6th March 2020 By Shannon Williams | shannon@tourismticker.com | @tourismticker
Courtney Johnston
To mark Sunday’s International Women’s Day 2020, the Ticker interviews some of the sector’s newly appointed women leaders. Today, Te Papa’s new chief executive, Courtney Johnston, on working as a student at the museum and how landing the “ultimate job” was 20 years in the making.
“I’ve been a part of Te Papa since it opened,” says Courtney Johnston.
“I studied at Victoria University and have been heavily involved in the museum, gallery and library sector across the Wellington region.”
Now, 21 years on from Te Papa’s opening, Johnston says she still can’t quite believe she landed her “ultimate job” last December.
“I’ve been working in the industry for 20 years and, in my mind, this was the ultimate job for someone who works in the sector. It took quite a few years to build up the confidence to know this was a job I could do,” she says.
“I still quite regularly pinch myself.”
Johnston, at 40 years of age the youngest person to hold the chief executive role at Te Papa, says the path to the top involved very deliberate decisions.
She worked as the director of Lower Hutt’s Dowse Art Museum and Petone Settlers Museum, and spent four years on the board of Museums Aotearoa, including 18 months as chairwoman. She was also a member of the advisory group for the Tourism Growth Partnership Fund, an initiative that put seed funding into innovative tourism potential across the country.
“It gave me a good insight into how tourism in New Zealand works and how it might look in the future,” she says.
“I very deliberately sought out opportunities that would help increase my knowledge and give me experience in governance, always building towards a job like this one.”
Johnston then joined the Te Papa executive team in September 2018 as the audience and insight director. Fast forward 12 months and she was in line for the chief executive role following the resignation of Geraint Martin.
She becomes the second woman to hold the top position at Te Papa after founding chief executive Dame Cheryll Sotheran.
“It means a lot to me on a personal level. Cheryl was CEO when I worked here as student and I find the example that she set for women in leadership really inspiring,” says Johnston.
“The four largest museums in New Zealand were all run by men last year. In our sector, museums and galleries, we still have a bit of a glass ceiling when it comes to our largest museums. I was really fortunate that I have had strong female leaderships. I have benefited from other people’s generosity and leadership so I want to do what I can to help support that.
“Governance groups that I’m a part of encourage having entry level positions for people new in their careers, who want some insight into governance and what it means. I’m now in a position to start thinking about a bigger strategy in more depth. I’m really fortunate that I have been supported by a network of strong women and now I can pass on those benefits.”
Courtney Johnston and Te Papa host Roger Gascoigne. Image: Jack Fisher, Te Papa
Looking forward to her first year leading the museum, Johnston says Te Papa is focused on bringing the “best of the world to New Zealand”.
“We are in the final reach of our big summer exhibition, Wonderland, and this week we announced the Dali exhibition for summer 2021. I’m happy to be part of that opportunity to bring the very best of the world to New Zealand so New Zealanders can experience that kind of experience without having to travel too far.
“We’re the only museum in Asia Pacific to receive [the Dali] collection, and that’s a real opportunity to see what we can do there for tourism. We’re also on the verge of announcing a big artist for the middle of the year, which is exciting.”
While the museum has experienced growth in visitor numbers for the past five years, Johnston says she is not expecting to see growth in 2020.
“We had a big bump a couple of years ago with the Lions rugby tour, and a bump before that with Gallipoli. The Terracotta Warriors exhibition gave us very strong results. Wonderland, on the other hand, was put together knowing it wouldn’t have those same big numbers,” says Johnston.
“I’m not expecting to surpass the recent visitation figures, however, having said that we are pretty thrilled with the visitation that we do get, considering the size of our country.”
Issues facing the sector such as the current coronavirus outbreak will also have an impact on numbers.
“There is a big ambiguity there that we are managing. The saving grace is that the whole of New Zealand is currently preparing and we are getting great advice from the Ministry of Health,” she says.
“It’s a big live issue for us at the moment. The whole tourism sector is thinking about this incredibly hard; we know it will have impact on our numbers but we cannot predict what that is going look like, so we are planning for all scenarios.
“We have seen a bit of softening in our numbers, however, our Wellington region visitation is up. International is down, and we are trying to get some insight from other Wellington operators if that is something being shared. It’s still a little early on to see what we can attribute that to, so we are watching it closely.”
Our series on newly appointed women industry leaders, marking Sunday’s International Women’s Day 2020, continues in Monday’s Ticker.
