I’m a city manager. I’ll always consider myself a city manager. I work with other city managers and local-government professionals. But instead of working full-time for one municipality, we now help government leaders create the change their organizations need. Sometimes they need financial analysis or a strategic plan. Sometimes they want to improve their businessRead… Read more »
Over the last two weeks, I shared how government leaders should heed Vanilla Ice’s advice in Ice, Ice Baby to Stop and Collaborate. In this final blog of the three-part series, we will focus on how to Listen. While many think of social media as the place to spew every thought one ever had orRead… Read more »
Chief Customer Officers (CCO) are becoming commonplace in the private sector, with more than 2,000 of these C-level execs in the US alone. Should federal agencies follow suit? The answer is unequivocally yes. As the only senior exec whose primary goal is to represent the interests of the customer, a CCO can help a federalRead… Read more »
Federal HR professionals with access to electronic employee databases typically have access to a wealth of so-called “structured” employee data, or information that can be quickly counted and analyzed in spreadsheet programs to create pivot tables and reports. Examples of structured HR data include employee salary and demographic information and employee survey responses, all ofRead… Read more »
For decades, OMB and Departments have been trying to trace federal grants and loans to specific places: cities, neighborhoods, farms, enterprise zones, individual houses or stores. The complexity of community development, economic development, rural development, job creation, or just accounting have plagued how funds can be traced. The purpose of tracing the money is toRead… Read more »
If you follow me on Twitter, you know that I’ve been captivated by the antics and misadventures of Murder, She Wrote’s protagonist, Jessica Fletcher. Dame Angela Lansbury, the actress behind the widowed bestselling mystery writer, keeps it real at every point of the series, which ran twelve seasons from 1984-1996. (So it’s just a littleRead… Read more »
We all have to work with other people in our careers and we’re never going to get along with every single person but we can definitely take an active role in attempting to. Conflicts exist in all work places and in the public sector there are some antagonists that can lead to additional strain onRead… Read more »
As I write this post, there are 64 emails sitting in my work inbox, of which nine are unread. I’m sure some of you are laughing right now: “Sixty-four emails? Honey, I’ve got over 2,000. Cry me a river.” Don’t hate. It’s been a slow day. And I ditched over a hundred of them before sitting downRead… Read more »
Let’s admit it: we are all familiar with it from one source or another. Some get it from a demanding job and others from home. STRESS! It is a part of life and at times seems to consume us, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Once you learn how to control IT insteadRead… Read more »
Knowing what motivates you can lead you to do your job better and drive you to contribute more at work. Here are four ways to find out what drives you and use it to improve in your career.