costly but it really
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does pay dividends but it needs a
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concerted focus from the top down to do
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it the bigger challenge is actually the
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digital realm in galleries and to get
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back to your earlier points about you
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know how do how do young generations
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learn so much or how they learn now is
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through a digital interface and so they
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expect that to be in the galleries but
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the thing about digital technology is it
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dates very quickly and it's very
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expensive and so you're always trying to
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find that careful balance with having
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technology that allows visitors to drill
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down into the information that they have
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but that won't become obsolete I mean
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that we can never compete with you know
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the video game world but so that's
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that's how balance we have to tread and
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also you don't want the digital
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technology to take away from the
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integrity
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the object that's right in front him you
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don't want it to overwhelm it right now
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in addition to the display and the many
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educational institutions are
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experiencing disruption at three three
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levels with may as a result of digital
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transformation one is on the research
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front so secondly there's the teaching
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and thirdly is the engagement with the
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public do you see the same thing
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happening at the Museum and if so what
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has what has been so well have been some
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of the things you've done to address
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these issues
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hmm well those three realms are very
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interesting one for a museum like ours
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because they're at our heart where a a
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research and teaching institution but in
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many ways that's what makes us the most
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interesting now we all live digitally
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all of our researchers are students who
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come visit us and the public and so the
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key is is how do you unite all of these
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different digital arenas so they're all
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informing each other so for example you
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know in our galleries I've often said
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you know the most interesting thing
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about archaeology is archeologists and
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so we actually update what our field
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archeologists have been doing in the
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field in the galleries and so the
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research angle comes through and you
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through to the public so they know that
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all of these different areas are all
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sort of working to together to sort of
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cross fertilize each other that's great
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now I was talking the other day to to a
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colleague of mine who works with a lot
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of different companies on their digital
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strategies and she was telling me that
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one of the biggest mistakes that she has
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found people make when they are trying
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to go through this digital
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transformation journey is that they just
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hire a chief digital officer and they
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expect that one person to change
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everything and and of course it doesn't
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work and then you know after some time
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the chief digital officer is out and
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they try something else I was wondering
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if you have encountered similar thinking
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it museums around the world and and what
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do you think might be a good way to
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implement digital strategies if
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don't think this is the right way right
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well many museums have actually employed
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a chief digital officer I think the Met
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is probably the most famous example that
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we've seen in recent years and they do
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sort of think well that'll be the Silver
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Bullet that will cure everything I think
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that there is potential for a chief
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digital officer for this reason is they
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can find ways of uniting the different
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platforms that are happening digitally
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anyway in the museum and bring some sort
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of order to chaos from the research
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angle they can all be somebody who can
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you know look at a researcher who saves
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working in Egypt with a with a the
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projects out there and he could
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basically help inform them of digital
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tools that they didn't really know about
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but it's certainly in and of itself not
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going to solve your problems but I think
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museums are sort of feeling their way
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with this one but it's certainly in the
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last few years many museums have gone
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down this route and not always
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successfully know you've been at the
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pennmen since July 2012 if I have seems
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like yesterday and before that you were
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at museums in Toronto and in London and
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I was wondering you know what the
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lessons that you learned early on any of
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career that that were helpful to you in
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in what you are doing today and what
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some of those lessons might have been
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well I think when the lessons I learned
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very early on was that the best way to
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communicate with anybody is with
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storytelling and that really doesn't
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matter which museum you are in but
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that's really that's really at the core
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of what we do you're trying to transform
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somebody's understanding of themselves
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by stories of the past or whatever your
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discipline was I've always known that in
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fact nothing is more powerful than
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actually meeting the people who are
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doing the research and finding ways to
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get them out in front is is paramount
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you know everybody responds to a person
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and that is always a challenge for a
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museum because we're often galleries
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with nobody in them there's one thing
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I've really learned from being at the
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Penn Museum though which I didn't know I
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mean the other museums I've worked at
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have been very large fairly hierarchical
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mostly government-funded
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so Penn has is a university environment
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and so you have to have a much more
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consultative approach to leadership
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which is of course the Academy's way and
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you know I mean initially I thought well
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that'll probably slow things down a bit
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but in fact I think it makes things a
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lot a lot more effective and it's a it's
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a part of my own leadership thing that I
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that I really whose great to discover it
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and I think it it leads to more
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substantive change and of course the
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other big difference is from coming from
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a you know government-funded
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institutions to institutionally Penn is
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of course fundraising is a huge part of
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leadership here I mean if you want to do
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something you have to fundraise for and
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Penn is enormous ly supportive in that
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process well I wonder since and you've
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been at Penn for six years what has been
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the biggest leadership challenge I have
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faced in your time here how did you
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overcome the challenge and what did you
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learn from it
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well the biggest challenge has been a
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building transformation project so this
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museum is a really remarkable and unique
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one you could never create a museum like
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the Penn Museum today and our focus has
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been teaching and research but we have
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collections that some of which are in
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like every single textbook of the whole
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of the history of art I mean these are
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incredibly important objects but we sort
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of let our public spaces go some of
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those galleries have been around for 70
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80 years in some cases and so this was
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an enormous opportunity and an enormous
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challenge was to basically redo 44
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thousand square feet of the museum so we
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embarked through our strategic plan of
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the largest project we've ever done but
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of course it comes with a fairly hefty
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price tag of over a hundred million
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dollars so that our biggest challenge
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has been
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been adopting a fundraising strategy
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that can help us meet our goals and
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luckily were at Penn which you know
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which gets very excited by big ideas and
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so we are we're well over 60% of that of
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that total so far but you know that is
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and will always be there that the
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heaviest lift that I have as a leader
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here serve is to meet those goals and we
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will thinking about the future now how
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would you like Penn museum to be
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positioned for the future and how would
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you measure its success right well right
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now anybody who's an archaeologist or
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not historian deals of the ancient world
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knows about our Museum when these
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galleries are reopened and with the
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marketing campaign go with it my gauge
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of success will be bought public facing
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and I would like any visitor to
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Philadelphia to be very upset if they
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don't have an opportunity to come to the
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Penn Museum it has to be an absolute
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must see for coming to Philadelphia and
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I mean there there are sort of obvious
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ways to measure that success and one of
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them will be which we we are around
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200,000 people come and visit us a year
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and I'd like to double that and I think
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it's imminently possible I mean where
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else in the world outside of Egypt will
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you be able to see a Egyptian veronik
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Palace at full height it's going to be
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spectacular well Julian thank you so
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much for speaking with knowledge at work
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and it's been great speaking with my
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absolute pleasure
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you
