Be the Bigger Person

In local government, we sometimes are subjected to criticism from the outside. While it is not really our call to judge what is warranted or not, we sort of grin and bear it and develop a layer of thick skin and broad shoulders. There are comments that have become famous when dealing with difficult people. When they go low, we stay high. Be the bigger person.

Maintaining composure is important. Possess a level-headed nature. Rise above the nonsense and the fray to a place of positive optimism. For the city or county manager, that means staying professional in sometimes heated situations.

Gauging Performance

As local government managers, we are often moving swiftly to one activity to another.  Council or Board meeting.  Legislative or intergovernmental affairs activities.  Personnel or union matters. Financial report.  Big picture and strategic planning items. And back and forth again throughout the day, week and month - often not spending time to reflect on how the leadership and management work is doing. 

How do we gauge our performance as a leader?   Here are three simple strategies.  1) Check in with your Board or Council.  Your contract may cover a formal performance plan/review but this is informal. Do timely meet-ups to solely talk about how they see things going.  The problem with the once-a-year appraisal process is that…it’s once-a-year.  2) Sample the feedback comments from key department leaders you can trust.  These are your key and critically important team members that make you “look good.”  While they report to you, trust should be present enough that they feel comfortable and open to providing candid feedback and commentary. 3) Discuss your ask for inputs with others in the field.  How does your brethren see you?  Say you’re trying to ascertain outside perceptions of your leadership.  Garner their takes and use the input as you will from the internal team.

Coaching

As a chief administrative officer for many years, I get the trepidation to partner with an executive/leadership coach for purposes of personal growth and professional development. CAOs, good ones at least, are sort of built to lead and do stuff individually and get things done by themselves. Seeking assistance on matters such as these are often foreign concepts.

That being said, the clients I coach almost universally tell me - I needed this type of arrangement. Why? CAOs of local governments are high performers. To excel they need supports just like anyone else does, to further refine talents, to recognize weakness areas, and to hone developmental skills. A competent executive coach can work with a willing and engaged CAO to tap into areas of growth and to get over humps and obstacles that were initially seen, with the CAO in their solo lens, as impenetrable.

Lastly, and related to our specific consultative service offerings, CAOs want to talk and be coached by someone who has done this type of stuff before, who has walked the walk so to speak. Someone who has negotiated dicey labor agreements and dealt with a political board. Someone who has been challenged with both hiring and firing decisions, and big and small picture planning processes at the local government level. You would want your ski instructor to have skied before right?

Reset

This blog posted is lifted from/inspired by a presentation I provide called Reset, Reboot and Renew: Your New Year Ahead as a Local Government Leader. (I will be providing this via Zoom on 01/16).

As the new year begins, it is essential for public sector leaders to take a step back and Reset their focus. This process starts with a self-assessment - examining your personal values, organizational goals, and professional aspirations. Ask yourself: Are my current efforts aligned with my purpose? Reflecting on foundational questions allows you to identify areas for improvement while still celebrating successes.

Leaders often face external challenges such as the effects of the pandemic funds drying up, shifting political climates, impacts of elections and the demands of home life. Add in inflation and “life in the public fish bowl” and you have pressures galore. These factors make it even more crucial to regularly evaluate the meaningfulness of your work. By addressing assumptions and reconnecting with your "why," you can set the stage for a year of clarity and purpose. Resetting isn't just a pause - it's a launchpad for impactful leadership.

A New Year

The new year is upon us. We have moved into 2025. The shows will be on to commemorate the year of 2024, the hits and misses, celebrity deaths and major news items. It’s time to reflect on your year and what went right and wrong. 

For the clients we coach, 12/31 or 01/01 are just another set of days. Yes, there’s the revelry and the Auld Lang Syne and the cheers and well wishes.

But for those who practice regularly the mindfulness practices we teach, they are consistently appraising and self-reflecting. Example, a daily journal. A time to note what you are grateful for and what you are looking forward to, and note highlights and lowlights of the day.  

Now, don’t get me wrong, many us still do the New Year’s Resolutions and have fun with it - but it’s still just another day for those of us focused on mindfulness-based, present-moment living.  

Happiness is the absence of desire.

This quote, attributed to many - most recently the author James Clear - got me thinking this last week. It was the week between Christmas and New Years and I think about the excessive, and over-the-top holiday shopping experience in the United States. How many people, of all ages, desired some good or service for a present, that they did or did not receive, that they felt would lead to happiness? Seeking and desiring an external “something” (companion, raise, present, car, dog, etc) will only lead to an eventual come-down moment when the temporary, immediate high fades. And you will be back to the cycle of desire and want….and unhappiness. Longing for, and hoping to achieve ________, are still fine and acceptable practices - but, in 2025, let’s all try and find a better balance between striving and savoring.

What is popular is not always right…

This was, for me as a teenager in South Buffalo, an annoying sign that hung on our kitchen. Along with “it’s what you do with what you’ve got,” they were my teacher mother’s way of reminding us to maintain a strong backbone, practice ethical conduct and be of sound moral character in our daily activities.

Breaking this one down after all these years away from home, and it really rings true, especially for those in the field of local government management. Advancing a tax cut, or a tax increase. Making the tough decision to abandon an inefficient or redundant program, with people’s livelihoods on the line, in favor of privatization. A staffing decision where the players are related to Board members. Sometimes the most difficult ones are when you know the exact truths and all the facts and the people/public do not, and the actions taken off of those facts are wildly unpopular.

Bottom line - do what is right in the face of strife. Be ethical in a slimy political world. Stand your ground. Do not cater to groupthink. Exercise independent thought.

Partisanship and Politics

The form of government (council manager) that I have operated under and within, generally speaking, for my professional life - is by far the most professional, productive and efficient form of governance structure in the US local government sector. You blend the elected official expertise in policy and strategic thinking and civic responsiveness to issues the community desires, with the seasoned, educated touch of a professional, ethical and trained non-partisan administrator. 

This is the composer - conductor relationship.

The One-Day MPA

Many of the local government managers I am affiliated with have an MPA. My guess would be 75% of city and county managers possess the graduate degree in public administration. The coursework varies, and the time to complete as well, but generally you have the core topics of management, HR, budgeting/finance, some theory, decision-analysis, public policy and a few others.

For the coaching clients I work with, I often tell them to do a one-item reset at times (or review) and focus on an element of the MPA. Management. Communications. Budgeting. HR. Policy. Pick “A course” and re-review it against what you are doing now. Take communications. Do a check-in and self-assess what you are doing or not doing in communications. How’s your internal messaging? Your department / director meeting cadence? External messaging with residents? Marketing of your tourism, Main Street or economic development efforts? Press release content, quantity and quality? Website presence? Social media work? Go one by one in the items in this course area and appraise progress, or static-ness, and develop a customized, individual “lesson plan” for development or refinement of areas that need work.

Reflection

I talk about being in the present a lot. You could say “it’s my thing.” A centerpiece of my Mindful Public Management Training. Do not dwell on the past. Focus on what is in front of you. Today is the only thing know - yesterday’s (or Tuesday’s for the Skynyrd fans) gone and tomorrow is not yet guaranteed. You know the platitudes. So what I will say next could come across as counter to that. Reflection is ok - think about this at night - what made today unique?

With my son asking me a question once - what do you do all day as a County Administrator? I would have fun rattling off the diversity of services and functions we as CAOs find ourselves in due to the expansiveness of county government in NY. In fact, I wrote about this story with Ben Effinger for ICMA’s PM Magazine). With an end-of-day reflection, and the asking about the unique nature of that day, such a practice can lead to a more appreciative self. You were blessed with another 24 hours, you maximized that time how? What did you do today that you never do? Might never do again? Pinch yourself to make sure you’re real.

Public Speaking

One of my recent posts on LinkedIn gained a lot of traction and impressions this year and I thought I would re-post here under my Blog section. The subject is public speaking:

Public speaking is something that most local government managers have to do, in some cases a lot, throughout the course of their career - yet many receive little to no training on this key element of work life for the CAO. This is not an antidote to that reality, but a list of Top 10 helpful hints to those that endeavor to do the people’s work.

1. Do not read from the slides Ever.

2. Relative to number one, always think of this - if you give out your presentation in advance and/or read from the slides, what value do you really bring to the presentation itself?

3. Practice any speech verbatim in the same type of environment (i.e. setting, sitting or standing, podium or not, etc) that you will find yourself in during the actual speech.

4. If there is a Q&A style format post-speech, anticipate some questions and rehearse those responses in advance. Do not go into overplanning this Q&A part, though, as you will never be able to anticipate everything.

5. Should there be time before a public speaking engagement to chat with the audience, do it. Maximize this pre-speech time to break the ice.

6. Humor is good and encouraged, pending the environment/setting - but do not go overboard and make sure to exercise tact and, shall we say, political correctness.

7. Engage the audience, even if there is not a Q&A. In other words, make significant and regular eye contact, move around if you can, do not look at the same people, etc.

8. Many of us have verbal fillers (e.g. - umm, ugh, so, you know what I mean, and so on and so forth, like, right, etc). It’s ok to have these, no one is perfect. Just work on them and recognize where and when they present themselves and work diligently to curb their regularity.

9. Unlike the NFL quarterback, I implore you - Do not go long. Ask in advance what the speech length is expected to be, or have in your head if there is not set time, some sort of rough estimate on the length. No one remembers if you end early, however, people will definitely remember those that go excruciatingly long.

10. Finally, remember your purpose. If this is introducing a public hearing, you go in one direction. If it’s a speech introducing careers in local government to an MPA program, you handle it a touch differently. If it’s the local rotary club and you’re the monthly program, there’s a preferred setup for that. Know the audience and length, and center yourself on the purpose and mission of the speech. Why are you there? And what does the audience here need to know? Then, deliver a knock-out speech!

The DMV

In my home county, our County Clerk recently won election to the State Assembly and will be departing her position at year-end. In New York, the County Clerk usually runs the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) office. I am reminded of a post I made on the DMV and I thought I would re-post here under my Musings section.

The trip to the Department of Motor Vehicles, aka the DMV, has for decades been characterized by unpleasant customer experience.

News flash - 1) It doesn’t have to be that way. 2) It isn’t always the case.

I feel for the DMV staffers. They have been grouped with trips to the dentist, visits from annoying in-laws, and a virtual call to a customer service agent (who you only got to after pressing a whole bunch of buttons because the “menu has recently changed”) whose manager is not available and who can’t help you telephonically.

But the DMV workers are often misunderstood and maligned for no good reason. When I was the CAO in Livingston County, the DMV was run by a series of elected officials (I worked with three County Clerks) who ran for office to secure the position. The rest of the few dozen staff were appointed and civil service positions. They ran the office with a professionalism and laser focus on proper, courteous and fast service to the residents and visitors. Yes we had lines at times. Yes, we had numbers to pull from. But we also had (and still have) residents from neighboring counties driving sometimes a great distance, to transact their activities at our DMV due to our reputation for service excellence.

And, when Covid hit we pivoted to an appointment system. Life threw us a curveball and we hit it out of the park. We took a good customer service experience, one that already defied the preconceived notion that the DMV experience had to be dreadful, and we made a good process even better.

The lessons here are plentiful. Don’t let assumptions rule the day. Don’t let a reputation persist that isn’t grounded in fact. If others perpetuate stereotypes of poor service, so be it, be different. Strive for excellence. Focus on the customer. Steal elements of the private sector (that work well) and commit to operating in that environment as a public sector agency. The trip to the DMV can be…..gasp….enjoyable.