Science Museum Group: History, Objectives, Sustainability, and Financial Operations

This article provides an overview of the Science Museum Group, including its history, organisational structure, strategic objectives, steps taken to meet consumer demands, sustainability efforts, and financial operations. It explores the museum's role in preserving and promoting science, technology, medicine, media, and industry. The article also discusses the museum's governance and the issues impacting its stakeholders.

SCIENCE MUSEUM
GROUP

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
Overview of History of Science Museum Group and Organisational Structure.........................3
Strategic objectives of Science Museum Group..........................................................................4
Steps taken by Science Museum Group for meeting consumers’ demands................................5
Steps for Improving Sustainability..............................................................................................6
Financial Operation of Science Museum Group.........................................................................6
Balance sheet of the Museum:.....................................................................................................8
Classification of Stakeholders...................................................................................................10
Issues impacting the stakeholders..............................................................................................11
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION
Science museum group is basically a collection of the various British museums namely
national railway museum in York, Science and Industry Museum in Manchester and many more.
Its chairman is Dame Mary Archer who was appointed by the Prime Minister. The report
basically describes various aspects of the group including history, overview, customer trends,
objectives, sustainability, financial operations, governance, stakeholders and the current issues.
MAIN BODY
Overview of History of Science Museum Group and Organisational Structure
History
The origin of Science Museum Group is in South Kensington Museum which was set up
after the Great Exhibition of 1851. The science museum along with Victoria and albert museum
after the reorganisation of the South Kensington Museum in 1909. It was also expanded outside
London and the National Railway Museum which was established in 1975 when the railway
collection of British Transport Commission was transferred to the Science Museum’s board of
trustees. This museum was opened in 2004 by doing partnership with council of Sedgefield
Borough. But, on 1 December 2017, the responsibility of all its operations was transferred
completely to the Science Museum Group (Science Museum Group, Annual Report and
Accounts, 2013). The National Science Media museum which was considered as the National
Museum of Photography, Film & Television, by taking the support of Bradford City Council
which was a part of council’s redevelopment economically. The Science Museum collections
store at a location of Wroughton which was the airfield of Second World War which was made
available to the Museum by the defence Ministry in 1979.
Organisational Structure
Management
The museum considers the Board of Trustees as key players though they are only 12-20
in number, are appointed by the Prime Minister. The director of the museum which is also the
Chief Executive Officer is responsible for the Board of Trustees. The Accounting officer is
accountable for the DCMS for compliance with the statement of Management and Financial
Memorandum. Their duties are stated under the National Heritage Act 1983. For example, the
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role of Trustees is mentioned in the Act as to establish the policies of the museum, review the
performance and also endorse appointments to the key positions of management (Science
Museum Group, Annual Report and Accounts, 2019). The main activity performed by them is to
assist the chairman so that they can meet the overall responsibilities of board according to the
policies of State secretary and also by complying with the charity law. Trustees also contribute
by providing guidance and expertise to the chairman regarding the development of strategies and
its practical implementation.
The director of the Museum is responsible for collections, the cultural programmes held in the
museum and also coordinating the delivery of overall goals of museum. The executive of the
museum is responsible to allocate the resources, lead the strategic management and develop the
cultural content in programmes by sustaining the values.
The museum is having highly diversified staff who are provided with equal opportunities. There
is an effective communication between the employees which is shown in the surveys and training
programmes where they are asked for the feedback and the new ideas which can bring
innovation in the museum. It also partners with the occupational health providers. All the people,
line managers, staff and everyone strives hard to achieve the goals of the museum by promoting
equality and diversity in all the programmes.
Strategic objectives of Science Museum Group
The Science Museum Group (SMG) is basically focussed on the history and
contemporary practice of science, technology, medicine, media and industry. The SMG
comprises of many other museums like National Railway Museum, Museum of Science and
Industry and many more. In the field, this group is the largest, most comprehensive and most
significant in the world (Science Museum Group, Annual Report and Accounts, 2013). The main
objective of science museum group is to get more opportunities which can consider its outputs
more than output of its parts. The strategic objective of the Science museum group are as
follows:
 Desire to the highest standards of international museum in all the aspects like care and
protection of the collections, programming, scholarship, learning and advocacy in the
subject areas.
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 To strengthen the core narratives and able to deliver the gallery displays which are mostly
dynamic.
 Develop the strategies which can facilitate the audience with the experiences which can
enhance the quality of their life.
 Effective implementation of all the strategies keeping in mind the satisfaction of the
audience.
 Set a specific Audience Plan till 2020 and review it in every 3 years (Science Museum
Group, Annual Report and Accounts, 2019).
 Completing the One collection project till 2023.
 Devising innovative programmes in order to promote the innovation and manufacturing
in UK.
 Expand the museum and its services in the national as well as international areas and
markets.
 To make the optimum and justifies use of the available estate.
 To be an organisation which can develop great people by being extrovert and dedicated to
generate maximum number of entrepreneurs.
Steps taken by Science Museum Group for meeting consumers’ demands
The Science Group Museum and all the people related to it strives hard to consistently
meet the demands of the visitors and also try to meet up the exceeded demands of them. The
management of the museum reaches and reflects all the communities which are to be served in
order to achieve the goals (Demirag, 2018). The museum also segregates its overall audience into
segments so that their demands can be analysed clearly and can be addressed completely.
The museums strive hard to improve the visitors’ experiences based on their attitudes towards
culture and science and also on their behaviours. For this, they establish a visitor plan for every
museum which helps the museum to analyse the growth audience in the coming years. They also
organise internal workshops and Inspiring Service Framework at the museum to improve the
customer service (Museum Trends and Prospects for 2018, 2017).
The trustees of museum also monitor the audiences through specific research projects and exit
surveys which helps in gaining the feedbacks from the visitors on the site or through social
media. All the comments of the visitors are addressed and the required improvements are made
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in the museum. They also developed a system named Customer relationship management which
helps it to build stronger relationships with its visitors which enables more effective
communication with the audience (Agyeman, 2019).
The museum also tries to remove the barriers between them and the audience. They evaluate the
reasons behind the lagging behind of the audience from social and diverse culture. It also
delivers various exhibitions and programmes on all the sites offline and online both.
Steps for Improving Sustainability
The Science Museum group also lays emphasis on the impact of the organisation on the
environment. All the museums of this group are taking initiatives which can benefit the
environment in one way or the other. It exhibition named The Sun: Living with our star aware
the people about the humankind’s relationship with the closest star and the need to preserve its
identity. Likewise, the half term programme initiated by the National Railway Museum focused
on the Energy and Sustainability in which they engaged many families in recycling and
alternative energy sources (Policies and Reports, 2020). At the same time, the museum also
organised various school programmes in which they tried to support the links of environmental
curriculum and also encouraged the students to so the same through certain subjects like power
generation, designing and materials.
Besides this, the people in the group always finds such options in all the processes where the
environment does not get harmed. The colleagues travelled more than 5 million kilometres by
rail because it is a low-carbon emitting transport which has positively impacted the footprint
(Ledgerwood, 2017). They have also introduced solar panels on the collection buildings along
with PV installation for the gatehouse. They have also upgraded their light system from halogen
to LED and also replaced the chillers and boilers. They also plan to decrease the landfill waste
and implements the best waste management plan. The museum is also hosting a bee garden for
the summers in collaboration with the citywide project. They also use their estate to support the
initiatives which drives sustainability in a much better way.
Financial Operation of Science Museum Group
As noted in 2018-19, the total of the group became £510,477 after being increased by
£4,951k at 31 March, 2018. The Group believes in distinguishing its funds into following
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classifications: Restricted & Unrestricted, Expandable and Non-expandable funds, endowment
funds and the benefit pension liability of Group along with other funds as expandable reserves.
Along all these, the Non-expendable amounts are mainly associated with the capital assets’
future depreciation. But, unfortunately, in 2018-19 the expendable reserves of the group have
faced a rapid decline.
The designated funds are used in the capital projects, investments in infrastructure, budget inline,
also in the one collection project which is located at the national collection centre and also the
special exhibition gallery which is in Manchester. The restricted funds increased rapidly due to
the funding identified in the advance of activities such as generous donations exceptionally from
the David and Claudia Harding Foundation and many more (Financial Reporting Council, 2018).
Figure 1: Classification of Funds
Source:
The net results of the Group were considered as a deficit of £107k. The figure which was noted
in 2017-18 consisted a loss of £8,547k on the disposal of Blythe house to DCMS. Whereas the
figure of 2018-19 contained a loss of £4,500k on the disposal of the collection of RPS to the
Victoria and Albert Museum.
The result of the unrestricted for the year 2018-19 was a deficit of £11,718k which was £8,050k
in 2017–18. This happened due to the lack of sponsors and the income of ticket in this year.
Though, due to the exceptional donations and grants, there was an increase in the restricted
income and also due to funding from various supporters like DCMS.
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Figure 2: Income and Expenditure by Fund
Source:
The grant received by DCMS increased substantially from£45.2m in 2017–18 to £47.9m in
2018–19. The stable investment for the core activities is £35.0m because of the grant received
for the museum of national coal mining at £2.4m. The museum also received for the Special
Gallery Exhibition of £0.6m in Manchester and also £7.5m for One collection programme.
Donations were increased from £3.9m to £8.1m in 2018-19. Fluctuations can be seen in the
donations every year. The group also got the income from the grants and the tickets which also
increased from £14.4m to £18.7m. under the grant incomes, there was an income regarding the
AR experience at the Science Museum along with the Tour of Superbugs named as The Fight for
Our Live and in the charitable incomes the tax relief in the payment for museums and the
exhibitions of the Gallery is also included (Blooploop, 2020).
Balance sheet of the Museum:
The museum faced an increase in the tangible assets by £12.9m. The net surplus was found to be
approx. £25.2m with depreciation of approx. £16.3m. There was an additional investment of
£25.2m in the various projects of Science Museum Group. The sales balance and the proceeded
fund at the end of the year was approx. £28.4m (Science Museum Group, Annual Report and
Accounts, 2019).
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Focussing on the future developments, the group will lay emphasis on building the sustainable
unrestricted income. In the next year, the completion of the Group’s shop’s refurbishment will
take place and the initiation of the new IMAX projector will take place. It also follows various
policies like creditor, investment, reserves etc.
Governance of the organization
The Directorate of the Group has the foremost responsibility for coordinating the
functions of the secretaries who works for the main board as well as governance arrangements’
oversight and the board committees’ management.
The Board of Trustees of the group determines the matters which needs the approval of the
board. The committee who is responsible for collections and research gives advice to the board
of trustees regarding their role. The audit and risk committee provides the assurance regarding
the risk, control and the required governance (Long and Ibar, 2017). The role of Masterplan and
the estate committee is to give advice to the board of trustees regarding the development plans of
capital of group along with the financial decisions within the limits. The Finance committee
provides the board of trustees considering all the financial matters and helps in making the
finance related decisions but within their remit. The committee of remuneration advices on the
Director’s remuneration and of the senior executives. The Science Museum advisory board is
responsible for advising the group director and board of trustees on the offers regarding to
cultural activities. The Advisory board of Railway Heritage Designation helps in making
recommendations to Board of trustees on the subject related to designation and disposal of
railway heritage artefacts and archives. The board of directors of the SCMG enterprises ltd. helps
in decision-making regarding the commercial operations and also monitoring the progress of the
group against the budget (Wetherley and Otter, 2018).
The governance of the organisation adheres to the standards of the good corporate governance as
the company ensures that all the shareholders and the key owners exercise their rights and
functions. Also, there is transparency and the information of all the roles and responsibilities of
all the committees is clear to each other. The roles of the different committees and boards are
also appropriate according to their designation which suggests that the company is following the
standards of good corporate governance. All the boards and committees of Science Museum
Group promotes the transparency principles. The principle of professionalism is also promoted
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by the individuals by performing all their roles sincerely which increases the confidence of the
existing and the potential investors and also enhances the growth and development of the
Museum group.
Classification of Stakeholders
Stakeholders are basically individuals or the groups which have a legitimate interest in
the decision-making or any activity of the organisation. They are the people who support the
organisation and without whose support the organisations would cease to exist and also they are
impacted by the outcomes of the organisation or the project (Mallin, 2016). Its common
examples are Employees, customers, communities, governments, shareholders, suppliers.
Classification of stakeholders
Internal stakeholders: They are important because they are the ones who interface regularly
with the collection management system and exercises the power to foster or hinder the works
dependent on the system. There are mainly five types of museum staff including the collection
managers or the registrars, curators, educators, conservators and exhibit designers (Braun, 2019).
Each stakeholder needs a valuable experience from the CMS and each one of them play the role
considering the input as well as the extraction of information from the collection system.
Collection managers input information for provenance and accession of each object which helps
in assisting the museum staff in the management and care of object.
Curators are responsible for both the input and extracting the information of object.
Conservators are responsible for referencing the important information of object. They support
the reports that provides areas where information can be stored and retrieved by the staff.
Educators are in charge of the educational events, lectures, workshops and helps in content
creation.
External stakeholders: These are the parties and the individual who does not work for the
organisational objectives but plays a major role by making a large investment that supports the
museum. These can be the donors who invests in the museum for activities like refurbishments
and also to enhance the infrastructure or advancing the collection regarding the museum. They
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engage in every activity of the museum as they contribute towards its success. They are also the
investors who invest in the museum and act as key partners.
Issues impacting the stakeholders
The current issues identified by the board of trustees of Science museum group are as follows:
 The National Railway Museum Vision 2025 is supported by the board of trustees but will
affect the stakeholders as it needs a lot of investment and also will create pressure on the
internal stakeholders.
 One collection has various recommendations which were approved by the board
regarding the timeline of the project as it needs extension of ONE as development part of
NCC (National Collection Centre) at Wroughton but it affects the stakeholders in the
country because they will be affected by the success and failure of the project (Armstrong
and et.al., 2019).
 Sustainability is the another issue as the board devoted a large and significant part of the
annual strategy in this which also pressurizes the internal stakeholders to perform the
sustainable operations and also needs the investment from the donors to appoint a
sustainability champion.
 Group ethics policy: It affects all the trustees, volunteers, advisors and staff to follow all
the ethics in their operations and also helps in achieving the objectives personally and
professionally. It also creates a sense of trust in the stakeholders towards the museum.
CONCLUSION
The above report focussed upon the history and the overview of the Science Museum Group.
It also mentioned some of the strategic objectives of the group in which the data was taken from
the annual report of the museum group. The consumer trends which are followed by them were
also highlighted. The organisation is improving its sustainability by adapting many practices.
The report also highlighted the financial operation of the organisation along with its governance
and also ensured that the company meets the standards of good corporate governance or not. The
stakeholder analysis of the company was done and the issues which impacts the different
stakeholders were also evaluated.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Armstrong, G. and et.al., 2019. Marketing an Introduction. 4th ed. Harlow: Pearson
Braun, R., 2019. Corporate Stakeholder Democracy: Politicizing Corporate Social
Responsibility. Budapest: Central European University Press
Demirag, I., 2018. Corporate Social Responsibility, Accountability and Governance: Global
Perspectives. 1st ed. Abingdon; Routledge
Ledgerwood, G., 2017. Greening the Boardroom: Corporate Governance and Business
Sustainability. 1st ed. Abingdon; Routledge
Long, D.G. and Ibar, Z., 2017. The Ethical Kaleidoscope: Values, Ethics, and Corporate
Governance. 1st ed. Abingdon; Routledge
Mallin, C., 2016. Corporate Governance. 6th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Wetherley, P. and Otter, D., 2018. The Business Environment. Themes and issues in a
globalizing world. 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Online
Agyeman K.W., 2019. Top 10 Museum Trends You Should Know. Museum Tech Trends.
[ONLINE]. Available through: <https://medium.com/museum-techtrends/top-10-
museum-trends-in-2019-3c5582ed8253>
Blooploop., 2020. Top visitor attraction trends for 2020. [ONLINE]. Available through:
<https://blooloop.com/features/visitor-attraction-trends-2020/>
Financial Reporting Council, 2018. The UK Corporate Governance Code. [pdf] London:
Financial Reporting Council. Available through:
<https://www.frc.org.uk/getattachment/88bd8c45-50ea-4841-95b0d2f4f48069a2/2018-
UK-Corporate-Governance-Code-FINAL.pdf>
Museum Trends and Prospects for 2018, 2017. [ONLINE] Available through :< https://www.ne-
mo.org/fileadmin/Dateien/public/Activities_20172021/Training_Courses/
2017_FR_Paris/We_Are_Museums_-_Trends_and_prospects_for_2018-min.pdf>
Policies and Reports, 2020. [ONLINE] Available through :<
https://www.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/about-us/policies-and-reports/>
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Science Museum Group, Annual Report and Accounts, 2013. [ONLINE] Available through :<
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/
attachment_data/file/246510/0519.pdf>
Science Museum Group, Annual Report and Accounts, 2019. [ONLINE] Available through :<
https://www.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/SMG-Annual-
Report-Accounts-2018-19v2.pdf>
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