The V&A Wants To Be a More Diverse Employer - Here's How It's Communicating That

In recent years, the V&A – a family of museums based in South Kensington, Bethnal Green, Dundee and Stoke-on-Trent, has been working on its internal branding and communications to diversify its appeal as both an attraction for visitors but also a place to work. One of its priorities last year was to create a cut-through employer identity that would showcase it as an employer brand.

Wonderhood Design was invited to enter the procurement process after the V&A became aware of its The Neighbourly Fund, an initiative that sees it support local Soho businesses with access to its brand and design expertise. Launched in 2023, it aims to help independent businesses in London from restaurants to shops to stand out against competing bigger chains and brands.

Utilising the V&A employee value proposition; ‘Together we make it V&A’ the Wonderhood Design team released a new visual identity at the beginning of the year, developed over around 12 months and beginning with focus groups with current V&A employees and volunteers.

To connect its promise across all communications, a graphic ribbon has been introduced across the brand infrastructure featuring a colour palette of yellow, orange, green, yellow and purple running over, behind and through the imagery of employees and volunteers, while also weaving in and out of different spaces and locations.

“Our challenge was to create an identity that encapsulates the breadth of roles within our diverse organisation and champion the inclusive understanding of creativity that underpins our global brand,” says Sophie Rouse, head of integrated marketing and insight at the V&A. “Wonderhood understood our challenge brilliantly, and together we have created a beautiful, flexible identity that will help us stand out in the market and attract more people to be part of the V&A.”

Discussing the work involved in the project are Wonderhood Design cofounders Simon Elvins (head of design) and Roy Barker (creative and design operations director) alongside senior strategist Tara Ellis and Eddy Yan, the agency’s new business and marketing director who also acted as account lead.

Creative Salon: Can you give a bit more background to the initial brief from the V&A?

Ellis: They wanted something that was really simple, something that was flexible that could be used across all employee touch points, whether that was badges that people would wear, or name tags in the actual museum, or email signatures, or even postage inside signage to attract volunteers or employees looking for a role at the V&A. What was really interesting is that there is a limited diversity in the sector as it stands. The V&A was facing a similar challenge around encouraging and creating a diverse employee and volunteer work base. What they wanted was to bottle up how amazing the V&A culture is to work there and use that to welcome people in.

What's real interesting about that are the sector perceptions. A lot of people think you need to have a high-level degree. They think that you need to be well-educated. They think it's not a place for them. The V&A in itself is incredibly welcoming and incredibly accessible. Everyone wanted to encourage people in. They were asking; ‘How do we overcome some of our almost traditional, posh perceptions, to welcome people in?’ So, knowing what the challenge was we wanted to get more diversity into the building. How do we do that? For us, it was all about making that inspiring culture something that we could add to our design and create something that felt modern, inviting, and welcoming.

Yan: It was an interesting tender process. They asked a lot about how we would tackle the brief, and that was a big portion of the pitch, so we did have to figure it out a solid process internally. One thing we do at Wonderhood Design is make sure that the strategy is watertight at the beginning. That was a point of differentiation for us and what Sophie latched on to with our specific approach being able to get under the skin of their business. So, the first step was conducting interviews, doing our own research and getting to a firm understanding of all of those different audiences; the current employees, the future employees, or volunteers, and getting to a very clear, single organising thought or design springboard,  allowing all the stakeholders to buy into everything across all the different stages. It's a lot of management in terms of the structure you need to put around all the processes, and then, once you brief the team into design, it's a very iterative process.

CS: Were there any set targets to meet from the start?

Ellis: There wasn’t any specific number. The biggest task was: How do you actually embody that sentiment of being an inclusive and diverse place to work? What's interesting is, that although they haven’t previously done it from an employer proposition, the V&A has been on a mission to make what it stands for more accessible, such as with the V&A East. They also have opened up a V&A East Youth Collective initiative, which is all about welcoming younger individuals in who may not think of the V&A or that kind of side of museum culture as being something for them. For us, although there aren't any specific numbers, what was great throughout the process is almost sense-checking the sentiment, whether it is relevant and something people felt a connection to internally. We also did a lot of research externally. That was helpful to see that the direction we were heading in was useful.

Elvins: The brief was to retain current employees but also attract new talent. So, ensuring that the employees who are currently there feel a sense of sort of pride in what they do. And building a community around that while attracting new talent. A lot of people think the V&A is for certain roles and only has certain layers, but they also have front of house, security, and IT, so it's trying to open up the perceptions a bit. Then there is a whole other layer, which is large group of people who go to them to volunteer. These are all slightly different audiences that had to be captured within this.

Ellis: And to build to that, the strategy was: We have a framework which a lot of organisations often do when it comes to brand strategy, but we call it the four C's, and what that means is we will interrogate the company. What makes the V&A incredibly unique? What makes it something that people could get excited by and people will talk about? We then have Consumers which look at those audience groups - we looked at Current employees. We interviewed them. We spoke to 200 V&A Considerers and Non-Considerers to understand why they may not want to think about the V&A. Then we spoke to volunteers and we looked at the sector. A lot of these people just have an interest in arts and culture or museums in general, what we needed to work out was, what's everyone else saying? What can we say differently to stand out and demonstrate what the V&A offers? The fourth one: What is going on in a wider culture? What matters to people now more than ever, post-COVID, in this new recession-era and to work out what we need to motivate people to apply, consider, or even stay. The retainment part was a big part of this as well. Those four Cs identify an opportunity.

So, what can the V&A uniquely say? How can we compete versus the rest of the sector? And then also; What is true to how the audiences are feeling? They had already come to a strategic bit of thinking, which was, ‘together we make it V&A’ And that was the line. But what they were missing, which I think was the key role we played in the process, was imbuing that with meaning. What does ‘together we make a VNA’ mean? Throughout the whole process, we saw that is the collaboration. That's the inspiration that you see as soon as you get in the doors. The fact that the organisation is diverse and welcoming and how everyone forms a big piece of the V&A puzzle.

CS: Where did the inspiration for introducing the ribbons come from?

Barker: It was quite a simple device, almost like a little red thread that was joining the different sites. It's not just South Kensington, Wedgwood and Dundee. It has a young V&A and there are multiple sites. There are also multiple job roles, and even within one building, there is conservation and front of house and the gallery. I guess it was quite a simple device that could literally run through and connect all these places together so they're not seen as a series of disparate siloes. It would run through and pull them together, and act as a device to pull you through and bring it all together.

CS: Can you talk about the color palette and the four colors that you've chosen?

Elvins: It was about having quite a vibrant palette. There's some energy there and that contrasts quite well in terms of the V&A’s historical context. So there's a counterpoint and a bit of a balance, but I guess there's a sense of optimism and joy. It’s eye-catching in terms of those bold colours.

Barker: There was a lot of work done around colour accessibility, which the V&A rightly, was very hot on to ensure that the palette was accessible to all through the website and legibility. So that was something to bear that in mind as we were working with the colours.

Ellis: When we looked at the sector, we looked at how everyone else was showing up on their home pages, their career pages, their consumer comms, their employee and volunteer comms. It was incredibly generic, quite lackluster and bland. Considering these museums are some of the most inspiring homes in the world, their sites just weren't reflecting that. So, for us, it was important to feel modern to tackle those traditional perceptions and feel really distinctive versus the rest of the category, so it embodies the inspirational sites that they are. It’s more welcoming as well. Colour is such a great way of inviting more people in.

CS: And now that the project is live, what's next for it?

Barker: We worked collaboratively with their design team and ultimately, they're the ones who are rolling out the identity. With brands and identities, you're always handing it over to someone. Along the process, we decided to create a sort of bespoke motion and asset tool that allowed the V&A’s internal design team to create these simple animations using the graphic lines for job posts or whatever collateral they needed. It was a custom tool in their hand, so you wouldn't need a specialist designer or a motion designer to set something up. That was quite a nice element  to hand over to them, so they can use that as a tool to roll out and put the identity very much in their hands.