Storage Debt: Applying the Theoretical Model of ʻTechnical Debt' to the Management of Museum Storage

Abstract

Numerous recent studies have identified critical issues with a high percentage of museum storage facilities around the world. The problems detected in such studies are usually solved with ambitious renovation projects, or through the reorganisation of existing resources. This article, drawing from the example of five Spain-based museums, explores the new concept of ‘Storage Debt’. Storage debt refers to the cumulative processes and factors that generate the critical conditions mentioned above, which are quite costly to reverse and which adversely affect museums’ activities at multiple levels.

The storage debt concept arose from the theoretical framework of ‘technical debt’ (coined in the software development industry) and applied to the museum field. The former concept refers to actions and decisions that solve a need in the short term, but that in the future generate contexts that make core activities challenging and whose resolution involves extra efforts and resources. This article brings the theory of debt to the museum discipline by defining the concept, characterising the debt that accumulates in the context of museum storage and identifying strategies that museums can apply to solve the problem within the context of their collections.

Making the accumulation of storage debt visible raises awareness around the additional cost that it implies for museum operations, but also around its potential effects on the value of collections. In this sense, the concept can facilitate communication with museum partners unfamiliar with the more technical aspects of museum management, such as patrons or sponsors. Likewise, when paired with risk analysis, the concept of storage debt makes it possible to shift away from a crisis model toward a predictive model: one that is more institutionally viable and sustainable.

Keywords:

• storage
• museum
• technical debt
• reorganisation
• risk management

Notes

1 ICCROM cites this percentage on its RE-ORG project website (2021). This value is frequently used when describing stored museum collections, since it corresponds to the perception that museum professionals have of the volume of objects within a given collection that is not on exhibition. However, although the percentage of items on display in relation to those held in storage is very small, it is extremely difficult to estimate percentages for certain institutions, such as archaeological museums or collections with incomplete inventories (Gardner 2007, p. 39).

2 Dissociation is an agent of deterioration that involves the loss of objects, object values, object-related data, or the ability to retrieve or associate objects and data (Waller and Cato 2020). Unlike the other agents, it affects the legal, intellectual, and/ or cultural aspects of an object.

3 ‘Refactoring’ refers to an internal restructuring of code that does not alter the external behaviour of the programme in question.

4 Debt interest ‘increases complexity and is more costly in the long term’ (McConnell 2008, p. 3). With the passage of time, deficiencies—or ‘cruft’—will make it more difficult to modify and extend the system further, and thereby pay off the debt (Fowler 2019). Technical debt can be defined as any technical issue ‘that stands in the way of deploying, selling, or evolving a software system’ (Kruchten et al. 2012, p. 18).

5 Steve McConnell was the first to refer to the intentionality of technical debt. These first attempts to theorise and organise the concept of debt began almost 10 years following Cunningham’s definition.

6 Since 2018, the museum has belonged to the Working Group on Emergency Planning for Collections of the Sub-Directorate General of State Museums, tasked with preparing a roadmap for the effective implementation of emergency preparedness and response plans in the State Museums of Spain.

7 Seeking a solid theoretical foundation for debt, the authors developed a comprehensive and general framework capable of integrating all types of debt described up to that point.

8 The CoC was first mentioned by Barry Boehm (1976) to explain how the cost of making changes or modifications during the software development process increased exponentially with the advancement of the project.

9 In line with these approaches from the IT field, ICCROM and UNESCO launched ‘RE-ORG’, a step-by-step methodology for reorganising storage for small museums (Lambert 2011). This methodology outlines a series of phases that include different tasks grouped by areas of responsibility, a proposal that largely coincides with current agile trends in software development.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ana Tomás-Hernandez

Ana Tomás-Hernandez has managed the Conservation Department of the Museo Nacional de Cerámica y Artes Suntuarias ‘González Marti’ (National Museum of Ceramics and Sumptuary Arts ‘González Marti’) in Valencia, Spain since 2017. She holds Masters degrees in Cultual Management (Instituto Univetsitario de Investigation Ortega y Gasset-Complutenese University of Madrid, 2007) and Conservation (Polytechnic University of Valencia, 2008). She has worked in different institution attached to the Spanish ministry of Culture, including the Museo Reina Sofia, the Museo Nacional de Antropologia and Promocion del Arte. She has been a member of serveral working groups on collection mobility (European Commission), preventive conservation in temporary exhibition, and emergency planning (Ministry of Culture, Spain).