Overview
Role Summary
Head of Collection Care and Moves
Collection Care and Moves
Full-time (41 hours per week) (including one hour paid lunch break)
Permanent
£75,185 per annum
Application deadline: 12pm (midday) on 28 March 2025
About the role:
This role will lead a department responsible for delivering the highest standards of collection care across conservation, collection moves and storage, and management, in support of the Museum’s Operating Plan and strategies. This role will develop, implement and review the strategies, plans and processes for the care of the Museum’s collection, ensuring compliance with all relevant legislation and professional standards.
Key areas of responsibility:
- To ensure the proper care, conservation, storage and moves, and management of the Museum’s collection to recognised professional standards, and delivery of the Museum’s Collection Care (and Moves) Strategy in collaboration with relevant leaders and colleagues.
- To develop and maintain set professional standards, both within Collection Care and Moves and the team(s) that interact with the Museum’s collection. To manage a high standard of communication and collaboration with these teams.
- To manage the leaders and teams working across collection storage, major collection moves projects, loans and displays, and care and access, in the context of both BAU activities the delivery of the Museum’s Masterplan.
- To develop the right management capacity and processes to ensure compliance with internal policies and procedures, along with legislative and regulatory frameworks relevant to the care and management of the collection, including areas of health and safety, firearms, and human remains.
- To lead, motivate and inspire the department, actively developing and maintaining a high-performing and collaborative working culture with an emphasis on continuous improvement and solutions, including successful collaboration across the Museum and externally.
- To support the delivery of the Museum’s ambitious Masterplan, partnering effectively with leaders across the Collection Directorate to drive effective cross-collaboration between teams to ensure high-quality, successful outcomes.
About you:
- You will hold an undergraduate degree or equivalent practical experience, with a recognised project management qualification or equivalent.
- You will have experience working at a senior management level delivering complex projects that involve multi-disciplinary teams.
- You will have experience of strategic business planning, with an ability to lead with internal and external stakeholders across the sector.
About the British Museum:
Founded in 1753, the British Museum’s remarkable collection spans over two million years of human history and culture. The Museum is a leading visitor attraction, and its world-famous collection includes the Rosetta Stone, Egyptian mummies, the Sutton-Hoo finds, and the Lewis Chessmen. The Museum also holds an extensive collection of prints and drawings spanning 600 years, including works by the greatest graphic artists Dürer, Michelangelo and Rembrandt. You can view a selection of our impressive collection of prints and drawings in our virtual gallery.
The Museum offers a competitive benefits package including:
- Generous annual leave allowance of 25 days (rising to 30 days after 10 years’ service) plus 2.5 privilege days and plus bank holidays.
- Membership of the civil service defined benefit pension scheme (find out here what benefits a civil service pension provides).
- Free entry to a wide range of museums and exhibitions.
- Participation in private and public Museum activities, including talks by leading curators from around the world and behind-the-scenes opportunities to learn how museums care for and manage their extraordinary collections.
- Interest-free travel, bicycle, and rental deposit loans.
- Professional and personal development opportunities
- Employee Assistance Programme.
- Discounts on food and gift shop purchases.
Additional details:
For more information about this role, please see the job description.
If you have any additional needs that we should be aware of to support you with your application, please provide details to bmrecruit@britishmuseum.org.
We have a legal responsibility to ensure that employees have the right to work in the UK. If you currently do not hold the right to work in the UK, we can only sponsor a limited number of roles that meet eligibility criteria. To offer a sponsorship, the job role you apply needs to be in the list of eligible occupations: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/skilled-worker-visa-eligible-occupations. Additionally (with some limited exceptions), the role will need to meet the minimum salary threshold of £38,700 or the going rate for the job, whichever is the highest. You can find more information here: https://www.gov.uk/skilled-worker-visa/your-job
The British Museum is committed to promoting equality of opportunity for all staff and job applicants. We aim to create a working environment in which all individuals can make best use of their skills, free from unlawful discrimination or harassment. We value the benefits that a diverse workforce brings to a museum which represents world culture. The Museum is committed to ensuring that no job applicant suffers unlawful discrimination because of any protected characteristics. Our recruitment procedures aim to ensure that individuals are treated because of their relevant knowledge, skills, and experience.
We specifically encourage applications from candidates from ethnic minority groups who are underrepresented within our senior roles.
We offer a flexible way of working scheme that allows our employees to work remotely in a way that suits them and the organisation. We welcome questions and conversations at interview stage about how flexible working could work for you. We would typically see this role as working on site about 3 days a week.
The Museum also adheres to the HMG Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) for pre-employment screening of Civil Servants.
