LGM - EXAM 2 - Ch. 7

Tensions on the governing body are exacerbated by two gaps:
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Tensions on the governing body are exacerbated by two gaps:
1. The knowledge and expertise that separates full-time staff from part-time elected officials;
2. The governing body's preoccupation with political acceptability and the the staff's focus on administrative sustainability

(Identified by John Nalbandian)
The typical lack of government expertise on the part of newer members is compounded by ____.
Frequent turnover on some councils and boards.
In many communities, governing bodies range from ________.
Five to seven members
Elected officials are amateurs who function as _____.
Civic-minded citizen legislators
Most local elected officials see themselves as individually and collectively as ______.
Local government leaders
Some local elected officials see themselves as ______.
Trustees, delegates, and activists responsible for representing citizens and making public policy to improve their community.
Key indicators that council or board is getting of the track to high performance?
Lack of clarity over who does what in terms of roles of the governing body and the staff on the four dimensions of governmental process: mission, policy, administration, management
Four dimensions of governmental process were identified by ____.
James Svara
International City/County Management Association's 2012 State of the Profession survey results when they asked city and county managers to rate the effectiveness of their council as a decision-making body?
26% said it was moderately effective
38% stated it was not effective
Building governing body effectiveness is especially difficult, given the mayor's or chair's strong or limited authority as presiding officer?
Limited authority
Regardless of whether members are elected at-large or from a district, they do not owe their electoral success to ________. And they have a mandate from voters to pursue __________.the agenda on which they campaignedICMA's State of the Profession survey found that when top administrators always work to promote interaction among council members, _____ governing boards are highly effective at decision-making, compared to ____ when interaction is never or only occasionally supported.7 of 10; 4 in 10Choices about how often to schedule meetings of elected officials and what type of meetings are appropriate are usually in the hands of the _____.Mayor or CAOSpecific expectations regarding effectiveness and related practices among the governing body, mayor or chair, and manager vary greatly, depending on ______.Social and political norms, traditions, and laws, and can vary with changes in the personalities involved as elected officials turnover and managers move on.What does it mean when a manager is an organization capacity builder?The manager must build an organization that has both capacity and competence. This entails implementing and updating business practices and processes for personal administration, finance, purchasing, payroll, contracting, and other basic local systems. Involves use of management techniques (strategic planning, performance measurement, benchmarking, program evaluation to ensure continuous improvement)Technologies such as websites and social media are being used to _____.Increase public outreach and access and to reduce costs.Increasingly, managers seek to build organizations that _____.Promote innovationA critical component of this organization capacity building is _____Professional staff.As local government workforces become more diverse and multigenerational, strategies will be needed to recruit and respond to the changing races of the admin staff, such as_____.Bilingual education, job rotation, job sharing, and flexible work hours.What did Alliance for Innovation say in 2016 about transforming HR?"Transforming local government human resources policies and practices is at the heart of building the workforce of tomorrow"If there is a breakdown in organizational capacity, ____.Both managers and elected officials can be placed under a harsh public spotlight and confidence in local government quickly diminishes.Governing bodies expect the manager to offer what kind of advice?Balanced and impartialWhat does providing balanced and impartial advice involve?- Presenting alternatives - Providing all relevant information that is reasonably available on all different options - Assessing advantages and disadvantages - Explaining professional reasoning - Basing reasoning on professional, technical, ethical, or legal principals, not personal beliefsRegardless of the quality of the opinion of the manager's opinion or recommendation ___.Some policy proposals will not be politically acceptable.Leonard D. White called attention to one of the hazards found in the "adventuresome spirit" of many managers. What was it?A manager that undertakes civic leadership stakes his position on the acceptance of his program by the voters. If his program is rejected, he sacrifices his position as manager. He allies himself with one group of citizens and against another.What is one of the most difficult tests for a manager acting as policy advisor?Remain nondefensive and under control during heated debates over the information and the recommendations that he/she has brought to the governing body.Managers must develop a sense of ____.When to lead and when to follow, when to advocate and when to remain passive.Once the governing body has made a decision, the manager must ____.Get behind it fully and ensure that the staff does the same.Many state statutes and local charters and ICMA require ____.Manager to see that all actions of the council are faithfully executed and they uphold and implement all policies adopted by elected officials.If a manager believes a directive is a bad idea and can't talk the governing body out of it, they can ____.Resign.Managers helping elected officials explain their decision to the public to promote understanding of the body's POV takes ____.Emotional intelligence, diplomatic, and communication skills.Staff focus on ____, while elected officials focus on ____.What do you know?; What do you hear?What is the litmus test of local operations?Service to all citizens.The manager cannoy supervise all day-to-day execution, and therefore must create a culture of ____.Responsiveness and performance within the organization by providing routine service to citizens and by handling special requests and complaints. A key aspect of creating this culture is by equipping staff to provide high quality, customer oriented service. Manager or AM should not micromanage.To promote the development of new and innovative ways to provide services staff should be encouraged by managers to ____.Take initiative and risks, which means supporting staff when they take risks in good faith and fail.Failure should be used as _____.A learning opportunity rather than a call for discipline or punishment.What does it mean when elected officials intervene directly in service operations?Confusing employees with conflicting directives, weakening accountability for results, disrupting workflow, wasting staff time and resources, and short-circuiting coordinated plans developed by the supervisor responsible for day-to-day operations.Language in the Model City Charter (2014):Council members should deal with employees through the manager.To make sure that the noninterference tenet is honored, some managers have insisted that there be ____.No contact between employees and council members without their permission.Research conducted in 2005 in North Carolina found ___.The charters of nine of the 28 largest municipalities contained "work through the manager" language, while the remaining charters were silent on the matter of council-staff relations.Common interaction arrangement:- Encourage direct contact between elected officials and employees for routine inquiries that do not affect admin workloads; - Route more significant requests through the manager - Requests that involve significant and unplanned expenditures of time or money or that will disrupt work schedules are take up with the managerAny elected official concerns regarding personnel issues should be discussed with ____.The manager directly.Despite the individual nature of the politician's world, when serving on a local government board or council ____.Individual members have no autonomous authority.Most managers will ______ at any time to suggestions from individual members, as long as they do not conflict with the will of the governing body as a whole.Welcome, discuss, and frequently respond.If members request sets new directions or requires allocations of funds or staff time not anticipated by the governing body, ____.The manager will usually ask the member making the proposal to put it to the entire body for consideration.Governing bodies expect their managers to be ____.Sensitive, alert, and responsive to their needs for current information and to be barometers of changing community sentiments and emerging issues.One of the implicit foundations of the council-manager form of government?Manager will ensure smooth transitions and institutional stability and memory and will make substantive stylistic changes as different individuals transition on and off the governing body.Members sometimes view the manager as ____.Inextricably tied to the old way of doing things and an impediment to progress and new ideas.Candidates, upon taking office, usually learn ____.Simplicity of campaign rhetoric seldom stands up to the complexity of governing, leading, or managing. Experienced managers will withhold judgment on members whose campaigning seems threatening and will set about to prove that they can serve the new governing body as well as they served the previous body.Managers should consider holding a ______ after new members are elected to discuss policies, practices, and finances and roles for elected officials, the manager, and staff.Governing body retreat.Most managers anticipate that, given a chance ____.They will eventually earn the trust and confidence of new members as those members learn the realities of governing, gain skill as legislators, and observe the manager's performance.One way to cure feelings of isolation in officials and members is to ____.Maintain a relationship of trust and confidence with open communication and candid feedback.When an elected official openly directs constructive criticism toward the manager and gets issues out on the table ____.The manager can ask questions, provide information the member might not have, and respond to his or her concerns.Feedback (possibly in the form of evaluations) gives members the opportunity to ___.Clarify their expectations of the manager by means of concrete examples as they arise, and gives manager more certainty about what needs to be cone to satisfy the elected officials and how well he or she is succeeding.ICMA results about political discourse in their communities- 33% reported that PD in their community was "somewhat polarized and strident, occasionally rude" - 6% "very polarized and strident, often rude" - 52% "generally polite and tolerant of different opinions"What can polarization lead to?Citizen trust and confidence in their local governments will likely erode, leading to low turnout at the polls for general and special elections, lack of public support for bond issues, negative comments in the media, unwillingness to serve on boards, volunteer, reluctance of millennials to pursue LG careers.Shortly after an election and before the governing body begins complex and often contentious budget deliberations, it is important for members to ____.Revisit their protocols and rules of procedure for their deliberations to determine how well these have worked and what changes need to be made in order to promote greater civility in their dealings with another and with the manager and staff.What has made LG operations more transparent and accessible?Advances in computer and communications technology.How can a manager know when problems in the relationship with the governing board in time to take corrective action before dismissal?- ASAP, elected officials and manager should decide what they expect of each other to carry out major responsibilities; - Agree on the purpose, procedure, and timing of manager's evaluationICMA model employment agreement establishes the following minimum requirements for evaluations:1. A written evaluation 2. A meeting to discuss the evaluation 3. A written summary 4. Delivery of the final written evaluation to the manager within 30 days of the eval meetingICMA model employment agreement:Elected officials are are asked to complete a written form prior to eval session, rating the manager on: - How well they exercise management responsibilities - Works with the governing body - Carries out goals and objectives set by the council or board - Devs and executes the budget - Provides leadership - Relates to the community - Deals with the media and external audiences - Communicates, delegates, supervises - Performs in other key areas. Also rated on personal characteristics like objectivity, integrity, risk taking, judgment, initiative, ethics and morals, imagination, drive, self-assurance, stress management, positive image;Retreats are valuable ways to:- Develop strategic goals, objectives, priorities to advance the governing body's vision for the community - ID agreements and differences among members in their values, beliefs about and goals for the community - Plan how to achieve common goals and accomodate differences - Understand one another's expectations about working together - Learn individual leadership styles and behaviors - Build teamwork - Review progress in previously agreed-upon goals.Annual retreats are an effective way to:Build and sustain a unity of effort that is different to develop in the course of a governing body's regular meetings and to help keep elected officials and the manager focused on the big picture for the community.Sometimes elected officials engage in:- promoting cases or special constituencies - micromanaging administration - criticizing their colleagues and the staffMost elected officials are not ____.professional, full-time politiciansWho identified the attributes of high-performing decision-making bodies?UNC School of Govt, Nau?There needs to be an agreement between the governing body and the manager on performance expectations:Visions, goals, objectives