Public Service Association officials and several former museum staff members have criticised museum management and culture.
Critics have raised several issues, including suggestions museum staff were expected to undertake excessive amounts of unpaid work.
Board members yesterday excluded the public to discuss staffing matters, in order to "protect the privacy of natural persons", board papers said.
There had been a full discussion and every board member had been invited to speak, Mrs Collins said later.
Museum staff worked hard and enthusiastically and were not pressured into working extra hours, she said.
Museum administrators were well aware the museum had a relatively small staff and limited resources, given the size of the museum's collections and the many exhibitions and activities taking place. Museum staff worked "very hard and passionately for us".
Organisers did not want to abuse that dedication and were being careful staff "didn't become stressed".
This was not in response to recent criticism, but Mr Paul had said there would be some changes in museum practices, including making more use of outside contract staff during busy times, she said.
Mrs Collins also recently wrote to Dunedin City Council chief executive Jim Harland, responding to "negative publicity" in the media about museum employment conditions. Copies of the letter have also been sent to the mayors and chief executives of the museum's other contributing local authorities: the Clutha, Central Otago and Waitaki district councils.
The museum was an open and good employer and had "every necessary procedure in place to address valid staff concerns or grievances", she wrote in the letter.
The people to whom the PSA was referring appeared to be "disaffected ex-staff".
The "only grain of truth in the issue" was that the museum had less money than it would like to pay "good and skilled staff", and it was working with the DCC to address that.
