Candidate for
Council Member; City of Cincinnati

Transformational Leadership: The Catalyst for Political Stability & Economic Growth

The Chamber's Survey Results also identifies "political leadership" as the greatest barrier to growth in this community. It's not difficult to understand why.

Management literature describes Transformational Leadership as motivating followers to perform beyond what would be considered normal expectations by activating followers' higher order needs, fostering a climate of trust, and inducing followers to transcend their self-interest for the sake of the organization.

For City Council and our "deliberative body" in general, this requires:

• Articulating a Vision
• Providing an appropriate Model
• Fostering acceptance of Group Goals
• Setting high Performance Expectations
• Providing individualized Support
• Stimulating the Community Intellect

While much has been done to restore order to Council's proceedings, the underlying structural deficiencies of how City Council does its work remain unaddressed. Key changes can quickly be implemented to improve Council's effectiveness, including:

• Redesign Committees of Council to more closely align their responsibilities and oversight to the organization of the Administration.
• Define the missions of the four dozen (or more) independent Boards & Commissions and identify the Committees of Council to whom they report their work, & open the appointment application process to the public focusing on Grassroots Leadership Academy graduates
• Redesign the agendas for City Council and its Committees to focus on outcomes, defining actionable items, responsible individuals and target completion dates.
• Hold Committee meetings on Thursday & Friday, allowing the Administration the following Monday & Tuesday (and weekend if necessary) to work on items introduced for consideration in the following Council meeting
• Hold quarterly rather than yearly Neighborhood Summits
• Hold one Committee meeting weekly in a neighborhood
• Assign Councilmembers portfolio responsibility for neighborhoods to pilot "district" representation

Rightsizing Government & Eliminating Losses

Without data regarding Cincinnati's municipal workforce, we certainly can surmise that while we've lost 34 percent of our population, we still encompass 78 square miles with over 2,000 miles of roadways, presumably with commensurate amounts of water and sewer piping underneath.

While this Administration has taken small steps towards realigning government to be outwardly focused & customer-centric, much remains to be done. I propose restructuring the Administration into four Key Functional Areas with the following responsibilities:

• Public Services: Community Development & Planning, Buildings & Inspections, Transportation & Engineering, Parks & Recreation
• Safety, Health & the Environment: Police, Fire & Rescue, Public Health, Environmental Quality
• Utilities & Sanitation: Sewerage, Water, Sanitation
• Enterprise Services: Information Technology, Plant, Property & Equipment, Human Resources, Law & Internal Audit, Finance & Contract Compliance

For City facilities, I propose using a House of Quality tool to ensure the functions of government are subordinated to the citizenry in both form & function. If P&G's A.G. Lafley can work in a cubicle, so can every City employee from City Council on down.