Building High-Performance Local Governments: Case Studies in Leadership at All Levels

Don’t permit your organization to be lulled into complacency after recovering from a tough recession.

Explore what’s necessary to improve the performance of your organization, including the development of leaders at all levels who will use their full capabilities to boost collective results. The High-Performance Organization Model identifies the steps needed to diagnose what will be required to achieve the strategic outcomes you define as success. It shows which levers will move the organization in the direction you decide is critical.

This book contains more than just theory; here you’ll find case studies of local governments—demonstrating how Commonwealth Centers for High-Performance Organizations’ (CCHPO) model has been applied in the past to improve performance. You will learn how employees emerged as leaders to identify and tackle problems, developed the tools needed, and organized their thoughts to work through solutions which could be applied effectively without the traditional bureaucratic hassle. These examples show how a supportive, values-based work culture can be cultivated to expand thinking power by increasing discretionary effort from all levels of the organization. Engaged employees can be leaders who refocus your services, improve your processes, save money, and solve problems. Your organization can benefit from the full range of talents, skills, and abilities that often lie untapped, but become accessible through the principles of the High-Performance Organization model.

This model will be an indispensable tool for any person looking to make significant improvements throughout their organization. The detailed case studies and easy-to-follow model created by the Commonwealth Center for High-Performance Organizations make for a pleasantly informative guide that will give a special advantage to readers who implement their standards.

The primary authors are principals of the Commonwealth Centers for High-Performance Organizations (CCHPO) Network. Collectively, the CCHPO Network of organizational development/change management professionals has extensive experience in assisting local, state, and federal governments, non-profits, and the private sector improve their organizational performance. Areas of consulting emphasis are large-scale organizational improvement, development of high-performance executive leadership teams, employee engagement, organizational diagnosis and work culture surveys, integration of the continuous learning and improvement philosophy into organizational work cultures, design and implementation of product quality, service quality and project/program management programs, executive coaching, and delivery of executive development programs. CCHPO is a Strategic Partner of ICMA (International City/County Management Association)-the HPO Diagnostic/Change Model and performance improvement materials have been designated by ICMA as a Leading Practice in Local Government. All of the Network professionals are certified in a variety of development instruments including Lominger's Leadership Architect Suite and Prosci's Change Management process.