Developing Leadership Teams in Local Governments

Why can’t government operate more like a business? We can, in some ways. But when it comes to how leadership teams function, local governments face unique challenges. Local governments are made up of very diverse businesses units, from police departments to libraries to water utilities. In the corporate setting, businesses are usually focused on a comparatively narrow range of products or services. A second major difference? Cities are regulators and service providers. It’s no wonder developing a strong and effective leadership team within a complex city organization can be challenging.

City managers are often told to run cities like a business so that they will function better. Because of the complexity of city governments, developing a strong leadership team in a city is, one could argue, even more important than in a business. Local government leaders must not only be good at running their own business units, they must work together to guide an organization whose needs may eclipse those of individual departments or business units.

The Business Model

A normal business, whether its product is hamburgers or medical care, has the luxury of having everyone on the leadership team focused on the same goal. The team may include the CEO and heads of finance, marketing, operations, human resources and technology, among others. All of these leaders are focused on improving the profitability of the company by delivering the products or services the company produces.

The biggest challenge for most CEOs in developing a leadership team is getting them functioning as a team and finding consensus about the best way to move the organization forward. Finance may be focused on cutting costs while marketing is more interested in spending dollars to enter new markets, but they work together to find agreement on priorities because they are all selling the same product and have the same larger goal of maximizing profitability.

The Difference with Cities

Cities are far more complex. A leadership team is likely to include police and fire chiefs, directors of parks and recreation, libraries, planning and development, public works, utilities and internal services such as finance, human resources and IT. Police and fire departments are focused on safety. A library, parks or cultural arts director is focused on providing a broad array of services to an extremely varied clientele. Many cities provide water, sewer, electric or other utilities, and the managers of these business units have a job much more like private industry, with a defined product and customer base. This is just a sampling of the types of high level managers that might be on a city’s executive team. Unlike with a regular for profit business, they have vastly different business unit goals.

Additionally, many departments serve dual purposes. Fire departments rescue people, and they also enforce fire safety regulations. Planners help guide future development in the city, and they make sure that buildings are designed so that they are safe and fit in the community. Many city staff are ensure that local regulations comply with state and federal laws, enforce those regulations, and carry out the more service oriented aspects of their jobs.

When department heads come together as a team to lead the larger organization, it can be difficult to stop acting as a business unit manager and focus exclusively on the health and direction of the larger organization’s goals. Leaders understand the critical role their departments play in the city. What could be more important than protecting residents from crime? What would happen if water and sewer customers were unable to flush their toilets? When residents think about value for their taxes, do they want access to safe and attractive parks? What is the risk if a building inspector doesn’t catch a safety issue in a new building? The work of each of these business units is critical in providing for the health, safety and welfare of the community.

Tips for Building a Local Government Leadership Team

So, just how do you build a city leadership team out of capable and experienced managers who are focused on their business units? This job typically falls to the city manager. Here are some tips:

• UNDERSTAND THE IMPORTANCE OF ORGANIZATIONAL HEALTH – Team buy-in on the role of the organization in relation to individual departments is critical. The organization needs to be financially viable, trusted by the public, have a reputation for providing the right level of customer service and regulation. It also needs the respect and backing of its board of directors, the city council. Only when the organization is healthy and performing at an optimal level, can individual departments be assured of receiving the resources and support that they need to function as effectively as possible.

• TEAM MEMBERS REPRESENT THE ORGANIZATION AS A WHOLE, NOT INDIVIDUAL DEPARTMENTS - The leadership team must understand that in leadership team meetings they represent the organization, not their departments. This takes active work, and only becomes easier with experience. It is tempting to lobby for benefits that will improve the individual department one leads, but this can be detrimental to the organization. For example, implementing new software to manage employee schedules in the fire department may help the management in that department, but might have the downside of causing double entry work for payroll employees or take resources away from software that would benefit multiple departments.

• IMPLEMENT GOALS AND METRICS – Clearly define the goals of the organization, and how success will be measured. Develop and regularly review a limited number of organizational metrics. Understanding how the organization is performing enables the leadership to be nimble and resolve existing issues as well as react to new challenges.

• CLARIFY ROLES AND COMMUNICATION EXPECTATIONS – Every member of the leadership team has the responsibility to communicate the larger organizational goals to staff and explain how each department contributes to those goals. The city manager’s office can’t be the only advocate for these bigger picture goals. The right communication at the right time helps employees understand how their work fits in to the overall organization and helps elected officials see an organization that is functioning effectively and efficiently, without silos. This approach also helps the public see their city government as one integrated and highly functioning unit where it is easy to get information and access to services.

The Importance of Leadership Teams

Why is it important to have high functioning leadership teams in local governments? Some cities let the department heads manage their business units and have the manager’s office focus on the larger organization. A lesson from the private sector is that great leadership teams provide more innovation, flexibility and stability than companies whose leadership is driven by a single individual.

Steve Jobs may have been the face of Apple, but he knew how to hire well and put together a team that is considered one of the most innovative of the information age. Another lesson from Apple is that a strong leadership team focuses on the long-term success of the company, and enables that company to survive changes in leadership. This is especially important in cities, because government employees are expected to retire at increasing rates in the coming years. Good to Great and Built to Last by Jim Collins, two of the most respected business management books in recent years, look at what it takes for businesses to find and maintain success. Strong leadership teams are critical in both instances.

City managers have huge jobs. They run organizations whose budgets are often in the hundreds of millions of dollars and have public duties that are critical to the organization. They also work with an elected board, the mayor and city council, to accomplish their goals. In city government, those “board members” do not typically have experience running a government organization or even experience with the various lines of businesses in a government agency. This is another critical difference from most businesses, whose board members are chosen because of specific knowledge, skills and attributes that will help the business succeed.

This is why city managers play a critical role in aligning the day to day staff work with the vision of the elected leaders. This is also why city managers must be able to depend on department heads to support that larger vision while continuing to manage their own organizations. When all of this comes into alignment, you have a high performing city that is delivering the best value to its shareholders. Just like a business.

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