Tag Archives: Project Management
Festival Management Training in The Gambia
Courtesy of Kangurang Festival
Over 16th and 17th of October, 27 participants from 10 institutions across Gambia joined us for the Festival Management and Operations Training. The two-day course aimed at enhancing participants’ understanding of essential concepts and practices to create impactful, well-organized, and environmentally conscious festivals that engage and benefit their communities.
It was led by Hanine-K Lakkis, a cultural specialist, events director, and trainer, and Mina Morou, The Gambia Programmes Manager for HERITΛGE.
The training is part of HerMap Gambia, an initiative co-funded by the EU that aims to enrich the understanding and appreciation of Gambian cultural heritage while enhancing the capacity of key stakeholders in the cultural sector. It was developed in direct response to requests from five distinct festival organizing groups seeking our expertise to enhance their event planning and management skills. Recognizing the unique challenges and opportunities within festival management, HERITΛGE designed this program to equip participants with essential skills in festival planning, marketing, operations, safety, and sustainability.
By addressing these core areas, HERITΛGE aims to strengthen the capacity of local actors to create impactful, well-organized, and environmentally conscious festivals that engage and benefit their communities. This tailored approach ensures that participants can meet both their organizational goals and the growing expectations of their audiences.
On the first day, participants from Kankurang, Wassu Stone Circles, Niumi Fort Bullen, Roots, Galloya Street Art Festivals as well as Kubuneh and Galloya Cultural Festivals and National Centre for the Arts and Culture (NCAC), Gambia Tourist Board, the Gambia Youth Chamber of Commerce and independent organizers were instructed in the fundamentals of festivals, including their types, purposes, and impacts, along with detailed guidance on planning aspects such as venue selection, programming, and marketing strategies. On the second, they went over operational considerations, such as risk and crowd management, and sustainable practices to minimize environmental impact.
“I want, on behalf of the National Centre for Arts and Culture, to express our sincere appreciation to the Heritage Management Organization and all the Facilitators for offering this valuable training opportunity to our festival organizers,” said Sanna B. Jarju, Head of the Department for Literature, Performing and Fine Arts of the NCAC.
“The training is done at a time when there are a large number of emerging community-based festivals, most of whom strive for sustainability…Festivals are an important way to safeguard our cultural heritage and enable the attainment of the UN Sustainable Development Goals in The Gambia,” he added.
New Training Calendar: Online Workshops for Heritage Managers
The Heritage Management Organization (HERITΛGE) is happy to announce a series of online training workshops for heritage professionals and caretakers for 2024-2025. A variety of scholarships and funding opportunities are available. As places are limited, candidates are advised to apply as soon as possible.
Online Workshop Calendar 2024-2025
Introduction to Heritage Interpretation for Site Managers | 01–03 October 2024
Master the principles of high-quality heritage interpretation and gain hands-on experience in implementing them at your site/organization in order to create meaningful and unforgettable experiences for visitors.
Engaging Communities in Cultural Heritage | 11–13 October 2024
Understand the community engagement process, a key heritage management strategy. Master the challenges of working with local communities discern between communities and audiences and understand audience segmentation, get introduced to ethnographic approaches to creating collaborative research-based programs, and learn the methods and techniques of oral history to elicit and document tangible and intangible heritage.
Conservation III: Preventive Conservation (pilot) | 15-17 November
A pilot workshop only open to heritage managers that have previously completed Conservation II: First Aid for Finds.
Interpretive Writing for Natural and Cultural Heritage | 25–27 November 2024
Learn how to write text that grabs and holds the reader’s attention. Discover and practice a wide range of techniques to engage visitors and master the techniques of interpretive writing. Participants will work to become a HERITΛGE-accredited Interpretive Writer, after successfully completing, and being assessed on, the exercises and activities.
Project Management for Heritage Managers | 13-15 December 2024
Gain the skills and knowledge to run a successful project from inception, through the planning and implementation phases to closure. Create a work breakdown structure, a critical path diagram and a Gantt chart. Research potential funders and write a grant application. Improve personal time management skills. Learn to think critically, identify risks and create solutions.
Organising Temporary Exhibitions from your Collections and Touring Strategies | 14–16 February 2025
The focus of this workshop is to give you the skills to ensure temporary, touring and partnership exhibitions can enhance and promote your institution’s mission, create new audiences and mutually beneficial partnerships. Attendees are encouraged to bring their own exhibition ideas to the workshop for discussion and development.
Communication Strategy and Strategic Marketing for Cultural Organizations | 07-09 March 2025
Join a focused learning experience that provides a systemic approach to successfully attract key audiences’ attention through traditional, new, and social media. Acquire a working guide to effectively communicate news, initiatives, and announcements of your organization and manage communication around a crisis or issue.
Successful Fundraising for Heritage Managers: Strategies and Best Practices | 28-30 March 2025
Start-up and build an organization’s contributed revenue to increase its impact in the world. Participants learn best practices and apply them to create the case for support and letter of inquiry for their own organization or project. Workshop sessions combine live and asynchronous lectures, case studies, class discussions and interactive exercises.
Conservation I: Introduction to the General Principles of Cultural Heritage Conservation | 4-6 April 2025
Learn the fundamentals, the ethics, the evolution, and the contemporary international context of conservation. At the end of the course, participants will be able to understand the potential of conservation, together with the processes which are necessary to maximize it.
Strategic Planning for Heritage Managers | 9-11 May 2025
Successful strategy can lead to success and this course will provide participants with the tools and methodologies to successfully formulate and implement strategy in organizations managing cultural heritage. Learn the methods and tools of strategic analysis that will enable you devise and evaluate alternative strategic choices and comprehend the demands of a strategy implementation project.
More workshop dates will be announced soon. To apply visit our Executive Leadership Training page.
2023-2024 Training Calendar for Heritage Professionals
Introduction to Heritage Interpretation for Site Managers | 6 – 8 October 2023
Transform a visit into a captivating experience. Acquire the skills to create meaningful and unforgettable experiences for visitors, during this 3-day online workshop. Only accepting last-minute waiting list applications.
Project Management for Heritage Managers | 7 – 9 October (US only) & 9 – 10 December 2023
This intensive 3-day online workshop led by Tim Healing will show participants the way to run a successful project from inception through planning to implementation and closure. A special US pilot program is still accepting last-minute applications.
Engaging Communities in Cultural Heritage | 27 – 29 October 2023
During this 3-day workshop, we aim to develop a different approach to community engagement based on social (and art) research with community-led initiatives. By adopting a research-led approach, we can foster collaborative design and actions that truly resonate with the unique cultural and social dynamics of each specific group or community, as well as their interactions with others. We will explore methodologies grounded in ethnography and oral history, while also engaging in practical exercises to reinforce learning.
Interpretive Writing for Natural and Cultural Heritage | 10 – 12 November 2023
Written text that grabs and holds the visitor’s and reader’s attention is the key to effective word-based heritage interpretation. During this 3-day online workshop with Steven Richards-Price you will discover and practice a wide range of techniques to engage visitors and master the techniques of interpretive writing.
Climate Change, Community Engagement & Interpretation | 1-3 December 2023
Brand new, 3-day workshop on climate change, heritage interpretation, and community engagement that seeks to empower participants with the tools and skills necessary to engage local communities in climate action through the lens of heritage interpretation.
Temporary Exhibition Design: Agile Exhibitions in a rapidly changing environment | 2-4 February 2024
This up-to-date 3-day workshop focuses on how temporary exhibitions can enhance and promote an institution’s mission, create new audiences and generate revenue, from building an institutional strategy for exhibitions and partnership-building to planning and putting on temporary exhibitions for display at home and on tour. Attendees are encouraged to bring their own ideas and projects to the workshop and time is allocated for 1:1 consultation with the workshop facilitators.
Community and Economic Development | 16-18 February 2024
Cultural heritage managers increasingly have to both demonstrate and create economic benefits for local, regional, and national economies. This workshop will provide attendees with a firm understanding of the motivations for mobilizing cultural resources for economic benefit; the limits of that mobilization; different strategies for creating economic benefits; and how economic impacts are measured and communicated. The workshop will then guide attendees through the development of a plan for the creation of economic benefits for their own case studies, including the development of goals; selecting appropriate strategies; judging economic feasibility; and monitoring and evaluation procedures. As a result of the course attendees will be able to implement economic development strategies in their own community.
Communication Strategy & Strategic Marketing for Cultural Organizations | 8-10 March 2024
You have organized the best exhibition of the year or set up a ground-breaking educational program. You have worked hard with curators, conservators, educators, and everything is ready to rock, but now you wonder… how can I bring people in? How can I reach my audience, and what should I be telling them? This 3-day course is a focused learning experience that provides a systemic approach to successfully attract key audiences’ attention through traditional, new, and social media.
Fundraising for Cultural Heritage Organizations | 22 – 24 March 2024
This 3-day workshop provides a survey of fundraising strategies and skills needed to start-up and build an organization’s contributed revenue with the aim of increasing its impact in the world. Participants learn best practices and apply them to create the case for support and letter of inquiry for their own organization or project.
Conservation II: First Aid for Finds | 12-14 April 2024
The workshop will provide step-by-step instruction on the best practices in the care of freshly excavated archaeological and historic objects as well as in the care of objects belonging to collections that have just been damaged. It will also examine the case of providing first aid measures to architectural heritage. It will go through all the processes that are essential during preparation, application of treatments and monitoring.
Strategic Planning for Heritage Managers| 26 – 28 April 2024
Strategy is a key factor for success in all areas of human activity. This 3-day interactive course aims to provide the tools and methodologies to effectively address the topics of successful strategy formulation and implementation in organizations managing cultural heritage in today’s complex environment.
Conservation I: Introduction to the General Principles of Cultural Heritage Conservation | 24 – 26 May 2024
Following the success of your first Conservation workshop in 2023, we are again accepting applications for this 3-day interactive course that aims to teach the principles and objectives of conservation, and in so doing to introduce its methodology. The workshop will deliver the fundamentals, the ethics, the evolution, and the contemporary international context of conservation.
HERITΛGE provides scholarships to most participants in its training programmes. These scholarships can cover up to 90% of the cost of attendance, depending on the circumstances of the participants and the availability of funding. On average, participants contribute around 300 euros to attend one of our 3-day training workshops.
Project Management for US Heritage Managers
HERITΛGE is launching a pilot training program in Project Management specifically targeted toward U.S.-based Heritage Managers. The 3-day online training program will take place Oct. 7-9 2023, with participants only required to contribute a $50.00 registration fee.
“Project Management is a skill that many take for granted and is often underrated in its importance, but it affects every aspect of our work,” said HERITΛGE Director, Dr. Evangelos Kyriakidis. “This training focuses on those working in the heritage, environmental, or social action fields, but it can equally be applied to any project by emphasizing the importance of planning,” he added.
The course will be delivered by Tim Healing, who has over thirty years of experience working as a project manager and a professional background in project management, community, and NGO development. He specializes in the coordination and support of cultural heritage and community-based social action projects and has particular experience working with local communities, national and regional museums, heritage institutions, government, and non-governmental organizations.
For this pilot program, exclusively targeted towards US-based heritage managers, participants will only need to pay a $50.00 registration fee.
Participants in HERITΛGE’s Executive Leadership in Heritage Management Workshops are automatically granted HERITΛGE Membership.
Find out more: Find out more about our Project Management for Heritage Managers Workshop here.
How to Apply: To apply for this workshop, please fill out this form before September 27, 2023.