Saturday 21 January 2012

Young folks these days

Two points. One, I am still vaguely resentful that I'm neither fully-fledged Gen X nor Gen Y. Two, I want to claim GLAMAZONS (galleries, libraries, archives, museums, aquariums and zoos) as my own invention, before pointing you to a post that mentions ZAMs (zoos, aquariums, museums).

Colleen Dilenschneider's 8 Top Tips for Museums and Non-Profits to Engage Millenials in 2012, based on Tina Well's Top 10 Gen Y Trends for 2012:

  1. Sell admission by emphasising the good that your institution does
  2. Tell people what's special and immediate about the experience you're offering
  3. I refuse to type in this made-up term; you're going to have to click through for that one
  4. Blah blah technology blah blah (I'm a bit dubious that point 2 and point 4 work together, unless you make technology the point, and that's shortsighted)
  5. "Curators are no longer the celebrity rockstars of the museum world… the visitors now hold that title." Awww, bless. I hope someone told the curators about their rockstar status in 2011, when they could still enjoy it.
  6. Take people behind the scenes - non-generationally specific good advice
  7. Get your stuff online - help people use it (this I can wholeheartedly agree with)
  8. Engage at a personal level to get donations, and make it easy to donate online

Overall, I'm not taken by either of these posts. But I often find it's the stuff that annoys me that I need to pay more attention to.

2 comments:

Nina Simon said...

As a fellow "cusp"er, let me console you with the fact that apparently we're superior to our generation-constrained friends. http://web.mac.com/ashleybrewer/The_Balanced_Life_Spa/The_BLS_Blog/Entries/2007/6/25_The_Advantage_Of_Being_A_Cusper.html

Courtney Johnston said...

I like that! I'm renaming us the Stealth Generation - infiltrating with ranks of Xs and Ys without committing to either side :)