TOPICS
TOPICS
Preparing for the Transition: What Appointees Want
Click here to read the full series.
This four-part series on preparing for the presidential transition is the result of surveys and interviews conducted by Alan Balutis, a former federal executive with more than 30 years of government experience. Balutis, who served as the Commerce Department's first chief information officer, is now director of the Internet business solutions group at Cisco Systems Inc. He also guided three presidential transitions and seven secretarial transitions while at Commerce.
The series ends this week with advice for career professionals from a 31-year veteran of government service, who asked to remain anonymous. This source served two stints as a political appointee, one for a Democratic president and the other for a Republican.
While career employees likely are familiar with the usual transition preparations, such as writing briefing papers and books, counseling staff members, and preparing a possible exit strategy in case the new boss is intolerable, they can take other steps.
1. Ask some hard questions about the programs you manage, such as "Why do we do it that way?" If the answer is, "Because we always have," think again. You need a better answer than that for a new appointee.
2. Try to anticipate the questions appointees might ask and have good answers ready. Good answers can and sometimes should include this type of statement: "That's the way the last administration wanted it done, but here's why I think there's a better, more effective approach." But don't say that just to dump on the previous administration and get in good with the new one. If the incoming appointees are any good, they'll despise you for that.
3. Do your homework. Review all recent criticisms of your program and organization, including outside evaluations, opposition party railings, and Government Accountability Office and Office of Management and Budget findings. Valid or not, you need to know the complaints, because your appointee has the right to expect thoughtful, professional assessments and recommendations from you. Be in a position to deliver.
4. Relax a little. This may be the most important advice. You can't control who is elected or who is appointed so don't spend too much time playing what-if games. If you can do this -- and an awful lot of Senior Executive Service members will have trouble -- you'll feel better. In the end, you also will perform better and be a more pleasant colleague and family member.
5. Always remember, your family members still matter more than almost anything that can happen at work, so don't neglect them by obsessing over what is going to happen in the office.
This is the last installment of the transition preparation series. Click here to see the first, second and third installments.
COMMENTS
- Most agencies are doing things that have to be done, and mostly they are doing them well. All the attention on "performance management" and "green operations" and the rest of the "hype" amounts to fine tuning of the system. In fact, much of the time it amounts to making fine adjustments to the vernier with a baseball bat. A new appointee on the job wants, first and foremost, the agency under her (or him) to continue to function smoothly. Questions about how things work (that I MUST know) are primary. Questions about previous or current criticism are important in avoiding embarrassing exposure, but secondary in that the answer will not affect things much unless the issue is valid in terms of keeping the agency running smoothly -- in which case it's really in the first category. Later, the new appointee may want to look into some sort of adjustments, and those adjustments may be very important to the appointee -- but they will also mostly qualify as fine tuning. Any really big changes will probably be discussed in the press for a long time before you hear anything concrete, and what comes to you (even though perceived as a big deal) may still only constitute fine tuning at your level in your agency. So the key is to forget about the "doom" and "gloom" and "how do we survive?" hype in favor of doing the good job you have been doing. The rest will be fine tuning! Oh, by the way, if you're an appointee or an SES you may have to put on a big act about how important adjusting the vernier by a factor of 0.0001 is for the press and the other politicos. You know that, right? Just don't forget -- it's an act. Arty Wright Posted November 5, 2008 12:16 PM
