Orienting the Disoriented or Giving Politicians What They Need To Be Strong Leaders

1. Orienting the Disorientedor Giving Politicians What They Need To Be Strong Leaders MMAA District Meetings September 18 to 27, 2006

2. Included today is • Purpose of today’s presentation • Importance of orientation • Roles of Council and CAO • The Main Point • Governance • Leadership • Personal Philosophies • The Basics • Resource material • Conclusion

3. Purpose • Not to be a duplication of seminar earlier this year • Provide some insights from my experience • Share a few stories that can help cement some important points

4. Importance of Orientation • Training for the new members • Refresher for the returning members • Excellent opportunity to change the way things have been done • More unified approach to how Council operates • Relationship building

5. When to prepare – when to present • Prepare now, not after the election • Pick day for orientation and advise candidates to keep that day open • Do the orientation as soon after the election as possible

6. Who to include • All members of Council should be there, new and returning • Bring in department heads to give overview of their responsibilities

7. Roles of Council and CAO • Roles – according to Municipal Act, elected vs. administration are distinctly different • Mayor/Reeve • provides leadership • Chairs meetings • Council • To develop and evaluate the policies and programs of the Municipality • To ensure that the powers, duties and functions of the Municipality are properly carried out • To carry out the powers, duties and functions expressly given to the Council by legislation

8. Roles of Council and CAO • CAO • Administrative head of Municipality • Manages day to day operations • Responsible for ensuring policies are carried out • Responsible for informing Council on operations and affairs • Responsible for employees of Municipality unless Council determines otherwise • Book keeper and minute keeper • May delegate duties to other employees unless prohibited by Council to do so

9. The Main Point • George Cuff • local government guru • Years as a municipal employee • 12 years as elected official • 28 years of consulting • Has reviewed operations of over 300 municipalities in Canada

10. The Main Point • Present what George Cuff has learned • Number one failure of elected officials is they think they are supposed to ‘manage’ • Council deals with the organization through one employee, the CAO

11. Governance • Get Cuff’s Guide for Municipal Leaders for each member and yourself at • municipalworld.com • Governance defined as • process of exercising corporate leadership by the policy-making authority (i.e. council) on behalf of the public to the organization as a whole, in terms of its purpose, control and future • overseeing the organization to ensure that its mandate is achieved

12. 10 Key Governance Principles • 1. A clear mandate • Council responsible for the direction, actions and outcomes of the municipality’s business • 2. Clear authority • Define who is responsible for what • Hire and fire • Power to delegate • Expenditure approval and to what level • Authorities of committees

13. 10 Key Governance Principles • 3. Public accountability and responsiveness • Decisions must be based on best interests of the public • Advise public of decisions made • Access by the public to Council • 4. Clear sense of purpose • Mandates, goals, objectives and strategies • Ensure public input

14. 10 Key Governance Principles • 5. Full disclosure • Full and complete reporting by administration to Council • 6. Sense of integration • CAO needs to ensure coherence within departments • 7. Council/CAO sound relationship • Openness, trust, respect, confidence, caring

15. 10 Key Governance Principles • 8. Independence of Council • Act of governing is Council’s • Must have independence to do its job • 9. Orientation and succession planning • Both required to ensure a sound governance-administrative system • 10. Ongoing performance assessment • Annual report card for Council

16. Leadership • Applicable to CAO too • Defined as • dealing with people by communicating, enabling, equipping, defining morals, having solid character, being ethical • Role of leader is to ensure performance and well being of employees • Working leader is to be avoided (leadership hard, technical easy), tend to become working leader because want it done right, tendency to step down one level and make decisions of person below them because easier (Florida everglades example)

17. Leadership • Authority (Milgram Experiment) • People tend to do what people in authority ask them to do • Don’t have to be heavy handed • Reluctance of subordinates to offer opinions or advice • Noncompliance occurs due to either lack of respect/mistrust or from perception of nonauthority

18. Leadership • Delegation • Must delegate authority to ensure activity\progress takes place (prevent authority vacuum) • If supervisor doesn’t like decision he can either overrule, negotiate, ask the group, or accept subordinates decision; the first three responses are the same • True test of delegation is when willing to live with it being done or decided differently than I would do or decide it • Delegating frees you up, allows the development of others, allows for decision by person who is often better qualified or situated

19. Leadership • Performance • A, B, C, D, E, … Z, + Performance = Results performance is what I do, results is the outcome (flight to Vancouver) • Need to measure performance, not results • Can’t use goals to measure performance as goal is the result, person can’t control A to Z, can only measure performance

20. Leadership • Initiative and Ideas • Initiative in organization will be determined by how you respond when their initiative turns bad • We encourage mediocrity when we demand no errors • Employees should always be thanked for bringing ideas forward, confirm idea is understood, promised a response to idea, and provided with explanation of why idea can’t proceed if that is the case

21. Leadership • Loyalty • It is the subordinate’s duty to tell his boss when you think they are wrong, withholding information is disloyal • Barriers to Communication • Pride – prevents us from wanting to receive information • Increasing commitment – having taken an original decision, must now defend it • Fear – (Spaceship Challenger) fear of failure, punishing people for bad news results in not hearing bad news in the future (doesn’t prevent mistakes, just communication)

22. Personal Philosophies • Employees are an organization’s greatest asset and investment • Happy employees are more productive • Employees are allowed to question their supervisor • Politicians have political perspective to consider in decision-making, administration does not so CAO recommendations may differ from what Council wants to hear or eventually decides

23. The Basics • Legislation • The Municipal Act • Responsibilities of Mayor/Reeve, Council, and CAO as outlined in the Municipal Act • Council sets direction, employees carry out decisions • Spheres of jurisdiction • What authority Council has, how it has it • Municipal Assessment Act • How assessment works • Where we get the numbers from • How we use it

24. The Basics • FIPPA • Explain what it means and how it impacts municipalities • Applies to every record created by Municipality from computer file to writing on a post it note to scrawl in margin on a page • Person has right to access any record unless it is excepted from disclosure by FIPPA • Right of access to information by public based on accountability of government • Right to privacy of individuals also covered by FIPPA • Can only use personal information collected for the purpose it was intended for, unless allowed for other reasons by FIPPA • Only persons who need to know personal information are to have access to that personal information (resume of candidates only available to those responsible for hiring)

25. The Basics • Planning Act • Provides authority for how municipalities address development • Overriding document is the Development Plan, adopted by Planning District where Municipality is member of one, Development Plan lays foundation for development • Municipality adopts zoning by-law, more specific than Development Plan, outlines areas of residential, commercial, industrial zonings as well as detailed restrictions in each zoning • Any proposed subdivisions must receive Council approval • Council is also decision making authority for any conditional use and variation applications

26. The Basics • Municipal Conflict of Interest • Members required to disclose assets and interests within 30 days of election • Whenever an issue is to be discussed at Council or Committee meeting where member or dependent of member may gain financially, must declare conflict and remove self from discussion of and decision on the issue • Member in conflict is not to speak to other members of Council about the issue at any time • If member is absent at Council or Committee meeting where issue discussed, member is to advise at the next meeting that he or she would have been in conflict if he or she would have been there • Make sure they understand this • Provide examples of how far reaching this can be, err on the side of caution • Advise them you are not there to remind them when they may be in a conflict, they need to keep track themselves • Determine up front if and when the Municipality will pay for legal opinions

27. The Basics • Strategic planning • Communication • Most important and most fragile thing • Discuss a strategy to keep public informed about what you are doing

28. The Basics • Membership in organizations • AMM • FCM • Local organizations like Development Corporations

29. The Basics • Tour of facilities • Set up a time to see what the municipality owns

30. The Basics • Financial overview • Explanation of a financial statement • Their role in overseeing this • Current financial picture

31. The Basics • Review current issues • Where are they at, do we want to continue with them • Current outstanding legal issues • Current direction on each issue • Potential implications

32. The Basics • Council meetings • When will they be • Share current format and suggest what you might change and why • Discuss how you might signal to them without embarrassing them, especially if televised • Protocol of meetings • Resolutions and how they work • Delegation protocol and why its so important • Seating arrangements (this could be a big issue)

33. Resource Material • Cuff’s Guide for Municipal Leaders • Available at municipalworld.com • The Workplace Leader by Training Plus • Town of Morden Business Plan • Available at mordenmb.com • Orientation outline • Email me at eepp@mordenmb.com • Ernie’s school of hard knocks

34. Resource Material • Recently read books • The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell • Good to Great by Jim Collins

35. Conclusion • Orientation • Sets the initial direction on the following four years • Orientation gives the politicians the background to know what their responsibility is (policy makers, governors, not managers) • Items presented at orientation can be referred to throughout the term as a reminder