Public Policy/Political Science 885
Advanced Public Management: Craft, Constraints, Accountability
Examines how managers in public and not-for-profit agencies can secure and utilize
legal authority, human resources, and funds to accomplish organizational goals.
Includes strategies for establishing and maintaining effective external relations and
for working through other organizations to accomplish objectives.
Mondays 1:20 – 3:15 PM
119 Babcock Hall
Adjunct Prof. Dave Cieslewicz
305 La Follette
dcieslewicz@wisc.edu
Office Hours
Immediately after class or by appointment
The following grid WILL change as speakers become available and as reading
assignments are fleshed out.
Class
Lecture topic
Guest speaker
Memo topic
for discussion
Sept. 10
Intro
None
Sept. 17
Organizational
culture, law &
politics: Who
gets to make
decisions?
Short run &
long run fiscal
management:
why it’s
sometimes
smart to spend
City Attorney
Mike May
Healthy &
unhealthy
organizations:
telling them
apart
Roger
Goodwin,
Madison HR
Director (ret.),
Dr. Frank
Byrne, CEO of
St. Mary’s
The Power
Broker (start
reading)
Resume/ One
Newspaper
page narrative articles on the
on what you
current
hope to get out Chicago
of this course
teachers strike
Should the city TBA
create its own
economic
stimulus fund
requiring
more
borrowing?
Should the city TBA
merge
Affirmative
Action into the
Equal
Opportunities
Commission,
Sept. 24
Oct. 1
City
Comptroller
Dean Brasser
(ret.)
Reading
2
Hospital
Oct. 8
Oct. 15
Oct. 22
Oct. 29
Nov. 5
Nov. 12
Nov. 19
Mayors
Innovation
Project: cities
as labs for
change
Measuring
performance:
where
numbers add
up and where
they don’t
Prof. Joel
Rogers
Andrew Statz,
Finance
Director for
Madison Pubic
Schools former
Madison Fiscal
Efficiency
Auditor
No such thing
Joel Plant, Chief
as a crisis: how of Staff for
we
Milwaukee
transformed
Police Chief,
Halloween
former
Madison
mayoral aide
How to build
Becky
the healthy
Steinhoff, E.D.
organization:
Goodman
building
Community
community
Center
capital
Change agents: Chuck Kamp,
repairing the
Metro Director
unhealthy
& Kevin Briski,
agency
Parks
Superintendent
Managing
Jim Woodward,
change
Meriter CEO, &
Paul Fanlund,
Cap Times
editor
Moving a
John Wiley,
bureaucracy:
former UW
every
chancellor
organization
has shared
governance
HR or
Engineering?
Should the city
buy up
properties on
Allied Drive?
TBA
Should the city
build a public
market?
TBA
Should the city
squelch or
reinvent the
Mifflin Street
Block Party?
TBA
Should the city
fund capital
costs for
neighborhood
centers?
TBA
Should Metro
raise bus
fares?
TBA
How should
define “basic”
city services?
TBA
Should the
City Council be
reduced in
size, become
full-time and
have its own
policy staff?
TBA
3
Nov. 26
That magic
moment: how
to know when
you know
enough to
decide
Alders Mark
Clear, Lauren
Cnare &
Bridget
Maniaci
Dec. 3
Making
lemons out of
lemonade:
how to use
your setbacks
to make
progress
Book
discussion:
The Power
Broker
Madison Urban
League
President
Kaleem Caire
Dec. 10
Should the city
council
override the
Landmarks
Commission
decision on
the
Edgewater?
Should the city
support a
charter school
targeted to
young black
men?
TBA
What
management
lessons did
you learn from
this book?
Finish The
Power Broker
TBA
Substance
I have attempted to build this course around you. I completed this syllabus only
after I read your resumes and your descriptions of what you were hoping to learn.
The thread that will run through this course will be defining and creating healthy
organizations. We’ll raise a series of questions and through the eyes of our mentors
and guest speakers and by working through problems we’ll find our way to some
partial answers, always keeping in mind that management is far more of an art than
a science.
How do we define healthy and unhealthy organizations? What are some red flags for
declining organizational health? How can we turn around unhealthy organizations
and how can we keep healthy ones moving forward? How much can we measure by
numbers? When is it the right time to make a big decision? How do we get buy-in
and move a complex bureaucracy?
And who is an organization for? Is it possible to have a healthy organization for its
employees but not for its customers? How do we gain alignment between the goals
of employees and the goals of customers? To what extent are the consumers of
public goods and services the same as consumers of goods and services provided by
the private market? What are the important distinctions between skills need in for
profit private sector versus public and non-profit sector management?
4
How can we use power effectively in the public (or the organization’s) interests?
Style
Since this is a graduate seminar we’ll rely relatively less on readings and lectures
and more on the experiences of our mentors and speakers and recreating the
dynamic in the classroom that real managers feel in the field.
Each student will choose a mentor who will be a leader in the public or nonprofit
sector. You should meet the mentor at least once early in the semester and then
communicate regularly as the semester goes on. It’s up to you to work that out with
your mentor.
The class will not neatly build on one concept after another in a linear fashion, but
rather twist and turn back on itself. This is largely due to our reliance on outside
speakers and mentors, each of whom will have their own schedules and time
constraints. Expect the syllabus to evolve as the semester goes along as our speakers
are lined up. While this might not be optimal, it’s much more like the world outside
of academia.
Assignments & Evaluation
Each week you will be given a problem to work through. Your assignment is to write
a memo to me as if I were the mayor (I will try hard to pull this off) and you were
your mentor. The basic goal is to convince me that what’s in the best interests of
your organization aligns with the best interests of the city as a whole.
Your memo will be due to me via email by noon on Friday of each week. You are
limited to a page and a half (about 750 words). You may not write more. I want you
to get used to boiling down arguments and facts into the most salient ones. This is
because, whether as staff or as the decision maker, your time and the attention span
of your audience will be short. A perfectly reasoned twelve-page document is not
likely to be read.
The following Monday we will discuss your memos as a group and you may find
yourself agreeing with some of your colleagues while disagreeing with others. In
addition, I will try to match the topic with the guest speaker so that he or she can
join in.
Your grade will be a function of the quality of your weekly memo and on your class
participation. There will be no exams, quizzes or papers.
5
Reading
The only required complete text is The Power Broker by Robert Caro. Your
assignment is to read the book by the end of the semester. (If you don’t have time to
read it all, concentrate on the middle part of the book, parts IV, V and VI.) Our last
class will be a discussion of the book and your last memo will be to summarize the
management lessons from it in 750 words.
There will also be some reading assignments as we move along through the
semester. They are likely to be short readings related directly to the topic at hand.
Goals
My hope is that by December you will be better at the following:

Writing clearly and succinctly.

Making strong arguments in a small peer group setting that help win your
case without alienating potential allies on future issues.

Learning to ask the right questions and knowing when you know enough to
make a decision.

Recognizing a healthy organization and understanding what makes it work.

Understanding how to change an unhealthy organization into a healthy one.

Understanding how to make necessary changes in an already healthy
organization without ruining the culture.

Recognizing opportunities to turn apparent setbacks into positive progress.

Understanding the nature of power and how it can be used effectively and
responsibly for the good of the organization.

Understanding how cities can be laboratories of innovative public policy.
Most of all this should be fun. If this becomes a slog for you let’s talk and find a way
to make it exciting.