Building on the Basics - Orientations, Plans, and Role Clarity

Newfoundland and Labrador have recently had their municipal elections; Alberta’s are also complete. Next up is New Brunswick in the spring.

As newly elected councillors, mayors, and reeves turn their attention to the next four years, and managers work with their councils to encourage and receive direction, governance needs to take root and be fertilized so it can thrive.

There is a cascade of good governance that needs to be in place for a council and a municipality to be as exemplary as they can be. In recent years, we have begun to engage with local governments through the entire course of their electoral terms, starting with an orientation for a newly elected council and ending four years later with the candidate workshop a few months before the next election.

This cycle of governance support is very important, particularly as outside influences taint what people expect from their local governments and what these elected officials feel are their actual jobs. The ‘basics’ as interpreted from the title of this blog is such a small part of how a local government operates, but it’s such a huge predictor of success

There is not a week that goes by that I don’t hear from a municipal manager that they are concerned that a council, or an individual member of that council, really doesn’t understand their governance role, or more insidiously, they do understand the role, but don’t want to stay within the boundaries of that role. My response is that a team does not work and can’t be successful unless the team members support each other and each contributes to the role they were elected to fill.

How would a hockey team win if the goaltender decided they’d rather be the coach or a forward? That type of selfish decision immediately generates conflict and leaves a hole in a role that is crucial to success.

These relevant roles carry throughout the life of the government. Whether in the orientation, in a strategic planning session, in community engagement, or elsewhere, if the elected person really wants to fill the role of manager, the municipality loses over and over again. The same can be said for the municipal manager or staff person who really wants to set the governance focus. Staff are there to support the direction of the elected officials, not lead it.

If there is a cascading alignment from vision and mission, through various governance and operational plans to the actual service delivery and then evaluation, that indicates the success or failure of how well the community is served.

Throw civility into the mix as well, and we have the ability to build on success or deepen the frustration and failure.

As a company, we have seen this so often that we’ve developed a ‘health check’ for local governments that we distribute (let me know if you’d like a copy). While the analysis is complex, the basics of the check include:

5-Steps to Assess Your Local Government

DIAGNOSE	Diagnose the root causes of concern.
IDENTIFY	Identify gaps between your organization’s current state of functioning and a high-functioning one.
ESTABLISH	Establish ways to close these gaps and create an action plan. Note: Some interventions will have higher impact and timelines than others.
ACT	Act on the interventions outlined in your action plan and communicate that positive change is occurring.
MONITOR	Monitor interventions for effectiveness and adapt as necessary.

Depending on the diagnosis, there are governance, administrative, and service delivery options that can be brought to bear.

We started this post with an admonition to focus on the basics. Without a firm foundation and a regular focus, it’s difficult for any local government to succeed in delivering what people in the community want and need.

For new elected officials, this concept is critical to understand. During council orientations, we often say that the municipality needs to ‘have the rules, know the rules, and follow the rules’. If one of these requirements is missing, then the benefits that accrue from these rules are very difficult to rely on.

Finally, if you have comments about this, or if you’d like a copy of the health check, you can reach me at ian@strategicsteps.ca .