The Visitor Experience

This morning, I was invited to sit in on a meeting titled, "Visitor-Centered Problem Solving Strategies". In this meeting were managers from most departments within the museum-- security, education, development, curatorial, etc. It was supposed to give these managers an the "tools" necessary to solve problems in their respective departments. It was titled "visitor-centered" problem solving because, according to their new strategic plan, everything that happens in the museum is supposed to contribute to a positive visitor experience. The idea is that "visitor-centeredness" is a trickle-down phenomenon.

It was interesting.

To illustrate how to use these problem solving tools, a sample "problem" was examined. The only issue here is that their "sample problem" isn't much of a "sample" at all. It's a real, glaring issue for all of the staff at the DIA-- visitor satisfaction. Recent surveys (one of which I took when I was at the museum last July) revealed that as many as one in five visitors are dissatisfied with the service they received while at the DIA. Something around 82% of visitors had a great experience, but in the grand scheme of things, there is still a great number of people who were less than thrilled.

So the meeting turned into less of a problem-solving workshop and more of a visitor satisfaction discussion (which truthfully, I found much more interesting). A lot of the concerns I think are fairly universal: The visitor services person was rude to me. Of course they were. You sit behind a desk for 8 hours a day, answering the same stupid question every 3 minutes and see how pleasant you are. That doesn't make it right-- it just makes it a reality. The visitors are right in that they deserve to be treated kindly and with respect while in the museum. So then it became a brainstorming session about why this has become such a problem and what is really making the visitors upset.

I was given a handout with actual visitor comments (only the negative ones, for the purpose of this meeting) and some of them were horrifying. One of the major themes I saw was that of staff who are trying to follow policies that don't always make sense. But when the staff are given no room to make decisions, both the visitor and the staff member become frustrated.

"I'm sorry, you can't use this entrance. I know it's raining. Oh, you have a heart condition? Sorry. You still have to walk around to the main door."

When I was working at the MHM, one of the best things my boss ever told me was that if I needed to break a policy to ensure the safety of myself or a visitor-- or if I was simply doing what I thought was best-- she would back me up every time.

In an emergency, I was NOT supposed to dial 911, but rather a special emergency line than rang to a facilities office in another building nearby. Then one day, I had a man collapse on my desk, panting and asking me to dial 911 because he was having a heart attack. So I called 911 and an ambulance got there a heck of a lot faster than if I would have followed the rules and called the facilities line. When later asked why I broke the rule, I explained myself and my supervisor backed me up, just as she said she would.

I don't think this kind of trust exists with the DIA's frontline employees. They are told to follow (sometimes seemingly pointless) policies to the letter... and they do because many believe that their jobs are at stake. And in the City of Detroit-- they probably are. Again, none of this makes it OK for staff to be rude to visitors. But after this meeting it became easier to see that there are a lot of factors at work in the quest for visitor satisfaction.

I am very interested in visitor surveys and the public perception of the DIA (and museums in general) so I found this morning's meeting to be right up my ally. I didn't learn much about "visitor-centered problem solving", but I did walk away with a deeper understanding of the problems the DIA is facing in terms of serving its visitors.

I will include the survey-results handout, along with the "Visitor-Centered Problem Solving Strategies Workbook", in my internship binder at the end of the summer. 
(That is more a note to myself than anything else.)