We Are a Dream Employer
The Estonian Museum of Natural History is a state institution under the Ministry of Climate, with the mission to inspire people to notice, understand, and protect nature. With 21 employees, we are a medium-sized museum in Estonia. According to a Kantar-Emor survey conducted at the end of 2023, we rank fourth in recognition among 200 museums in Estonia, just after the Seaplane Harbour, the Estonian National Museum, and KUMU.
The latter are large museums with around 100 employees. We are small but innovative and visible. Each year, we host around 50,000 visitors in our Old Town building, which is also the maximum capacity of the space.
In terms of visibility and media coverage, we are one of the most prominent museums in Estonia, and our employer brand is perceived as innovative, modern, evolving, and exciting. We offer mission-driven work and the opportunity to make a positive impact on society, while providing our employees with a supportive, cohesive, and inspiring work environment.
In 2024, the Estonian Museum of Natural History was recognized as a Dream Employer in the public sector.
We are driven by the desire to create a workplace and environment that everyone wants to come to in the morning, where work provides satisfaction and opportunities for self-fulfillment, and where colleagues are an awesome team with whom to achieve great things. In this spirit, we design our offices, rest and hygge spaces, organize joint events, sauna evenings, inspiration mornings, do sports together, go winter swimming, and more.
A Start-Up Museum: We Are Set to Grow in the Coming Years!
In business terms, we are like a "start-up museum" poised for significant growth. Over the next three years, we plan to triple our staff and expand the museum nearly eightfold in size. With this vision in mind, we encourage our team to learn, develop, and advance in their careers. We also focus on hiring talented individuals with long-term potential, so they can grow alongside the organization. Additionally, we offer extensive opportunities for continued education and training. In 2022, our employees completed an average of 138 training hours each—the highest in the Ministry of Environment’s administrative area.
Currently, our entire team is working on creating the most modern nature museum in the Nordic region, housed in the largest wooden building under construction in the Baltics.
In our daily work, we place a strong emphasis on team cohesion. We organize regular events, including monthly inspiration mornings at exciting external companies, weekly lunchtime winter swimming sessions (almost half of our staff are part of the museum’s winter swimming club "Sulpsutajad!"), sports events, and sauna evenings with social games. Our museum also features a light-therapy hygge room for winter recovery. Additionally, we hold summer and Christmas seminars in beautiful natural locations, complete with hiking and group activities.
We also foster a culture of praise and recognition, celebrating each other’s achievements. This includes training programs, Valentine’s Day events with a “say something nice to a colleague” box, birthday cards where everyone writes something kind, and Christmas cards summarizing notable contributions from the year. For the past 11 years, we have awarded "Colleague of the Year" and selected an "Act of the Year."
Our employees enjoy a generous benefits package, including 35 days of annual leave, three paid health days, and an annual "workcation" week, which allows staff to combine work and travel with colleagues anywhere they choose.
This year, we are partnering with Sinu Võõras Sõber to prevent work-related stress and burnout. Through this initiative, all museum staff can access psychological counseling with an occupational psychologist, fully covered by the museum.
Recent studies show that visiting museums can have an antidepressant effect, and since our employees can visit all Estonian museums (including the zoo) for free, this benefit is widely used to recharge, broaden horizons, or spend quality time with family.
Work-Life Balance Matters
At the Estonian Museum of Natural History, we prioritize a healthy balance between work and family life. In addition to annual leave, paid health days, a workcation, and a Christmas week at home, we offer additional time off for significant life events. Employees receive a day off when sending a child to school (September 1 for parents of primary school children), when a child graduates from school or kindergarten, when they graduate from their own studies, for weddings, and in times of bereavement. The workdays preceding all holidays are also shortened.
Where possible, remote work is an option, though it’s not very common here—we prefer the office environment, where we can interact and collaborate with our colleagues!
We believe that personal and professional life can be seamlessly integrated at the Museum of Natural History. It's perfectly normal for staff to bring their children or pets to the office—children, in particular, love the museum! You can even celebrate your or your child’s birthday here for free. Parents returning from parental leave can also choose a workload that suits them.
All museum employees have access to employer-sponsored fitness activities, and once a month, a masseur visits the office during work hours. This allows staff to save time while improving their health and restoring energy. We also support exercising during work hours to promote well-being.