Achieving effective visitor orientation in European museums. Innovation versus custodial

Abstract

Abstract.The context in which museums operate has evolved considerably over the last few decades, while the challenges they face have increased. The current need for museums to augment their own revenue and improve their performance coupled with the transformation of cultural models towards more experiential services has led many to adopt a consumer orientation in an effort to make museums and their collections increasingly accessible to visitors. This visitor orientation is more than just a wish to bring culture closer to the public, but rather a desire to understand visitors' demands and thus adapt to their expectations. This paper seeks to explore the relation between visitor orientation and performance in museums.Specifically, the study focuses on technological innovation and tradition as two alternative strategies to respond to visitor expectations. An empirical study was conducted for a sample of 491 European museums. Evidence is found to support the notion that the impact of visitor orientation on economic and market performance depends on how visitors' needs are perceived and on museums' commitment to either innovation or tradition and custody. Whereas technological innovation has a positive impact on revenue and economic performance, the impact of custodial orientation is negative. Custodial orientation only proves effective in market terms in large museums but does not prove effective in economic terms, for either small or large museums. This paper offers a guide as to 2 how to deal with visitor orientation in cultural and heritage organizations.Although an orientation to innovate geared towards satisfying visitor needs would seem the logical way for museums to increase visitor numbers, an approach involving too much innovation, often leading museums to becoming shows, has been widely criticized.

Visitors’ Experience, Place Attachment and Sustainable Behaviour at Cultural Heritage Sites: A Conceptual Framework

“…The debate surrounding visitation and protection of heritage resources has become more intense over the years calling for more sustainable strategies to be implemented, which remain crucial for heritage destinations. This is also due to the evolution of heritage management, which calls for an integration of the traditional curatorial approach driven by the imperative of conservation, with a more visitor-oriented approach, considering visitors' preferences and quality of personal experience [15,86,91,121]. With few exceptions, studies on sustainable heritage tourism have traditionally focused on the supply side (i.e., the heritage resource), warranting a deeper investigation on the demand side (i.e., the visitors/tourists) [29,63].…”

Evaluating the Application of Lean Six Sigma in the Creative Industry: The Case of a Spanish Company in an Islamic Country

“…Recently, several authors point out that the most important aspects for managing museums are to gain sustainability and reduce costs (Camarero et al, 2015;De Backer et al, 2014;England and Miller, 2016;Lo et al, 2019).…”

“…The characterization of procedures to design and apply several Lean Six Sigma methodologies at museums is oriented to improve organizational performance (Camarero et al, 2015;Martinez et al, 2018). Moreover, recently there is an increasing interest to make operational systems more flexible and provide support using different techniques (Tyszczuk and Smith, 2018).…”

Knowledge management as a tool for improving business processes: an action research approach

“…According to Camarero et al (2015) and Gómez-Martín (2015), the context in which museums operate has evolved considerably over the last few decades, while the challenges they face have increased. This is because the current need for museums to augment their own revenue and improve their performance coupled with the transformation of cultural models towards more experiential services has led many to adopt a consumer orientation in an effort to make museums and their collections increasingly accessible to visitors.…”

“…Specifically related to business process in a cultural context, museums are worth investigating in Information Systems research because they represent a relevant environment in comparison to the business context on which past IS research has mainly focused (Camarero, Garrido & Vicente, 2015).…”