Amy is packing her suitcase for her favorite conference of the year and shares what to look for in a great conference and why you should add professional development to your team’s budget this year.

Links from the Episode:

• Momentum Weekend Workshop with Lou Mongello
• Past Momentum episodes: Finding Your Momentum and Top 10 Takeaways
• 2027 Museum Planning Calendar
• Communications Trainings for museums

More Free Resources for Museums:

• Getting Visitors Through Your Museum’s Doors: Building Connection in a Noisy World ebook
• Museum Metrics Template

About the host:

Amy Kehs is a brand strategist and communications expert for museums. She has owned Kehs Communications since 2000 and has worked for the most renowned and well-loved museums in Washington, D.C. Her goal is to ensure that museums thrive into the next century and she hopes people will come to love museums as much as she does. Her proven process sets up proactive communication habits for museums, cultivating relationships with visitors who will want to return and bring a friend. Want to talk more? Click this link to book a call. Want to write instead? Send me an email.

Today I'm packing my suitcase to attend my favorite conference of the year.

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So today I want to talk about what

happens to a person when someone

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invests in them and why that

belongs in your museum's budget.

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Let's get started

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Hello, and welcome to the

"Love My Museum" podcast.

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I'm your host, Amy Kehs,

and I love museums.

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I'm also a brand strategist and

communications expert for museums and

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the creator of the Love My Museum method.

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So if you work in a museum and you

wanna get more visitors through your

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doors, you're in the right place.

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My method will help you with that.

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I spent decades helping museums

just like yours become places their

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communities can't stop talking about.

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This week, I'm at the Momentum

Weekend Workshop, hosted

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by my friend Lou Mongello.

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If you've been listening for

a while, you've heard me talk

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about Momentum before, but this

episode is a little bit different.

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Those past episodes were about what I

learned at the conference, but today

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I want to talk about what happened to

me because I went and what that means

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for the people who work in museums.

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And if you're new here, welcome.

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You don't have to have heard any

of those episodes to jump in today.

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I'll link them in the show notes if you

wanna go back and listen to them too.

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It's also October, which for a

lot of you means planning season

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and maybe the start of your fiscal

year or even just the budget

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conversation for next calendar year.

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I've been having a lot of these

conversations with my current and former

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clients, and some of those have been

asking for advice about their public

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relations and marketing line items.

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So I'm hoping this episode will

help you with that as well.

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Let me take you back to 2019.

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At that point, I had owned my business for

19 years and for all of those years I was

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working as a freelancer or a contractor.

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A museum or another type of client

would call me for a project.

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Maybe it was an exhibit opening or

a film project, a rebrand or public

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relations for whatever they had coming up.

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When the project ended, so did the work,

and then I'd wait for the next phone call

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I didn't have business cards, I

didn't have a website or a logo.

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I wasn't even on social

media as my business.

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It was all word of mouth, and for a

long time that worked really well for

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me, especially when my kids were small.

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I could pick projects that

fit around our family.

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I-- and I would take just enough work that

I had time to do it, depending on what

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the childcare situation was at the time.

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But by 2019, things had

started to feel a bit stagnant.

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My kids were getting older, I had some

more time, and so I wanted to do more,

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and I really wanted to help more museums.

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And I'll admit something else too.

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Owning a business on my own,

it felt a little lonely.

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My husband was the one who suggested

that I go to Lou Mongello's

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Momentum Weekend Workshop.

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It's a small conference for entrepreneurs.

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It's hosted by Lou.

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Just to give you a little background

on him, he left his law practice

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and started a completely new life.

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He has one of the most successful and

longest running podcasts called WDW

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Radio, and in addition to WDW Radio, he

started Momentum to support entrepreneurs

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turn what they love into what they do.

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It was the first business

conference I had ever attended.

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19 years in business and I had never

once gone to a conference for myself.

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I left that weekend so inspired.

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It reignited my excitement about my

business, and it gave me the space

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to really dream big again, I guess.

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But the most important thing I found there

wasn't a business tip or how to start an

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email list or the importance of branding.

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At Momentum, I discovered something that I

hadn't realized I was missing: community.

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I met people who understood what it was

like to build something on your own, and

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that didn't end when the weekend was over.

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At the end of the weekend, we

hold each other accountable and

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we answer each other's questions.

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And since 2019, I have not missed

a Momentum workshop weekend.

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There's a little tradition

at Momentum that I love.

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At the end of the weekend, we each write

on this postcard three things that we

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want to accomplish, and we give it to

Lou, and later on, he mails it back to us.

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A lot of the time, I've already done those

three things by the time the postcard

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shows up in the mail, but sometimes

I do need the nudge to keep going

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So back to that first momentum in 2019.

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Just a few months after it

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My museum clients closed their doors,

, but I had all of those ideas from that

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weekend, and that time gave me the

chance to finally work on them, and

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I invested in myself in other ways.

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I joined a group program.

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It taught me how to set

my business up properly.

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Not too long after that, I did a more

specialized online program, and then soon

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after that, I found a business coach.

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And so much of what you know today as

the Love My Museum suite of services

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for museum professionals, which includes

this podcast, grew out of that time.

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I wanted to tell this story a

little more fully today because

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I, I think that the stagnant part

is the part a lot of us recognize.

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Again, there was…

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Nothing was falling apart.

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My business was plugging along just fine.

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I just didn't know what I didn't know.

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I could have kept going on like I was

already going on, on the same path

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and the same kind of slow cadence.

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And I imagine you might be

familiar with something similar.

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You're good at your job, you care about

your museum, and you've been doing

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the same work the same way for a long

time, and maybe no one has ever asked

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you what you want to get better at.

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So I want to slow down on one of the

words in today's title: building.

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Building momentum.

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I think we tend to think of professional

development as a single event.

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Someone goes to a conference,

they come back excited, and

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that excitement's a great thing.

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That spark you feel after a

great conference is real, but a

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spark on its own isn't momentum.

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Momentum is what comes after.

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It's the accountability.

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It's the planning how you're going

to do all of those great ideas

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that you learned at the conference.

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Momentum is what you build after.

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It's the small things you keep doing

that keep you moving forward getting

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started is the hardest part, but

once something is in motion, it's

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a lot easier to keep it in motion.

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And that's why I say building.

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Professional development

should be something you keep

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adding to a little at a time.

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And here's the other thing I learned at

Momentum that I will keep saying for as

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long as I have this podcast probably.

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Continued education doesn't have

to mean going back to school.

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For a long time when I was working

in a museum, I thought that

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growing in my career meant that I

had to go back and get a master's

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degree or a PhD, but it doesn't.

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It can be a conference.

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It can be a webinar or a new book or

a group course, or even a podcast like

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this one to drive your growth at work.

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So making time to go to a conference

is important, but be sure you

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also think about what comes next.

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And when you are shopping around,

take that into consideration.

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So how do you do that?

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How do you find professional

development services?

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You can start close to home.

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Your state museum or regional museum

association might have a conference.

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And when you're deciding, look

to see if there are added bonuses

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to come to the conference.

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Does the conference ticket include

membership to the organization,

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and do they have other resources

that you get access to?

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A lot of these organizations will

offer free webinars all year long,

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or maybe there's a newsletter.

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And if you're planning next year right

now, and I know so many of you are,

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this is a great time to do that research

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And see when the conferences are

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I have my clients add this to their

planning calendar for the year,

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which this would be a great time

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calendar for museums is out now.

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It's free.

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It's my most popular resource in addition

to this podcast, and you can grab it at

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lovemymuseum.com/calendar.

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I will also link it in the show notes, and

I'll come back to that in just a minute.

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But first, I want to talk about a reason

I have actually heard from directors

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for why they don't want to invest in

professional development for their staff.

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And sadly, it sounds something like

this: "If I train them, they will leave."

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And oh boy, is this really hard to hear.

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I had to work really hard to keep my poker

face when I asked someone about this.

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And I do understand

why that fear is there.

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When you lose a good person at

your museum, it is really hard.

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It's hard to replace that person.

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It's hard on the, the other staff

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But I think the more likely

story is actually the opposite.

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People leave when no one invests in them

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They leave when they've been doing the

same thing for years and nobody has

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asked them what do they want to learn.

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And here's the thing I would love

for every museum director to hear.

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A staff person who asks to go

to a conference is telling you

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that he or she plans to stay.

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They are thinking about how to get better

at the job they're doing at your museum,

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and that's a really good thing to hear.

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I really don't think professional

development is a perk, and it's not

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a reward for your best employee.

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I think it is one of the least

expensive things that a museum can

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do to keep the people it already has.

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And if you're a staff member

listening, I hope you hear this too.

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If you are given the

opportunity, don't turn it down.

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And if you haven't been given the

opportunity, go ahead and ask.

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Asking to learn isn't asking for a favor.

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It's asking for a way of

investing in the museum.

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So here's where the brand new

planning calendar comes in.

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When you open your 2027 calendar and

start filling in the exhibit openings

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and the programs and the events, I want

you to add one more thing this year.

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I want you to add a line for

each person on your team.

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Doesn't have to be a budget number yet.

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It can just be a question:

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What does each person want

to get better at next year?

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And then maybe the name of a conference

or a training that could help

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for that goal If you put it on the

calendar now before the calendar

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fills in all around it, it is so

much more likely to actually happen.

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So here's your action for this

week, and it's in two simple steps.

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First, ask the question.

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If you lead a team, ask each

person What's one thing you

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want to get better at next year?

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And ask it of yourself.

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Second, find one opportunity that fits.

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One conference, one webinar, one course.

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Look up when it happens and

write it on the calendar.

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That's it.

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A question and a date, and that's how you

start building momentum for your people.

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If you haven't grabbed the 2027 planning

calendar for museums yet, it's free.

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It's at lovemymuseum.com/calendar.

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I've also linked it in the show notes.

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And I would really love to hear from you.

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What's the conference or training

you are hoping to get to next year?

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Send me an email and let me know.

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Also, did you know that I do

communications trainings for museums?

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I'll link that page on my website

in the show notes as well.

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And that's it.

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Keep loving your museum,

and I'll see you next time