How we work

‘It’s the people, the Southbank Centre has some kind of innate ability to hire a majority of fabulous people who make working and coming here a joy, really. And I just love the connections I’ve built, you build up friendships which will last a lifetime.’

‘I first started as a volunteer. I was unemployed, not in a good space. I just happened to be scrolling websites and found volunteering at the Southbank Centre, a place I’ve always visited to read, study and watch things. And I thought, well I’d never get work in this place, so I took that opportunity of volunteering.’

‘The people I work with, we all support each other, we all get on. It’s fabulous because sometimes we get calls that can drain you, but as soon as you hang up, someone makes you a cup of tea or asks if you’re ok. It’s a simple thing, but it means a lot, you know? It’s those so-called small gestures that mean a lot.’

‘My nature is to be private and introverted, to be by myself, and here I am working in the Southbank Centre, the two shouldn’t gel, but somehow I’ve made it work for me. This place has made me become more comfortable in large groups. That’s one of the things I’ve learned about myself working here; things are not as frightening as they may first appear.’

‘I’ve been here for 13 years and the energy is still good. You know a lot of people can get tired of a place. I can’t. I will find something to raise myself, that’s my spirit basically.’

‘There is a family and community thing going on here, which has been going on for years, and the thing is people come and go, yet you still have that real vibe going on here. People want you to do well. I’m delighted to come to work.’

‘I wasn’t actually looking for roles at the Southbank Centre. I love film and exhibitions, but I had no experience of the arts. So I would say I was lucky to gain work here. But the way things have turned out and the way things have progressed here, I almost feel as though this was written for me, you know? That I was meant to be here at some stage.’

‘Sometimes I forget to take my lanyard off, and I get caught in or around Waterloo station with someone asking me ‘Where’s the Southbank Centre?’ But I’m always happy to help them out. It’s another simple thing, to help people, they feel good and are so appreciative.’

‘One of the joys of working here is the various nationalities of people I’ve met; the sheer range of people. You pick up things every day with different people, you almost don’t realise how much you absorb in one day. And I think that’s another cool thing about working here, how much you hear and learn.’

‘I almost don’t have typical days, I’ve tried different things in various departments – that’s one of the things that keeps fuel in my tank, the variety of my role. The best thing I’ve done in my years here was manage the winter market, working with the commercial team, they were magnificent to work with and made it so easy.’

‘It’s very satisfying being somewhere that’s really connected with the local community – we’ve such a great free programme here and it’s great to be able to work directly on that and see the positive impact it’s having on the local area. I’m from South London, and I came to the Southbank Centre as a child, so it’s a nice full circle moment.’

‘I run the PROUD network and it’s so wonderful to be part of this supportive community, that’s behind me, helping me to be my best, fullest self. It’s been a real positive, we have a lot of fun together, and we’ve done some amazing events.’

‘I’ve always wanted to work in the arts, anything cultural I wanted to be a part of. As a child I really wanted to do something fun, and I think I have fun here.’

‘We have really big ambitions here at the Southbank Centre and it really does take so many different people to realise them and to work together collaboratively and respect each other’s contributions to that. It really is a huge collaborative operation here, and I think it’s so important to appreciate that.’

‘Running futuretense gigs is great because you get to meet the artists and as they’re usually quite young and new to performing professionally they’re really excited to be here. It’s probably the biggest venue they’ve played. So it’s great to get that excitement from them and be part of that.’

‘Festival days are great, being on-site, feeling the buzz as audiences are coming in and they’re really enjoying themselves, and so you get to see the impact of your work, that’s a great feeling.’

‘I think at a lot of organisations you can be quite scared to make mistakes, or ask questions or not know things, whereas I’ve never felt that here. And I feel like that’s down to really amazing line management and great teamwork from the teams I’ve been in.’

‘I’ve worked here for about two and a half years. Moving from a small museum with a staff of four to here and a staff of like 400, was a really big change, it was a little bit daunting, but everyone was super welcoming and continues to be welcoming.’

‘A day that Is full of variety is a really great day and I definitely get that here at Southbank Centre.’

‘When installing an exhibition, when we open up the cases and we see the work for the first time, it often feels like Christmas. That’s when we first see the work in the space, it’s really exciting.’

‘I love the building and that’s a really important thing for me, because I feel that putting on an exhibition is very theatrical. It’s about space and staging and bringing things together in a live encounter with the public, and the Hayward Gallery has got these really interesting, very different volumes that it’s a real pleasure to work with.’

‘There are some really great people who work at the Southbank Centre, across all the departments, there’ll be people who I’m just like, wow, you’re so great at your job and you care so much, it’s such a pleasure when you encounter people like that and that happens a lot.’

‘It’s always a real pleasure and an honour to work with artists. I love it. They’re always very interesting people and you get to work with them at a point when, however famous they are, they’ve got a vulnerability because there’s a lot at stake, and you’re with them in that moment.’

‘I always remember my first experiences visiting museums, they had a totally different register, a combination of quiet and almost an atmospheric pressure. I found I really liked that environment, I could really concentrate and think, and the magic of those spaces really attracted me to working in galleries and museums.’

‘I’ve discovered I like working with dead artists. I’d never worked with any dead artists before working here, and I’ve now worked with two – Diane Arbus in 2019 and Louise Bourgois in 2022. And that really forced me for the first time to work with the artwork and not the artist. It offered possibilities to do something totally different with the work.’

‘There are a lot of things that I see at the Hayward Gallery that I don’t think I would see anywhere else. I guess it’s the theatrical ambition of the installations, and the playfulness too.’

‘Mine is a fairly invisible role, people don’t really understand what I do, but I’ve explained it as it’s a bit like the film Night in the Museum, just during the day. I run around dealing with all the stuff that keeps happening, but no-one really notices because when the gallery opens everything seems completely normal.’

‘It’s really nice working as part of a bigger organisation and a bigger team because you get a lot of feedback and you see how you work differently with different people. You work in cycles but the teams shift and there’s a lot of opportunity to reflect on how things went. if you’re working at a small organisation, you don’t necessarily get that.’