Who is in the class?

When I was in graduate school, my class was full of people in the government space and non profit sector. It was an MPA program after all and the vast majority were state and local government, some federal government and then non-profit. One of my professors, the great Bob McEvoy, told us a story once about his time working on civic affairs and local government matters in Romania, while participating in an academic-exchange type program. He noted that journalists from the newspapers in Romania were taking the MPA courses there. He inquired about it, and these students noted that it was a requirement of their employers that they ingrain themselves in the subject matter about which they will be reporting on (local government, in this case) and, thus, they were soaking in as much as they could via actual MPA courses.

I was reminded of this story this week when a network connection in the private sector reached out about my consulting firm’s coaching/training/professional development experiences. I guessed he might be looking to make the transition to public administration. Instead, he was looking to upskill, learn, grow and be coached individually and specifically in the intricacies of public administration, specifically local government particulars, given that he was wanting to know his (primarily public sector and majority local government) client base that much more in the hopes of servicing their needs as a client even better. I found this fascinating and I wonder if more private sector people and contractors/vendors will consider actions like this in the future. To me, it will be a business separator and value-added benefit.