There’s a common concept in business, athletics and other team/group activities called “addition by subtraction.” Essentially, it means that you can sometimes make a team better by getting rid of players who aren’t getting the job done or don’t mesh well enough with the rest of the players.
It doesn’t necessarily mean the individual is a bad person or a poor worker. Sometimes it’s just a matter of that individual not being capable of helping the team be what all teams are supposed to be: a whole greater than the mere sum of its parts.
That thought crossed our mind when we read about the recent departure of City finance director Kent Oliven, who tendered his resignation July 30.
When Oliven joined the City in November 2012 he inherited a Finance Department that had effectively been a one-man band – or, more accurately, a one-woman band – under former finance director Allison Stutts. Stutts herself had inherited a department filled with people who had neither an accounting nor a finance background; and, in many instances, reportedly had not even received any specialized accounting or finance training. Nevertheless, as we noted in our 12,21.12 post, Stutts overcame most of those obstacles, as well as then-city manager Jim Hock, who often seemed to be sabotaging Stutts’ efforts to balance the City’s budget and get a much-needed (and long-neglected) handle on the City’s Uptown TIF finances.
Even with a sub-par staff, Stutts raised the mayor’s and the Council’s expectations well beyond what they had been under her predecessor, Diane Lembesis, who, in fairness, had the disadvantage of learning the ropes under former city manager Tim Schuenke and never quite recovered. Oliven, on the other hand, had the misfortune of following Stutts and he never quite measured up.
He wasn’t able to personally crank out the work like Stutts did, which meant that he had to delegate more than Stutts did. And whether because he didn’t delegate well, or because he didn’t have sufficient staff to delegate to, the work didn’t get done as it should have.
The only annual audit done entirely on Oliven’s watch was several months late, thereby greatly complicating the budget process. At times he seemed to have trouble explaining things in ways that the Council could understand and act on. And, judging from the July 25 Memorandum by accounting manager Andrea Lamberg, the Finance Dept. as then constituted may have been (and continues to be) so far over its collective skis that Oliven’s seeking to add only 0.75 of a full-time employee/equivalent (“FTE”) seems like trying to bail out the Titanic with a Dixie Cup.
It got so frustrating for many aldermen that, at the July 28 Council COW meeting, Ald. Marty Maloney (7th) – after being informed that there has been a 100% turnover in the Finance Dept. over the last two years – opined that there was “a systemic problem in the department” and concluded with: “I have no faith right now in the department,” an opinion expressly shared by Ald. Nick Milissis (2nd) and to which no dissent was voiced.
That’s not to say that Oliven didn’t make some meaningful contributions during his tenure. His resignation letter listed a number of his accomplishments while identifying other things that still needed to be done. Whether he should have been able to get them done before now will never be known, although it probably would have helped had he taken ownership of his position and his department the moment he walked in the door.
Taking ownership of their positions and their departments, however, is something that is virtually non-existent among the career bureaucrats in every local governmental body, perhaps because with ownership comes accountability. And we’ve yet to see any local bureaucrat who willingly embraces accountability (as our recent posts about the Hinkley incident demonstrated) – with the exception of the aforementioned Ms. Stutts, who seemed to accept both ownership and accountability with equanimity, even when it meant occasionally butting heads with the mayor, the Council, and her city manager boss.
Maybe that’s why she appeared to have no trepidations about leaving the public sector behind and starting her own private-sector financial consulting firm.
In contrast, most career bureaucrats are bone-fetchers who specialize in the go-along-to-get-along style of management. They generally just plug along in their non-descript management of the daily routine until some elected official throws out a “bone” – a particular policy, procedure, initiative or project – which the bureaucrats then chase and retrieve, more or less capably depending on whether it’s something they like or don’t. And if they don’t like it, they tend to bury it and hope the elected officials don’t notice.
Such bone-fetchers have no desire to truly excel, which is why most government is so mediocre at best. They tend to be lifers who just want to keep those solid paychecks coming in until they can start collecting those wonderful constitutionally-guaranteed defined benefit pensions after 30 or so years on the job, 5 and sometimes even 10 years earlier than the traditional private-sector age 65 retirement kicks in. And if they’ve played their cards right and moved up the bureaucratic ladder, they can recoup their entire employee-paid contributions with just one or two years’ worth of benefits. Meanwhile, the average private-sector stiff needs a $2 million-plus 401(k)…wisely invested, because it’s not guaranteed by the taxpayers.
Given the need for less bone fetchers rather than more, we were more than a little disappointed to hear that City Mgr. Shawn Hamilton is advertising for Oliven’s replacement by seeking someone with at least 10 years of government experience for a job that will pay between $101,588 and $142,181, “depending on qualifications and experience.”
Like the ability to fetch.
To read or post comments, click on title.