Callout for Project Manager for The Imagination Museum

9th November 2023

The Imagination Museum dance/heritage network – some context

In 2019, dance company Made By Katie Green (MBKG) secured funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England (through the Strategic Touring Programme) to begin to test a new professional development network called The Imagination Museum. This network is for dance and heritage professionals of all kinds – dance artists, choreographers, heritage practitioners, museum managers, researchers, curators, producers, teachers for example – who are interested in using dance to bring to life collections, sites and stories in new ways for new audiences.

When MBKG’s Strategic Touring (ST) funding came to an end, we began working with an Executive group of interested, expert individuals and partners from across dance and heritage sectors to plan what could be next for the network, following the positive feedback we had received from participants as indicated in our ST Evaluation here.

Good news!

We are thrilled to announce that we have received a grant from the National Lottery through Arts Council England for the first phase of development activity for The Imagination Museum, taking us from now through to September 2024. This will include updating our website and communications strategy, curating a programme of online and in-person Advocacy Events with key partners across the country in Blackpool, Cornwall, London and Suffolk (providing networking and workshop opportunities and enabling us to hear from participants), and developing the network structure to be in a position to offer 4 dance/museums co-commissions in our second phase of activity (subject to funding).

For now, Made By Katie Green are continuing to manage The Imagination Museum, but it is our ambition for it to be constituted as a separate organisation by the end of 2024.

The Imagination Museum Project Manager role

We’re looking for someone to support the Strategic Lead (Katie Green) and Project Producer (Vicky Thornton) and other members of our Core Team with a range of tasks during the first phase of redeveloping The Imagination Museum network (December 2023 – September 2024), including:

• scheduling and supporting internal planning meetings
• making arrangements for our programme of 3 online and 4 in-person Advocacy Events in 2024
• supporting marketing and communications activity
• managing and growing our contacts database
• establishing The Imagination Museum as a distinct entity (i.e. constituted separately from Made By Katie Green)
• some sector research to support us to put together resources and curate a programme of speakers for example
• collating evaluation data
• and helping to plan for Phase 2 of our activity, which will include helping to put together future applications for funding.

You will report to Katie and Vicky in the first instance, but we will invite you to manage your time as you need to (keeping track of your hours on a timesheet) in order to fit this role around your other commitments.

Indicative qualities and skills you will bring to this role

The ideal candidate will be/have:

• highly self-motivated, and able to be entrepreneurial in the face of new challenges
• friendly, open, positive
• organised, with experience implementing shared to-do lists and working as part of a busy team of freelancers
• excellent communication skills, with good attention to detail
• experience working in partnership with multiple organisations.

It may be helpful, but is not essential, if you have experience working across the arts (particularly dance), community and heritage sectors, with some experience of being involved in collaborative arts/heritage projects.

Key Dates

Project fee

The fee for this role is £5,600, equivalent to approximately 32 days December – September 2024 at £175/day.

To apply for this role please send:

1. An Expression of Interest (max 1 side of A4 or up to 500 words) covering:

• your relevant skills, qualities and experience (particularly any examples of your previous involvement with dance/heritage projects),
• a bit about why you would like to take on this challenge and what you think you would bring to the role/your approach,
• any particular support you think you might need in order to work with us as The Imagination Museum Project Manager. We welcome any questions you might have about particular areas of the Project Management brief.

Please ensure that you also include

• an indication of your availability to attend our Core Planning day on the 8^th January and first Executive Committee meeting on the 24^th January 2024,
• any other notable availability concerns around your other work that you can see in the schedule of key dates above,
• any access requirements about which you would like us to be aware, including ways that we can make the interview process more accessible if you are shortlisted for this role.

We also welcome Expressions of Interest sent as short videos or voice recordings if you would prefer to communicate with us in that way (we suggest a maximum of 3 minutes if you would like to submit something in either of those formats). Please either send us a password-protected video link or send recordings via WeTransfer to katie@madebykatiegreen.co.uk or contact Katie Green via WhatsApp on 07801 969943 if you are sharing your Expression of Interest in that way. Do not worry about the quality of the video or audio, as long as you feel that you can get the key information across clearly in the recording.

2. Your CV, or other website or online portfolio giving an indication of your work to date, including details of at least 1 person who can act as a referee for your work.

to katie@madebykatiegreen.co.uk by 5pm on the 1st December 2023.

We would also appreciate it if you could complete the short Equality, Diversity and Inclusion monitoring form here: https://forms.gle/Ls4GvyENXoa9a62z8 .

Your responses to this are voluntary, will be collected anonymously and will have no bearing on the outcome of your application. We collect this information from all kinds of people who engage with our work – performers, collaborators, audience members, participants, partners and so on – so that we can build a better understanding of who is engaging with us, and can work to address any gaps in representation that become apparent.

Please contact Katie Green on katie@madebykatiegreen.co.uk if you have any questions about the Imagination Museum Project Manager role, or visit www.imaginationmuseum.co.uk to find out more about the network’s activity to date.

We look forward to hearing from you!