“Ready for Anything”: Front-of-House Staff and Mediating Controversy

This article explores the work of front-of-house staff as mediators, specifically considering their professional experiences of navigating controversial debates. Drawing from museum organizational studies, this article presents a case study of the Visitor Experience team at the Wellcome Collection, London, and how they mediated the closure of the exhibition, Medicine Man. It situates their practice within a web of internal and external communications and considers the implications of their positioning as front-of-house staff within the wider process of mediation: as representatives of the organization, as experts on visitor behavior, and as advocates for visitors. The findings highlight the factors that determine the work of front-of-house staff as mediators, including organizational structures, perceptions of visitor expectations, and the implicit hierarchies present in the heritage sector. The article provides analysis of museum workers’ perspectives on contemporary concerns in the heritage sector around the management of controversies.