Consulting Archivist, History Factory, Chantilly, VA

Posted June 9, 2020

Description:

The Consulting Archivist will work within diverse project environments to deliver innovative work that ranges from strategy to execution and ongoing management. The Consulting Archivist’s primary responsibility will be to work with senior client leaders and functional areas to develop a deep understanding of the organization’s current information landscape and recommend archival strategies and programs that will deliver business value. Recommendations will reflect each client’s unique business environment as well as archival best practices, and industry, technology, and cultural trends. (S)he will also be responsible for building and managing client collections, supporting thought leadership and business development efforts, and helping inform future archives and content solutions. The position will report to the Managing Archivist and indirectly to the Chief Administrative.

Key Responsibilities:

Working independently and in collaboration with History Factory’s archives leadership, senior leaders, colleagues, account leads, and others the Consulting Archivist shall undertake the following efforts.

Strategy:

Define engagements and plans for the analysis of clients’ archival assets, technologies, and associated operational processes.
Interview client leaders and teams to understand business and project goals and gather relevant information and insights to define requirements expectations, and opportunities.
Recommend archives designs, strategies, and architectures that will enhance business value by improving service, controlling costs, preventing unforeseen issues, promoting use, and providing for the future growth of physical and/or digital content.
Evaluate and recommend architectures and processes for capturing physical and born-digital content.
Educate clients regarding the value of archives and key aspects of archival program architecture and design (e.g. scalability, accessibility, manageability, relevance, affordability, always considering the appropriate incorporation of technology).
Ensure archival solutions align with the client’s program vision.
Effectively present recommendations to client teams and executive management.
Take responsibility for developing and delivering analysis reports on time and budget.

Thought Leadership and Business Development Support:

Provide support for sales and business development including participating in client meetings and assisting in the creation of proposals.
Serve as a subject matter expert on archives and digital content trends in support of innovation and transformation of archives and content solutions.
Contribute to firm-wide thought leadership and marketing materials.
Identify opportunities and support the conversion of assessments into broader engagements.

Execution and Ongoing Service Operations:

Process collections of archival assets in all formats.
Build taxonomies and controlled vocabularies for archives and curated content solutions.
Create descriptive metadata that supports the discovery and identification of resources.
Perform activities necessary to conduct and manage digitization projects; including preparation of originals for digitization; project tracking; metadata creation and collection; and version control.
Apply information retrieval techniques to meet the diverse research needs of end-user organizations.
Curate and compile archival information on subjects, themes, and interests relevant to client needs.
Oversee teams and/or work efforts at a client facility and/or within History Factory.

Qualifications:

ALA-accredited Master of Library Science (MLS).
Minimum of 8 years of experience in archives.
Minimum of 2 years of experience developing and implementing future-focused archives programs.

Preferred Qualifications:

Deep knowledge of archival and content management technologies (legacy and emerging) and a commitment to continue to broaden technology skills.
Experience working with executives, senior leaders, and administrators in large organizations.
Demonstrated knowledge of business environments including an understanding of business case development and ROI considerations.
Understanding of the archives and content needs of marketing and communications functions.
Excellent oral, written and presentation skills.
Proven project management and the ability to manage multiple projects under tight deadlines.
Ability to creatively and analytically problem solve.
Deep understanding of contemporary archives best practices, concepts, and challenges.
Expertise in archival processing and digitization methods, procedures, and practices.
Ability to convey complex technical issues in business terms.
Experience in a business-to-business professional services firm.
Ability to work independently and in collaboration with teammates and other areas within History Factory.
Supervisory and leadership skills.
Flexibility and willingness to travel and work off-site.

How to Apply:

The original job posting can be found here. Please submit a resume and cover letter to [email protected]. Email only, please no phone calls.