Point B - Services - Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame

Case Study: Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame

Opened in the spring of 2004, the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame is the world’s first museum of its kind. The museum is dedicated to educating visitors on the significant contributions of the Sci-Fi community, while also paying homage to the creators and contributors of this genre.

The challenge: Joining forces to create a new museum
The senior management at Seattle's Experience Music Project (EMP) was on a mission: to reinvigorate EMP's importance in the community and create a new museum focused on the popular culture of science fiction. With the opening of the new Science Fiction and Hall of Fame Museum in its landmark building, EMP aimed to connect with the close-knit sci-fi community and to engage all visitors in a futuristic genre that affects everyday life. Another goal: to increase revenues through this new source of admissions and donors, as both institutions work to become self-sufficient non-profit organizations.

The museum’s plans included three floors of sophisticated multimedia exhibits and custom interactive kiosks—an ambitious design and build project that required a tight integration of creative designers and the internal EMP technical team. The EMP technical team was assigned with field engineering and installing the systems, integrating the audio and video from four Hollywood studios, building and launching a web site and troubleshooting it in time for the Grand Opening. EMP asked Point B to bring the technical team into the action with only four months before the doors were to open.

Point B: Project leadership at every level
Point B excels at bringing focus, coherence and momentum to large and complex projects. We brought leadership to the museum’s internal technical staff, helping them gain the information and direction they needed to begin work and reach well-defined goals. By promoting teamwork and aggressively tracking down design issues, Point B also helped to ensure that the museum exhibits were delivered on time and with full realization of the creative vision.

Point B leadership contributed three key factors to the museum’s successful on-time opening:

Organizational awareness to get the team fully engaged in the building process. We were able to broker key agreements and create an effective project leadership structure that ensured the team understood and delivered on the creative intent.
Close, continuous focus on progress by managing to lists of blocking issues, milestones and deliverables.
Flexible project leadership. By managing the large-scale project to interim milestones, we were able to recognize upcoming bottlenecks in time to augment resources in the key areas needed to stay on track.

Results: A united effort, a successful launch
The Science Fiction Museum’s technical operations staff was instrumental in the heavily publicized opening of the museum—with no technical glitches. With a clear focus and interim milestones, the technical staff’s talents came to the fore to achieve the museum’s vision: to inspire new generations to reach beyond the present, imagine the future and explore the infinite possibilities of the universe.

Long after the museum opening, the benefits of Point B’s project leadership live on; the technical staff gained valuable skills for communicating and collaborating with external teams in the future.

Case in point:
Want to get, and keep, a major project on a clear trajectory to success? Point B provides the business focus, organizational understanding and leadership skills to launch some of the most challenging projects on earth—and beyond. How can we help you get a new project off the ground?