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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2C, Onboarding Discussion ----AVE N HILLS MEMORANDUM DATE: July 26,2010 Item 2.0 TO: Honorable Mayor and City Council Members FROM: Patrick Klaers, City Administrator SUBJECT: Onboarding Discussion At the Jul 121h work session the Council requested to have the City Administrator Y � q Y Onboarding topic placed on an upcoming work session agenda. Please bring the survey results that were distributed at the July 12th meeting to this work session. Part of the purpose of the Onboarding exercise is to establish communication expectations between the City Administrator and the Council and between the City Administrator and the Staff. In general, I think that everyone is "on the same page" and if problems or difficulties develop then we will address them at that time. (The same can be said about the micro management topic- I haven't experienced any problems in this regard and, if issues develop, we will deal with them at that time.) Another part of the Onboarding exercise is to establish reasonable work priorities for the City Administrator. This will help everyone when my six month review takes place. In this regard, some additional discussion by the Council is appropriate. In order to assist the Council in this work priority discussion, the following is a list of things I have been working on and will be working on. This list of activities and projects is in addition to the normal day-to-day business that takes place. Public Works • work with Michelle and Joe to manage the department activities • manage the selection process for the new Director • help orient the new Director into his position • establish realistic short-term and long-term goals for the Director and monitor the progress in achieving the goals Community Development • the Director was on vacation my first 3 weeks • lead the selection process for a new Director and work with Meagan and Dave to manage department activities Community Development(cont.) • once the Director starts, help orient him/her into the position, establish goals for the position and monitor progress towards accomplishing the goals • learn about TCAAP and attend meetings • learn about miscellaneous Planning/CD projects such as Arden Village and Arden Plaza and attend meetings • work on the Library project and attend meetings • address the Hazelnut Park and Church land/parking lot situation and(again) attend meetings • get involved in the community survey project Lake Johanna Fire Department • learn about the contract relationship and the proposed Staffing Plan change • toured all the stations with the Chief • attend the bimonthly Board meetings Sheriffs Contract Cities Program • learn about the contract, the services,the funding formula, the relationships between the cities, and the relationship between the cities and Sheriff s Department • attend monthly Board meetings Human Resources • evaluate work responsibilities as currently delegated and ways to improve our operations • the performance review forms need revisions in order to deal more with establishing goals and how to achieve the goals • consider employee training for doing performance evaluations Emergency Management • addressing the lack of a designated Director since the responsibility was with Greg before he left the City • attend meetings of the Ramsey County EM group • research our current Emergency Preparedness Plan and documents • evaluate the option of contracting out for an EM Director Budget and CIP • learning from Sue the Arden Hills system • will be evaluating our financial issues and challenges with Sue over the next few months as the preliminary budget and tax levy need to be set by mid September Staff - • meeting and getting to know staff and their responsibilities and department activities • assessing the city operations; the organizational strengths and weaknesses; staff relationships (internal and external); and departmental work priorities - Miscellaneous • attend monthly meetings of the "5 Cities' Group and the quarterly meetings of the Ramsey County City Administrators' Group • participate in the monthly Roseville Engineer- CIP meetings • hold almost weekly staff meeting with the city staff Directors and Managers • I have been driving around the community to learn the streets, parks, neighborhoods, and business/industrial areas Big ongoing projects that need attention include establishing a City"Operating Policies" document; cleaning out and organizing the records area in the basement; and having everyone follow an understandable records classification system on our network(due to a variety of reasons including staff turnover, we have some problems locating documents in our network). One of my most significant goals, for now and the future, is to help develop the staff into an effective team. This will take time for me to prove myself to the staff and for the staff to have some trust in me. This leads to the ongoing work of directing staff toward achieving the goals established by the City Council. As you know and can see by the above list,the City Administrator and the City Directors are part leaders,part managers, and part workers due to the size of the staff and the work load. In conclusion, and getting back to the question of long and short-term work priorities and my performance evaluation, any direction and feedback that you can provide is appreciated.