What even is an Interpretive Plan?
Programs, events, and exhibits at museums, heritage sites, or science centres don’t just happen. It takes teams of people from different disciplines – like content research, curation, education, marketing, and design – to plan and organize what visitors encounter. Some organizations manage this in-house, though some may choose to hire consultants with specific expertise if the project is large or complex. An interpretive plan should be the foundational tool organizations should use to decide what new experience they wish to share with their visitors.
Don Enright summed it up clearly in his article, “interpretive planning is a form of communications planning… that use artefacts and storytellers and cool interactive displays and talented, passionate interpreters.”
I would describe it as an exercise that: defines goals and measures of success; identifies and researches a target audience; assesses what resources are available that highlight the organization; then develop themes that will communicate how wonderful the resources are, to the target audience, which will then help the organization achieve their goal.
In my experience working at two different exhibit design companies (on two different continents), I’ve noticed that organizations will hire exhibit design companies to develop an interpretive plan. This can sometimes be as the first stage or “concept phase” in a large project, or as a fundraising or strategic document to generate support for a future endeavor.
Lisa Brochu’s 5-M Model for Successful Planning Projects proposes a strong methodology in undertaking an interpretive plan, based on four core Ms – Management, Markets, Message, Mechanics – that determine the fifth and final M, Media. Brochu argues that, “media must be determined based on the sound analysis of information from those other [M] components… media tends to be the fun stuff that everyone wants to jump to first, but building a strong foundation based on the other Ms is critical.”
However, by hiring an exhibit design company to write an interpretive plan, exhibit designers will already have the media solution decided for an exercise they have yet to complete.
Designers will always design exhibits, which leaves out a wealth of other creative possibilities that may better suit an organization’s mission or audience.
Though exhibits are fun and exciting, deciding on an exhibit for an exhibit’s sake may not achieve an organization’s goals, or engage with their targeted audience. The interpretive plan process is intended not just to restate an organization’s goals generally, but to identify specifics for a specific endeavour, then interrogate the goals in order to get to the heart of what an organization wishes to achieve, or even grow into. Setting measurable outcomes is also crucial to understanding whether or not the project is successful, which cannot be clearly defined without specific goals to meet.
An organization may come to a project wanting to attract more visitors, but on further reflection, come to understand they want more visitors to engage with a particular feature of their site. Only by discussing the Management (goals) and Mechanics (resources and feasibility) can an organization decide that perhaps the media of exhibits won’t meet that goal as much as a guided program around that feature.
Additionally, understanding the Market is essential to define a target audience. In my experience, there is frighting low attention given to visitor evaluation, which is a substantial barrier to success. If consultants wish to assign a target audience for an exhibit based off of generalized information, there is a strong possibility that the resulting exhibit will not meet the needs of this audience. Understanding who visits consistently, who doesn’t visit at all, and if those groups are different from who an organization wants to have visit is an essential component of an interpretive plan.
For example, if an organization intends to target a second-language-learning audience demographic in a mono-linguistic community, developing a bilingual exhibit may be less successful than a series of events or programs presented in both languages, as a seemingly personalized introduction to the organization.
In short, if the answer is always exhibits, the true potential of an interpretive plan is lost.
emilymfriesen consulting 