Hey Chris,

This is a very interesting topic to me.  It seems like a kind or Rorschach
test for this community.  Everyone has their own experiences, some good,
some bad.
If you're comfortable talking about it, can you give us a little more
information about your situation?  How big is this museum?  how many staff,
how many volunteers.  Do you know anything about their financial situation
or how they're structured?

I'm very curious about it now.  I was in a similar situation, but the museum
is SO small that the only recourse was to ask them to let me raise the money
for my own salary.  Now I'm on staff full-time and making decisions about
the future of the institution.  The lack of staff can be a rare opportunity
if you can get involved with the inner workings of the institution.  On the
other hand, if I had been looking for a simple one-way salary transaction, a
"you pay me and I'll work until I'm done with my day" situation, I would
have gone to a bigger institution.  So my experience is with organizations
that are so far down at the bottom end of the size chart that one person can
be an enormous part of their annual budget.

But that's me.  What's your situation?

Aaron
_____________
Aaron Beebe
Curator
Coney Island USA

-----Original Message-----
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf
Of Rebecca M. Trussell
Sent: Thursday, August 04, 2005 5:56 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [MUSEUM-L] Issue of possible employment.

If you've been asked to perform important work pro bono --work for which
museums normally provide a wage or salary--ask yourself a few questions. Is
the museum new and struggling? Has it incurred a recent (emphasis on
recent) hardship, like loss of major donor, staff walk-off, death, etc.? If
not, there are critical observations you must make. Do you see multiple
signs that significant stewardship tasks are woefully behind? Does everyone
have a ready excuse? Do the numbers of volunteers doing curatorial,
collections management and/or administrative work far exceed the number of
paid staff? If so, museum staff may be at wit's end and your institution's
board may be used to a state of collective negligence--and may have a
purpose "other" than the mission statement--such as personal enjoyment,
community, etc. It's a situation that won't get better without a
crisis--that you may find yourself in the middle of! Your good work may
save the collection, or the day--but in the long run you're being used,
P.T. Barnum-style. Learn all that you can, grow, save the collection, if
you can--but get your plan "B" together. Good Luck!


Rebecca Trussell


> [Original Message]
> From: Indigo Nights <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: 8/4/2005 6:23:08 PM
> Subject: Re: Issue of possible employment.
>
> As has long been stated here, volunteering is one of
> the better ways to get your foot in the door at a
> museum, but one should be careful, they don't just
> take your foot and your leg too.
>
> For any of you who volunteer, if you have some sort of
> spreadsheeting capability on your compuer (Excel?), I
> strongly encourage you to track your volunteer hours.
> Record date, hours spent, to whom you were assigned to
> work under, what institution, and what you did.  Take
> the number of hours you volunteered, and project that
> against the Points of Light figure for a volunteer
> hour, which, for 2004, was listed as $17.55 per hour
> (STOP:  I know many of you don't even make that as
> employees, but that's the figure you have to work with
> and is comparable to the IRS figure).
>
> Run a cumulative total of the number of hours you have
> donated to the Institution and a cumulative value of
> your contribution therefor.  Use your statistics to
> try to leverage you into a full-time position but, if
> the money isn't there, and they're simply carroting
> and donkeying you along, you still have data you can
> use for resume purposes in attempting to get another
> position.
>
> If they promise you anything (except money) to keep
> you there and don't deliver, is there another museum
> in the area in which you can offer your services where
> the chances of acquiring a job are greater?  If yes,
> I'd say go offer yourself there.  If there is nothing
> in your area to which you could transfer your skills
> and abilities, I'd have to ask you:
>
> o  Why are you volunteering there in the first place?
> Is it for a job or the experience to qualify for a
> job?
>
> o  What would you do with your time otherwise if you
> weren't volunteering?  Would you simply stop applying
> yourself and your talents to a museum because a job
> wasn't there?
>
> o  How are you otherwise sustaining yourself?  Do you
> already have a job and do this in your spare time
> trying to get one in the museum field?
>
> If you've already got a job to pay the bills and would
> simply be sitting at home, not being a part of a
> museum, then I'd say don't quit.  If there's another
> place who would be a better job lead, go there if
> they'll have you.
>
> The place for which you are currently volunteering may
> never hire you.  But you are also using them in some
> ways to acquire job knowledge and skills.  The
> information you track on your spreadsheet should help
> on your resume.  I don't think I'd quit, but I'd keep
> looking for something else and realize you owe this
> place no allegiances.
>
>
>
>
> Indigo Nights
> [log in to unmask]
>
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