Enhance and Refine Your Collections Management Skills
Continuing professional development and training on your Collections Management System helps your collections team to expand their abilities and improve your workflows. Keeping up with the changing standards of the field and new functionality available in TMS, helps your institution better prepare to handle increasing workloads without compromising collections care.
Gallery Systems offers training and professional development across various levels of collections expertise to help maintain the continuing education of our clients and collections managers. We sat down with Allison Galland, Gallery Systems Training Specialist, to get the details on one of her most useful programs, TMS Core Training.
Allison’s experience makes her an excellent trainer. Here she poses with an collection object from one of her past positions in collections care.
“I think one of the best parts of my job is being able to provide the core-training in our New York City office,” says Allison, “We have the opportunity to work with users from all over the world and across the professional spectrum. Even seasoned users get excited about the features we go through during this training. It’s a great experience for everyone who joins.” Allison began teaching the TMS Core training program in 2015 and has taught numerous clients from around the world.
Allison’s professional background allows her to bring her own experience to the classes that participants appreciate. “I’ve sat in the seat of the trainee, in my previous positions, so I try to bring that knowledge in. I know what workflows are effective because I’ve done the work in museums, and as a trainer I have a lot of practice.” When asked what she liked to focus on, Allison responded, “I like to consider workflows. Anyone can tell you how to utilize an attribute, but I like to talk about what you should do first, what you should do second, and so on.”
Allison explains her process, “For example, before you use drag-and-drop in the media module, it will save you time if you rename your images according to your institution’s standard.” Allison’s TMS Core training also covers the most efficient ways to clean up data records, “Every institution goes through this, so in a room of professionals from around the world, it’s something everyone has in common and needs help with.”
Allison’s TMS Core training program covers the gamut of TMS, and trainees get help with everything from the Objects Module, to Reporting, to Components, Accessioning, Events, and everything in between. “It’s three days of training, and we cover a large amount of topics. That’s part of why it’s great to do it with professionals from different institutions. The trainees share their own unique experiences and it helps them to get even more out of the training.” Allison believes that the professional networking aspects of the TMS Core training program are part of why it’s so successful,
“One of the best things about this training is the opportunity trainees have to work closely with their peers. While we’re covering different modules and features, collections managers from one museum can explain their workflows, and staff from another museum will get excited because they’re able to learn from one another. I’ve seen clients create workflows for modules that I had never thought of before. It’s an amazing experience to have everyone together in such a personal setting.”
Whether training remotely via screen sharing, on location, or in the Gallery Systems office in New York City, training is an essential productivity enhancer for any museum. “Museum staff always leave training excited, and with a new set of tools to save time and make their work more efficient,” Allison tells us.
For more information on TMS Core training with Gallery Systems, or if you would like to learn about how you can work with Allison, contact us to learn more.
