Able to draw on over 25 years of heritage-related experience, David is able to offer a range of services. These include:
Fundraising
David has written several successful HLF bids as well as successful bids to major grant-giving charities. He has also obtained funding from central and local government, and well as development agencies and cultural sector funders.
Board Development and Governance
David has significant, current experience working with, supporting and developing museum boards. He can help your board manage change, plan for the future and recruit and diversify your trustees.
Business Planning
As funding from statutory bodies declines, it becomes increasingly essential that cultural institutions are able to identify and exploit income streams that will enable them to thrive in an increasingly challenging business environment. As Director of Lyme Regis Museum, David has experience in developing effective and realistic business plans.
Strategic Reviews
David has first-hand experience of the challenges faced by smaller cultural and heritage institutions when planning for the future. He understands the importance of developing a long term and consensual view amongst governing bodies and key stakeholders, mapping both organisational and supra-organisational challenges.
Activity Plans
As part of a successful HLF bid, a realistic and manageable Activity Plan is essential. David can help you prepare an Activity Plan that delivers for your institutions users, develops new audiences whilst respecting the capacity constraints of your organisation.
Change Management
Be under no illusion, the most challenging matter you will face in delivering a capital programme is carrying the support of your key stakeholders. But how, with the very many daily demands placed on museum leaders, will time be found for these crucial and sometimes difficult conversations? David has been there and ‘has the T-shirt to prove it’, and can support you in managing change.
Accreditation
During his long career, David has guided several museums through accreditation – either as a curator, or as a County Museums Officer. He can provide you with the support and experience you need to rise to higher standards.
Managing Museum Science Projects
Although a Social Historian by degree, David ‘gets science’ and has delivered two very significant science programmes on the Jurassic Coast. He understands the support focussed scientists often need in advancing strategic developments. Working with respected geologist Richard Edmonds, he delivered Jurassic Life, the most successful ‘Collecting Cultures’ programme ever run by HLF. ‘Jurassic Life’ was described by Sir David Attenborough as a programme that allowed ‘world class fossils sourced from the Jurassic Coast to be displayed on the Jurassic Coast’.
Interpretation and Exhibitions
Originally attracted to museums by an urge to communicate, David has worked on and led the delivery of a range of exhibitions and interpretation programmes including football, the history of feeding babies, rural history, military valour medals and earth science. He has experience of working with designers and subject specialists and believes the key to a good exhibition is to help people discover what they need to know.