Managing Community and Economic Development Staff

This is part of a series of posts on the topic of leadership and management as applied to community and economic development, authored by UNC School of Government faculty member Willow Jacobson. Community and economic development (CED) professionals are often responsible for managing and coordinating the efforts of sizable staffs, including planners, code enforcement officials, grant administrators, and more. It’s a good idea for CED managers to check in with their employees both to give and get feedback—and this post discusses effective ways to do that. I was recently listening to a county manager talking about his go to “magic six questions” when he has a chance to talk with an employee. These are questions he has ready, not just for formal performance appraisals discussion, but if he finds himself in a setting with time to talk to one of the members of the county workforce. His six questions are: Where are we going? Where are you going? What do you do best & how much time do you get to work on it? If you were your own coach, what would you be working on? How can I help you with that? Do you have any feedback for me? The first two questions push employees to think more broadly about where the organization is going and where the employee sees themselves heading. These questions tap into two important aspects. First, it forces employees to be forward looking—a practice that followers look for in effective leaders (Kouzes and Posner) and it is a means to help individuals begin [...]