JOB PURPOSE

As Scotland’s leading conservation charity, the National Trust for Scotland cares for, shares and speaks up for Scotland’s heritage. Since 1931, we’re pioneered public access to and shared ownership of some of the most magnificent buildings, collections and landscapes in Scotland. We care for ancient houses, battlefields, castles, mills, gardens, coastlines, islands and mountain ranges, as well as the plants, animals and birds that live there.

To share these special places, we hold approximately 50,000 image assets to promote and explain the purpose of the Trust. We are conscious that we do not have a robust digital asset management system to store and manage access rights to these images. These include images of:

• People
• Places – castles, gardens and landscapes
• Conservation in action
• Wildlife and nature

Note: there is an existing database (Portfolio) which holds imagery of collections items (as undertaken in a previous digitisation project).

Currently, these assets are saved across a range of locations: SharePoint, locally on people’s own machines, Flickr, on external hard drives. There are significant risks to the Trust having no coherent storage system:

• Misuse of imagery (contravening IP/copyright information) because we have no way of securely tagging and storing contracts/permissions forms alongside imagery
• Loss of assets (many are currently stored on external hard drives)
• Difficulty of sharing imagery both internally and externally
• Storage costs from duplication of images across personal machines

This immediately affects Content/Marketing, Communications and Fundraising within Audiences & Support. We currently do not have the resource or expertise within the Directorate to initiate this project so are looking for an external expert to develop a plan for how to transition to a DAMs.

The purpose of this role is to assess our current position, auditing our assets and putting in place a robust plan for an intuitive, well-governed asset management system in line with the work already done by the Collections team. We would like to use Portolio, a system already in place in other areas across the Trust, but would like the successful applicant to assess the efficacy of Portfolio, and report on its benefits/issues/whether we can optimise it to work for us, or whether an alternative package should be considered so we can make an informed decision. This will ensure a consist approach to asset management is taken across the Trust.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES AND ACCOUNTABILITIES

• Audit assets (video, imagery, illustrations) within the Directorate to gauge the scale of the requirements and clarify work required on copyright records.
• Assess the functionality of Portfolio for imagery, including a report on whether any development work is required to ensure it is suitable for the needs of the directorate.
• Build upon the work already done by the Collections Team to develop clear cataloguing standards for the DAMs to improve access and rights management and to ensure that a consistent approach is taken to asset management across the organisation
• Develop a plan for how to transition live imagery to Portfolio, and how to manage the transition of the image backlog.
• Design a plan for the implementation of workflows for good digital asset management including a review and disposal criteria policy and ongoing resource requirements.

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS, SKILLS, EXPERIENCE & KNOWLEDGE

Qualifications

Essential

• Strong track record in DAMs management and/or commercial digital image library management

Desirable

• Educated to a degree level in a relevant heritage or information technology subject

Experience

Essential

• Technically knowledgeable, technically experienced person
• Proven experience with Portfolio and other DAMs systems
• Thorough understanding of the cataloguing and meta data protocols for the retrieval and exploitation of digital assets
• Experience of planning and delivering a DAMs audit/approach project
• Ability to work independently
• Experienced and independent self-starter, with the knowledge and confidence to review existing systems
• Excellent knowledge of copyright and other legal compliance issues
• Experience of develop digital management workflows

Desirable

• Experience in a charity, heritage or cultural organisation.

The National Trust for Scotland is looking for an experienced Senior Conservator to lead conservation activity across our nationally important collections and historic interiors.

You’ll lead the planning and delivery of collections conservation at the National Trust for Scotland, managing a team of regionally based Conservators within the Collections team. You’ll also provide direct conservation support for a portfolio of Trust sites in our Highlands and Islands region including castles, visitor centres, and island properties. This role combines team leadership with hands-on oversight of preventive and remedial conservation, ensuring best practice, consistency, high standards of training and sustainability.

About You

• Qualified in conservation (or equivalent experience)
• Proven experience leading teams and managing projects
• Strong knowledge of collections conservation best practice
• Skilled communicator with experience training or mentoring others
• Comfortable working across multiple sites and travelling regularly
• Full UK driving licence
• ICON accreditation and experience commissioning conservation work are desirable.

Location & Travel

• Primary base: National Trust for Scotland, Broadstone Building, 50 South Gyle Crescent, Edinburgh, EH12 9LD

§ Regular travel to properties across the Highlands & Islands region will be required. A Driving Licence, valid for driving within the UK, and a willingness to travel is essential.