Today I was searching the web for technology requirements for job postings in the arts. I searched organizations that fell under the categories of art, museums, and performing arts. Here are a few of the listings I found:
Wolf Trap
Program Assistant for Professional Development
Technology Requirements: Proficient working with Microsoft Office, Adobe, databases; Ability to disseminate web-appropriate content from professional development material, experience in and familiarity with website development.
www.wolftrap.org
MoMA
Associate Educator, Distance Learning
Technology Requirements: Three to five years experience developing and/or implementing educational technologies in a learning environment.
www.moma.org/about_moma/employment/current_positions.html
Strong Museum of Play
Marketing Assistant
Traffics marketing publications, and publicity materials. Interfaces with internal clients and external vendors; designs, writes, and copyedits material for select marketing publications, advertising and publicity materials.
www.strongmuseum.org/about_us/job_opportunities.html
I also visited other websites such as the Old Globe in San Diego, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, the San Francisco Ballet, the Walnut Street Theater and many more that had job opportunities for production staff such as stage hands, costume designers, etc. but nothing for administrative staff. The few that did have listings for administrative positions did not list any technology requirements or listed basic knowledge of Microsoft Office. This makes me wonder if arts managers are really recognizing the need for technology within their organizations. I don't think that some of these managers are thinking outside the walls of their theater, museum, etc. and do not consider the Internet a place in which their organization belongs other than to provide basic information to the public. Or maybe they don't realize the potential that technology can play in providing a national/international platform to educate people about their organization.
In the job listings I found some clearly listed the technology requirements while others listed the duties and responsibilities that were associated with having to know a certain computer application. For example the Marketing Assistant position for Strong Museum had a requirement for "designing material for select marketing publications" which would lead an applicant to believe that they might need to know Adobe Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop, or other design software however, this is not mentioned in the listing. Another interesting thing I found is that technical requirements were vague. In the MoMA posting its says "experience in developing/implementing educational technologies" but it doesn't list what type of technologies (i.e. software) are currently being used or what type of distance learning is being utilized i.e., blogs, video conferencing. In order to find candidates who will meet the criteria I think it would be important to more clearly outline the job resposibilites and the software needed to accomplish these duties.
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3 comments:
Wide variety of organizational functions here, but similar skills. Great finds!
"...The few that did have listings for administrative positions did not list any technology requirements or listed basic knowledge of Microsoft Office. This makes me wonder if arts managers are really recognizing the need for technology within their organizations..."
-- This could be any one of a number of things: the hiring agent assumes that the applicants will have these skills already (doubtful - you always have to be specific in a job description), they are doubting that technology can improve the org's general course of business (likely), the org thinks "We're too poor to afford technology" (somewhat likely, but based on the Google video below, closeminded), or they simply don't want someone new to come in and change a bunch of stuff, but instead just do the job they're told to do (somewhat likely but that says to me the hiring agent has forgotten what it's like to be young :)
This is interesting. The listings I found on line are almost the same. Actually, trying to find out more about jobs and requirements, I called some of these organizations but it seemed like they didn't really want to talk about skills on the phone. They suggested that I go there in person or try to reach their manager in a better time!!
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