Latest / Business Roundtable / Public Impact, Private Insight: Leadership Lessons from Both Sides of the Table

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Public Impact, Private Insight: Leadership Lessons from Both Sides of the Table · Business Roundtable

• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Business Roundtable podcast once again. My
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: name is David Carr, your host of an owner and
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: founder of Stewart your business bringing teams together to accomplish
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: great things. And I have another brand new guest this
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: week that I've known actually for many many years working
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: from my work in environmental consulting, Shane sells Me. Shane,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Business Roundtable Podcast.
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: Thanks David, appreciate your efforts in the industry and thanks
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: for having me today.
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: Absolutely so. Sane and I go way back, and I
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: love why I want to have Shane on the on
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: the podcast is, you know, we haven't talked too much
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: about the public sector and in a lot of the
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: workings of business owners and and Shane has quite about experience.
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: I'm having him share a little bit about his background.
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  Speaker 1: But he's written a great book we're going to highlight here.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: You can send a little more about this book, Managing
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: for Meteors. But this idea of how do we help
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  Speaker 1: build leadership preparing the next generation, particularly in the public sector,
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: and uh, you know, I'm very excited to get into
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: this topic Shane, So again, welcome, and let's just back
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: up a little bit Shane, because you know, before you
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: started salesby Strategic Advisors, you have quite a history of
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: both public sector and private sector and so just you know,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: help set the stage for what got you into creating
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  Speaker 1: you know, SALESBGIC Advisors and where you're at now.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks David, and thanks for having me. So most
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: of my experiences in the public sector. I started my
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  Speaker 2: career in Michigan and I worked for the city Lanting,
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: capital city.
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  Speaker 1: That was too.
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  Speaker 2: Cold, and I went to Arizona and I worked for
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  Speaker 2: the City of Phoenix for about nine years and ended
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: up in a couple of departments there and leadership roles,
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: and that was too hot, but another capital city. So
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: then I ended up in southern California, temperature just right,
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: working for the County of Orange as the public Works director.
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  Speaker 2: And so that was great to have an opportunity to
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  Speaker 2: work for the fifth largest city in Phoenix and the
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  Speaker 2: sixth largest county in the country, Orange County, and do
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  Speaker 2: a lot of things there and then looking forward to
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: do more things and grow my experience. I started in
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  Speaker 2: the private sector around twenty twenty pandemic area and worked
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: as a CEO for global engineering firm and then as
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  Speaker 2: a regional strategy lead for a national firm, and then
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  Speaker 2: three years ago started my own business to work with
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  Speaker 2: clients that I like and treat people the way I
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: think they should be treated and provide some of that
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  Speaker 2: personal expertise as normally a fractional government executive, those are
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: usually the things that I'm doing for for folks. So
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  Speaker 2: that's where I'm at now.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, Shane, I mean it's unusual, uh, because you
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: and I I do share this. I worked locally here
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: for the Kendon Riverside for three years myself, and it's
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: interesting to be able to go both sides and see,
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: you know, what works and what doesn't work, and kind
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: of take the best from all of those worlds. And
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: I think, you know, you're one of the few people
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: that I know doing what you do today in such
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: a with such experience and background. Shane, I think you know.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: And so why I want people to listen in lean
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: in on this episode is you know, Shane has such
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: a background in history here and I love you know
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: kind of I love your metaphor that this this idea
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: of the meteor managing meteors. So if you don't mind
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: shows your book, Shane, because this is his book. You
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: guys are gonna be able to check it out. What
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: a put a link there. It is managing for meteors,
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: preparing local government leaders before the impact, right before the
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: idea ride. Right.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: But once that event occurs and the media or we're
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: talking about our metaphoric mediors, which I define as a
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  Speaker 2: major disruption, disruption which doesn't allow usually government executives or
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: leaders to do their primary job and deal with that
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  Speaker 2: issue at the same time. They can do both. So
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  Speaker 2: that's how I considered it a major disruption. And the
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  Speaker 2: point is once that disruption happens, it's too late to
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  Speaker 2: get prepared. Yes, so we want them to get prepared
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  Speaker 2: ahead of time. Yeah, it's so so important. I mean,
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  Speaker 2: I see things like you said, the media is hitting.
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  Speaker 1: Left and right, and you know the collabor the damage
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  Speaker 1: that comes from that, I mean, and and so we
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  Speaker 1: don't our our infrastructure. Our government is really important and
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  Speaker 1: if it fails us, we're in trouble. You know, I've
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  Speaker 1: quite honestly lived through some of that recently here in
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  Speaker 1: southern California where we had tremendous You know that you
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  Speaker 1: talk to public works where they didn't anticipate major snowfalls
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  Speaker 1: and how to get their equipment in the right places,
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  Speaker 1: all these things, and so it was a total breakdown
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  Speaker 1: in you know, in all these agencies working together, and
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  Speaker 1: so it's not just one. It's like it's you. We're
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  Speaker 1: going to get into this. But like thinking about like
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  Speaker 1: the challenges now that you know, particularly one of the
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: topics I really like that you cover is this generational
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  Speaker 1: transition that we're seeing and the challenges that governments are
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  Speaker 1: facing and the and the capacity there. So why do
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: we we kind of open the conversation is that it's
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  Speaker 1: not if the media is coming, and why does leadership
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: need to evolve for this? You know, it can't just
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  Speaker 1: be status or business as usual. It doesn't work for
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  Speaker 1: infrastructure or civic planning.
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  Speaker 2: Right the knowledge capital is leading the workforce much faster
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  Speaker 2: than it's being replaced, and in some cases it's not
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  Speaker 2: being replaced at all, especially in leadership positions. We have
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  Speaker 2: people advancing much more quickly. And these are you know, capable,
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: well intentioned, motivated, smart people that just don't have you know,
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  Speaker 2: the twenty or so years of track record that their
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  Speaker 2: predecessors did. And I'm not saying their predecessors were always
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  Speaker 2: great leaders, they just had a lot more experience to
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  Speaker 2: fall back on, and so we need to accelerate the
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  Speaker 2: learning for our new leaders. And the challenge here is that,
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  Speaker 2: especially for governments, and I talk about this quite a
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  Speaker 2: bit with government agencies, if you do nothing, I don't
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: mean do nothing in the sense of your not doing
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  Speaker 2: your job, but if you don't try to progress or
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  Speaker 2: be creative or be effective efficient. If you don't, if
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  Speaker 2: you're focused on status quo, the fact that the world
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  Speaker 2: around you in industry and you know, other government organizations
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  Speaker 2: federal or state, are moving and changing and doing different things.
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  Speaker 2: Just by that nature of taking a status quo view,
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  Speaker 2: you're actually going to fall behind. And so what I
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  Speaker 2: try to push them to do is to be as
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  Speaker 2: effective and efficient as possible. And you know, recently this
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: focus on efficiency has come under attack a little bit
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  Speaker 2: with like the doge mantra and things like that happen
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  Speaker 2: in DC. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking
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  Speaker 2: about a strategic, comprehensive evaluation of your organization, of your
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: financial approaches. Are you looking at revenues, how do you
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: deliver projects, how do you mitigate risk? All of that
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  Speaker 2: in thought out fashion, and then implementing goals around that.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, well I'm seeing I mean we're seeing
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  Speaker 1: locally here, we're both here in South California, Jane. I mean, unfortunately,
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  Speaker 1: I hear the stories coming out of mismanagement. People are
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: not looking at things well, funds are being spent ineffectively,
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  Speaker 1: they're not getting like you said, and so you're losing
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  Speaker 1: the trust of the public of like how are we
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  Speaker 1: managing these things? And so it's it's it's like you said,
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  Speaker 1: you can't do status quote because that's not working. We're
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: not seeing that being effective. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: One of the things that I try to do as
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  Speaker 2: we work through the organizations is to set goals, set objectives,
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: keep performance indicators to help them achieve milestone. And by
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: doing that, you can help improve your credibility of your
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: organization or community and help to rebuild trust because the challenge,
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  Speaker 2: especially for the local governments, they get almost all the
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: bad but none of the good. What I mean by
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  Speaker 2: that is, if the federal government is doing things that
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: are causing people to lose trust in the federal government,
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  Speaker 2: that flows down, or if the state is doing things
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: to cause people lose trust, that flows down to the
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  Speaker 2: local government. But those local government agencies are just trying
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  Speaker 2: to help the constituency. They are the location where the
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  Speaker 2: rubber hits the road. The local government is the agency
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  Speaker 2: that's there filling your potholes, cleaning up debris after emergency events,
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  Speaker 2: policing your streets. So they unfairly get lumped in with
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  Speaker 2: negative government perception, not having done necessarily anything wrong. But
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  Speaker 2: the point is you have to be trying to build
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  Speaker 2: that trust and credibility all the time because those negative elements,
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  Speaker 2: the media or all this come to you no matter
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  Speaker 2: what you do, So you have to take that step.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I've noticed, I know you and I are
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: both very active on LinkedIn among other platforms. I've noticed
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  Speaker 1: some agencies very proactive in getting messaging out there, what
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  Speaker 1: they're doing, what their plan is, how they're hiring. They're
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  Speaker 1: very intentional about the messaging. And I see it some
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  Speaker 1: of that are just completely like quiet. And I'm and
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  Speaker 1: particularly for the met for the for the the generational gap, Chin,
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  Speaker 1: I'd love to get your perspective on are we seeing
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  Speaker 1: as you're seeing the exiting of the workforce of this
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  Speaker 1: older generation you know, attracting you know, public servants, you
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  Speaker 1: know that would want to come in and you know, typically,
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  Speaker 1: you know, there's a lot of folks that would come
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  Speaker 1: into the public sector and work for many years, maybe
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  Speaker 1: the whole career, and that you know, it seems like
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  Speaker 1: that is changing and how to attract and retain folks,
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  Speaker 1: because it's one thing to get him in there, it's
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  Speaker 1: another thing to actually, you said, keep all that knowledge
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  Speaker 1: and that wisdom it's in the organization, because it could
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  Speaker 1: just leave and go somewhere else.
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  Speaker 2: It's an uppill battle for government agencies. So if you
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  Speaker 2: think about in the past, so your government agency would
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  Speaker 2: be looked at as a secure location. You might have
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  Speaker 2: a pension that's reasonable, your salary is going to be less,
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  Speaker 2: but you're going to have maybe some retirement benefits, you're
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  Speaker 2: going to have a straightforward, structured schedule, and there's going
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  Speaker 2: to be consistency. Let's just say that's the tenants of
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  Speaker 2: the past. Well, the private sector always offered as a
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: as a balance to that more compensation, but everything else
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: was kind of different. Your schedules might be more volatile,
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: your your work is more volatile, the security is less stable.
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  Speaker 2: And so that used to be the case where people
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  Speaker 2: could say, Okay, I want long term security and fulfillment.
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  Speaker 2: Maybe as a public servant, that's how I wake up
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  Speaker 2: in the morning, or I'm trying to you know, live
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  Speaker 2: the American dream, you know, make money and do things
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: more fast and get more things done. Maybe on the
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: private sector. Well, now, the challenge that local governments have
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  Speaker 2: is that that the scales are tipped a little bit,
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  Speaker 2: I think in favor of the private sector, and a
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  Speaker 2: lot of the workforce has it maybe experienced some of
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: the things that can happen in the private sector, let's
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: say in the recession, which you know, the factors are
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: pointing towards the recession, and so governments now think about
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: what's happened at the federal level, and you affect funding,
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: and that affects the state local less secure than in
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: the past. Right, you know, when did we ever hear
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  Speaker 2: about you two hundred thousand federal workers being just laid
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  Speaker 2: off or whatever. Right, that's that's unheard of. So without
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: without a financial crisis to push that, right, that's kind
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: of the other weird thing. So now government appears to
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  Speaker 2: be less secure, less stable. Then over the years, agencies
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: have eroded the pension benefits because of the liabilities that
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: are created you know, government agency has to pay for those,
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: and so that created a challenge. And then of course
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  Speaker 2: the salaries, we're not keeping up with private sector salaries,
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  Speaker 2: and no elected officials want to raise taxes to balance that,
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: so you're kind of stuck. And then finally, since the pandemic,
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  Speaker 2: I think this has been the biggest push where you know,
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: private sector companies, a lot of them offering work from home,
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: all schedule, all of that.
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  Speaker 1: Yep.
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  Speaker 2: In a local government, I think people expect and in
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: most of the cases it's a necessity that the worker
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: has to be on site at least most of the
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: time in conducting their efforts on site. So that's tip
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: the scales and I think hurt local governments more than
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: in the past.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's I get it. Behooves the government, particularly
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: the local government, to create I guess I would ask you,
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: you know, to create an environment and experience, you know,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: if they can't, you know, for the for the person
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: that you know wants to get in there. That at
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: least that's what I look at when I look at
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: private companies too, is like, you know, if you can't
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: compete financially, and sometimes the money is one thing, but
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: It's also what your role, what's your opportunity for development?
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: It's the environment that you find yourself in. Is this
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: a positive you know, encouraging like we're on a mission,
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  Speaker 1: We're on a vision, we have something bigger that we're
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: contributing to. Or do I just feel like just another
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: cog in the wheel. I don't really feel like I'm
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: something part of something bigger, so I'm more apt to leave.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: So are do you see, like, you know, governments and
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: that you're working with being more more thoughtful in how
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: they you know, attract and then maintain you know, new
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: hires to some extent.
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: I mean we're talking about a lot of agencies, right and.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, damn it. Yeah yeah.
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: We have I think four hundred and eighty four cities
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: and fifty eight counties just in California, So a lot
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: of differential in those, in the size of those. Yeah,
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: I'm still seeing a little bit of a siloing between
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: like the human resources recruiting efforts and mainline business groups,
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: which is nothing new.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but your point is if.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: Those get closer together, maybe people would be more excited.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: And then the other thing, as a leader in government,
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: what I always try to do was be pushing initiatives
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: that are generating a change, not change for change's sake.
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: But there are usually so many things you can work
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: on if you look across all your divisions. Are your
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: people something to get people, something to get your staff
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: excited about, but also hitting those big milestones, right, building
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: those big projects, getting that new technology in place, right,
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: getting a big win from a revenue standpoint, you have
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: people something to celebrate, yes, right, And so then people
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: are more motivated. And I in talking to the work
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: groups over the years, I used to just say like, look,
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: do you want to do all these great things and
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: all this stuff? And people just normally say, yeah, I
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: want to do that. And I said, that's a dynamic organization.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: But dynamic means changing, right, And so usually what most
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: people want is what I call or like a project.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: I call it immaculate constructure, immaculate initiative where everything is
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: better but nothing changed to make it better, just is
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: magically better. And you got to go through the process.
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: Right, yes, absolutely, Well, this kind of gets into a
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: point that the next point I want to get into
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: is kind of how do we deliver big projects in
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: these bureaudic systems. One of the things I remember, I
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: think when I first met you, Shane, when you're working
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: Orange China Public Works is you were going around and
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: talking about here's the capital improvement program, here's some of
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: the things that we're doing. You're getting the messaging out there.
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: You're reaching out not only within the organization obviously, but
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: you're reaching out to all the folks that are going
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: to be bidding pursuing these types of works. And having
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: lived in Orange County myself for over twenty years, I
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: saw a lot of these initiatives, from roadway projects to landfills,
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: to all sorts of different elements within the county. So
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: I think, you know, it's really it is important, like
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: how do we, you know, move these big capital projects
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: from just con conception the actual construction actually get it done.
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: I mean with some different things that we're seeing here
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: in southern California, you know, big infrastructure projects, So you know,
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: talk a little bit about like how what have you
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: seen how do we move that in an effective way
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: in the systems that we find ourselves all these different
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: agencies stakeholders.
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and that one, there's a lot of ton pack there.
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: But yeah, two two main things I think and I've
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: hosted a couple of practitioner sessions on this and two
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: and April. One was on developing and pushing out your
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: capital improvement program and the other is on the procurement side,
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: how to become an owner of choice. So the capital
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: and improvement program itself that you know, capital project is
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: something that takes usually a design, you might need to
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: acquire some land, you build it right, you maintain it
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: m h. Those are usually large, multi year projects and
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: if you don't have a plan to put that together
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: with some accountability around, it very difficult to deliver on
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: those big projects. Yes, famous quote right says if you
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: don't know where you're going, any road it will get
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: you there, right, So you have to figure out the
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: pathway forward. And just by publishing that. By the way,
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: it takes some courage for an agency because that creates accountability, yes,
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: with your teams, with the public. But that accountability puts
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: a little bit of pressure in place, and we want
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: we want some pressure to drive performance, but we don't
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: want stress, but want some pressure and then people understand like, Okay,
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: this is the goal I'm trying to achieve. And then
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: you as a leader and you might help folks with
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: this David and your business. But how do you package
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: that up so your teams understand the why and the
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: what and the how right and then set your annual
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: goals around that. That's how you get the big things
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: done right. You break it up into pieces, accountability around those,
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: and then you know, mark your progress in that way.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: I like, I like that what yousually said about, you know,
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: putting you putting it out there and putting some pressure
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: on us in a good way, not to add stress,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: but just to kind of have some accountability and say, okay, well,
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: this is what we're shooting for, this is our Well
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: it does take some you know, guts and some commitment
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: to be saying that, you know, are we really are
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: we really confident in this? We really want to make
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: this initiative and be willing to you know, realize that
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: you're no matter how how great this project could be,
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: you're going to get pushed back somewhere from somebody. So
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: how are you going to be able to withstand or
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: address that? Right? And it may we have to be
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: able to get those initiatives out there if we really
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: feel strongly about them, we feel like they're important.
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and it does a couple of other things, right.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: It It makes people think right, put things together. We
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: have smart people, let them think strategic. It also announces
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: it to the community. So every time somebody says, well,
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: where did this project come from? Came out of nowhere?
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: I didn't know anything about that, right, And I think
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: almost most importantly, it triggers an opportunity for the private
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: sector to provide services to the government agencies. And if
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: you are not promoting your project until the day of
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: solicitation comes out into the street said okay, here's a
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: request for proposals, give me your best and brightest. Well,
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: the teams are not set up that way in the
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: private sector. Everybody's so busy that you're going to get
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: less competition for your project because they're going to be
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: focused on a project that they knew more about and
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: could strategize around to increase their chance of winning. So
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: what happens when you get less competition, David, Prices go up,
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: quality goes down. Right, So that that's the challenge when
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: you don't put those things in place and put those out.
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: Into the community. Yeah, And I think, just to your point, Shane,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: maybe my history my working in the industry is that
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: when you do those things and you say, hey, this
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: is coming, like I said, solicitation is going to come
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: in a year or you know, we're in the beginning
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: stages like you said, it gives the opportunity or forward
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: thinking firms too to look. They're like, how can I
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: position myself? How can I address the challenges that they're
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: going to face? Oftentimes, you know, I'm sure you've seen this, Shane,
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: You and they may come up with some other solutions
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: and alternatives that you didn't think of or consider when
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: you actually get the solicitation and be open to that
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: and say, oh wow, we didn't consider we didn't find it.
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: Think about it that way. Great, you know if you
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: come up with some new innovative ways that we can
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: actually improve the project. But by giving or you know,
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: getting firms to think about this, and oftentimes, because I've
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: worked on these big types of project, Shane, it's these firms.
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: It's not one firm that, like I said, they have
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: to collaborate. They too have to figure out who do
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: I get to knee on my team that knows this,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: that and the other, and to build that coalition together
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: that they can be as effective as possible. Because like
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: you said, I've seen Shane where we've solicited as have
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: come and we're like, there's no way we can respond
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: effectively in the time and show well, and we're just
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: not going to pursue it. And so you want to
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: have a good feeling, a good feeling like I've really
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: got a shot at this and I can really make
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: a difference. Otherwise I'm just going through the motions.
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that happens all the time. We call that no
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: go in the pripector, right, you decide are you going
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: to go for this or you're not going to go
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: for this?
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: No go?
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: And what happens is a lot of firms if something
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: comes out, even if it's a great project, if they
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: weren't able to pre plan, preposition for that, then they
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: automatically don't go that. I don't think that's a great
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: strategy all the time, but I understand why people do it.
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: On the flip side, when you're putting together kepl pumer program,
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: we also need to protect the public agency folks from
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: losing credibility. Right, so they're going to take a risk,
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: we don't want them to lose credibility. So how do
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: we mitigate that? Yep, well, two things that you need
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: to focus on when you're putting together this program is
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: looking at physically constraining it. That means looking out further,
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: how much revenues do you have, take your expenses off?
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: How much can you afford to build, design, or build
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: any given year? One Number two is to resource balance that.
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: So I think a lot of agencies do the first one.
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: They figure out, okay, what can we afford and they
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: try to plan that out multiple year, but not a
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: lot of agencies resource balance it. And the resource balancing
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: is how many projects can we actually do in that year?
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, successfully, Right, that's a great one, yeah, Shane.
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: I mean that goes for the private sector too. It's like, well,
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: you know, I just want to make x more revenue,
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: but what does it take. I was just talking to
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: another growth business growth specialist on this earlier today. He's
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: in England. But same issues are faced in the sense
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: of you're not thinking all the stress, all the different
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: layers that hit from you know, from operations to you know,
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: all the different elements that are gonna be hit by
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: when you bring this in. Like you said, and I
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: think business private businesses do the same thing. They don't
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: count the costs that's involved. I mean, I'm I'm I'm
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: here trying to help build teams. What I'm saying, if
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: you bring another thing, you could actually implode your team
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: because you don't have people are burnt out, they're overloaded,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: and they're they don't they don't they don't know how
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: to get all this stuff done. And so yeah, you're
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: absolutely right counting that the outroot you said, the resource allocation,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: what's it going to take, what's the necessary infrastructure? And
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: I mean, right now, I don't know. I'd be loved
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: interested to get your take. I know we're coming up
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: here literally in a few years, we're gonna have the
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: Olympics here, and so like are they that's a huge
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: deal right in southern California. And I even I just
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: heard one, I think it was a city of Santa
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: Monic or somebody saying, look, we're not going to We're
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: not going to take on an event. We can't afford,
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: we don't have enough time, we can't afford to do this. Yeah.
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: I think they did an analysis that said if they
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: didn't spend all of the money to prepare for the event,
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: they would get kind of a halo effect from people
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: being in the LA area, and that would drive more
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: revenue than you know, if they actually held the event
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: and drove people to to to that jurisdiction. So these
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: are all decisions decisions to make, I think sometimes with
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: the Olympics, and one of the challenges I think with
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: LA twenty eight is this mantra of we're not going
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: to build any new whatever infrastructure use That was kind
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: of the talking point.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: Mm hmmm.
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: It's difficult to get smaller cities to invest millions of
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: dollars for everything to be temporary just to get people
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: to drive through their city. If you have legacy improvements
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: that you're going to be making now, you can benefit
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: from the Olympics long after they're gone. So you know,
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: I understand why they did it to try to win
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: the bid, but I think it makes a challenge for
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: some cities.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, and and and I mean many of these
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: projects too. It's one thing to work with one agency,
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: like you mentioned earlier, but I mean, I I've done
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: a lot of transportation projects over the year, so you know,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: you have it's not it's not just the county, it's
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: caltrans for example. You know, they got to be involved
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: and so it's like you have also competing even priorities
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: sometimes and like hey, what what we want to get
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: done and how we want to do this and so
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: and I've seen and I've seen the private sector kind
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: of get stuck in the middle sometimes on that I
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: was working on a product chain where it was like
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: it was a bridge project that I was over overgoing
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: a flight control area and the city had different perspectives. Also,
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: resource agency had a different perspective on all this, and
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: it's like grinding, you know, to a hall. Everybody doesn't
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: and everyone kind of gets silent and just kind of
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: picks on their little thing and it's like we're we're
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: not winning together. Right.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of pressures on leaders and local governments, right,
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: you have reduced revenues, You've got staff turnover, you've got
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: expenses going up, and so I think a lot of
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: times people get focused, heads down, what do I just
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: need to do today to get through today or the
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: next month or whatever, And they don't always look outside.
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: Not their fault just might be the way their day
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: is organized. What's my neighbor doing. I sit in a
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: neighbor city, you know, can we collaborate more with them
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: what's happening. So that's where I come in, and maybe
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: you too, David. Is I try to offer the heads
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: up perspective, Yes, like you don't know this, but your
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: neighbor that you would join with your city is doing
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: this and that can help me, or vice versa, or
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: you should know about it, right, So yes, I think
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: even though we have more access. You know, you and
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: I are talking remotely right now, we have more ways
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: to access each other. I think because of that though,
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: people have become maybe a little bit more siloed and
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: then I'll just log in or I'll just send an
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: email or whatever. It is nothing wrong with that, and
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: tell it reduces the communication to a level of losing
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: context and priority, uh and collegiality.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it takes folks like yourself, Shane, and I
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: get it. Not everybody is necessarily what I call future
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: orient and their things. Some people are literally just programmed
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: for the today getting things done, and we need both.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: It's not either or, and so you know, some people
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: resist both either way. Some of the people are like,
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: why do I just got to deal with the thing
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: and fight in front of me and other people, you know,
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: and then in the future oriented folks. You know need need,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: we need both. And so what it basically is saying
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: what I hear you saying, Shane, is like tapping into
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: the folks that are looking at those things, bringing together
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: you and I what I would say or connectors. One
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: of the things the framework I use called five voices
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: understanding your leadership voice, how you show up and recognizing
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: the strengths and not worrying, not being a defensive or work,
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: but just empowering other folks that have different strengths abilities
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: and you know, lifting that up. And it may be different.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: And I think organizations and maybe you can speak to
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: this because sometimes there's organizations that they'll default to one
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: way of it's almost like group think. It's like we're
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: all this way and we don't like these outside voices
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: coming in. But really you want to have some challenge,
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: like you said earlier, pressure and kind of testing some
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: of these things. Does this still work? Does this mantra
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: or mindset still work or should we do we need
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: to change it, not for change's sake, but to just
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: evaluate is this still working the way we want it
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: giving us the results that we really want. Yeah.
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: I think there's two things. One is that I think,
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: you know, the our government leaders are built to be
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: more conservative, and that's to have community government. There's a
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: reason for that, but sometimes times it causes you know,
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: the analysis paralysis all that stuff. And what I tried
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: to talk to my teams about and government was let's
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: do you know the enough research to have defensible decisions,
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: but let's launch and then course correct right that these
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: initiatives they take so long a lot of times years,
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: and there's time to course correct. I don't mean to
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: be flipping or ignore based details, but do your research,
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: make a defensible decision, and move forward, because if you
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: wait and you don't move forward. We talked about this earlier.
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: Everything's changing outside, so the decision points you made at
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: the time you made them might no longer be valid,
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: and then you're caught in this do over challenge. And
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: then the other thing I think that that you and
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: I might come up against with trying to help people
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: in organizations. And this is not right or wrong, but
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: people have to have a certain level of maturity. I
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: don't mean to say immature like your teenager, but just
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: mature and confident in themselves that it actually demonstrates leadership.
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: Yep.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: To bring in a strategic advisor or a fraction government
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: execut Absolutely connector you're actually multiplying your ability to be
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: successful and you're not diverting that. And that takes a
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: certain type of person to embrace that.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: In yep, I hunder present agreetion and I believe you
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: lead from that absolutely what I've seen to know of you.
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: I mean, I remember you know in early on my
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: career shame when I started to transition from being a
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: technical specialist biologist and I started to have to manage
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: projects and people, I realized I better lead myself. Well
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: if that's like anybody else to follow me. And I
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: have to be able to recognize, like you said, my
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: strengths and my weaknesses are by shortcomings and it's not
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: I'm not feeling guilty about it, just recognized that's not
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: my area of strength and where do I find people
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: to help me? And I absolutely agree why we have
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: the whole business around people podcasting is to bring folks
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: like your voice here to hear and listen. You're you're
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: an actual multiplier. When you come in, you're actually bringing
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: in and shortening the gap of both time and money
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: that they would spend otherwise, and it is wise. You know,
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: I just recorded an episode with the lawyer yesterday. We
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: were talking about like, instead of like the media of
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: having the lawsuit or the legal issue come up, being
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: proactive and getting things in place so that you're not
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: facing that and all the money in the time. But
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: we have to train our brains. I think, like I said,
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: intelligent leaders to being more proactive rather than just being reactive, right.
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: For sure, And part of that comes with trying to
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: be careful how we place blame with people, Like everybody,
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: everybody's always ready. Something happens, let's blame somebody. We need
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: a scape noovering, we need them going. Sometimes governments, things
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: just happen. Yep, right, a fire, a wildfire happens, you know,
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: whatever it is, right, storm happens. We want to we
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: expect our governments to be prepared for every event twenty
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: four hours a day, no matter the impact and the
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: scale of it. Well, the bottom line is that they're
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: not funded that way, right. People want maximum level of service,
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: but minimum level of taxation and costs. Right, So it's
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: an unfair expectation. But I think to your point, when
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: when we're trying to deal with leaders. That's my book
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: is about dealing with leaders, is trying to help them,
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: especially with things that are beyond what their day can
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: take on from a capacity standpoint. Yep, right, you can
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: do A and you can do B, but you can't
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: do both. Okay, So I'm working with you, David. You
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: work in the public sector. You have things you can
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: do that I can't do. You're going to be working
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: with your elected You're going to be managing your staff,
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: you can be looking at a time cheat, you're gonna
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: be developing your budget, You're going to be dealing mitigating issues.
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: Those are all things you can do that I can't do.
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: But you might have a project or initiative that I
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: can do and help you with my twenty five years
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: of experience in the industry or with your experience David.
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: And now we can get two things done right or
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: three or four, and if that person tries to do
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: them both right, they won't.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: Do either one. They won't do either well.
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: And yeah, that's hard to realize when you're in it right.
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: Absolutely well. One of the one of the topics I
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: want to get to before in the podcast. We talked
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: about this before the recording again where I feel like
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: you can help them is building future ready public and
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: private teams in the in getting the right funding, going
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: after the right funding right, how do how do we
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: get that practical strategies here that we can you know,
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: get that funding out there, get the teams in place.
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: And I know you had quite a bit of experience
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: in procuring funding. So these are things that you can
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: I think could help them. Well, you know, you know
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: you've worked with I think over one hundred cities on
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: the Infrastructure and Investment and Jobs Act for example, and
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: so like having them get ready for maybe the federal
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: discretionary funds or you know, obviously we're right now in
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: a great place of transition within our government and funding
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: and so maybe you can speak a little bit to that, Shane.
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: Sure, it's important issue, I think because if our local
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: governments are not looking outside the walls at their own
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: city hall or their budget, they're losing out on resources
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: that should be coming back. So the first thing is
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: hand your Kepel improvement Plan, you know, up to date
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: strategic resource balance fisically constraight like we talked about before.
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: Why is that important? You're going to now publish and
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: stand behind how much money you need for what phase
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: of a project and when you need it for what,
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: how much and went. And that's very important to target
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: federal dollars right because grant programs come and go, federal
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: formulake dollars flow in different times of the year, so
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: you need to know how to position those. And then
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: what I like to do and help agencies with is
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: take all of your projects that we think are eligible
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: first and eligibility screen against federal programs, and then line
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: them up in time and the phase and the amount
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: with the grant programs. So for example, the bi person
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: Infrastructural I had one hundred and twenty different grant programs before.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: Many of those are being cut nowt but you could
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: line up the timing for the notices of funding opportunity
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: releases and the eligibility categories and the maximum grant awards
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: and all that stuff. You cross reference that with your
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: capital improvement program see what hits Now you can start
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: to plan right, getting ready, being prepared, so when that
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: notice of funding opportunity comes out, you already know what
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: project you're going after, you already know how much, you
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: already know the phase, and you can get your grant
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: writers and your team's ready to go and try to
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: access that. The challenge right now, and you talked about
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: the transition happening at the federal level, is I'm getting
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: some feel at the local agency level, which I think
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: is justified. I don't have the confidence that if I
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: do all the things I need to do, the federal
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: government is going to maintain their commitment in awarding that
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: to me. And we've seen this with a lot of
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: programs where the latest was the brit program Building a
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: Resilience sorry building Resilient Infrastructure and Community, which was a
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: grant program to build resilient infrastructure like it sounds, put
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: into place in twenty eighteen by the Trump administration and
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: now just removed by the Trump administration and removing all
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: approvals all the way back for years. That's difficult for
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: a local government if you invested fifty thousand on your
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: grand applications and benefit costs analysis, and you progressed your
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: project in line with what you needed to do to
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: comply with those federal regulations, and then you basically get
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: the rug pulled out under yourself under you. So those
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: things are not helpful. People could justify the reasons, but
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: they're not helpful at the local level when funds are limited,
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: expectations need to be managed. In some cases, people are
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: submitting for grants because they have no way with the
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: funding and their agency to pay for that big thing,
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: whatever it is. So that's the challenge on the funding side,
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: and we're going to we're going to continue to see
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: infrastructure as a as a topical debated point as we
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: go into the federal fiscal year twenty six.
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: Well, I think, I mean, I mean, most infrastructure is
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: one of the things when you think about government and
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: what does government vioue. Infrastructure is one of the key
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: things we think about the roads that we drive on
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: every day, for example. You know, so that is going
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: to be an issue, and so it's hearing this and
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: knowing like how do you prepare? You know, and so
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: you know, as we're as we're getting getting closer to
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: the podcast and we can go definitely there's a lot
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: more things here, Shane. But you know what, the last
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: kind of topic I want to touch on here is
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: just really you know, with these challenges, how as I
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, how does how do we continue to work
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: together with both what I call cross section leadership bringing
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: the you know, what are private firms need to know
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: about working with government where we're at right now, how
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: can we help you know, strengthen that support that what
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: your the initiatives that you're doing. I know work with
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: private private clients, but how do we continue to be
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: proactive and building kind of that public private teams in
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: your opinion.
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a difficult one for depending on the agency
• 37:12
  Speaker 2: and the level. Right So at the local level where
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: I spend most of my time, I think it's about
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: building the partnership of trying to achieve something together. It
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: might sound cliche, but if your only reason for trying
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: to interact with that government agency is just to get
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: a feedback or contract, okay, but you're not really building
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: that partnership. But if your goal from let's say the
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: private sector is I want to go in and build
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: this project, to work on that initiative because I'm passionate
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: about that thing, You're going to do a better job.
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: The government agency is going to receive better service, and
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: together you're going to achieve a higher goal. But you know,
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: one of the challenges we have we talked about siloing
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: and all those things before, is many agencies are u
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: seeing their communication levels, not increasing it from the teams
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: that have the details that the private sector needs to
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: know about in order to beacon a partner. So I
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: think both sides have room for improvement. Yeah, both sides
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: have some successful elements now, but it's this constant, constant push.
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: I like it. I like how you said earlier, Shane
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: about kind of being having the maturity. I feel like
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: sometimes I and this goes public and private side, but
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: I've seen where sometimes maybe this is where there's uh,
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: let's just always use the example of the public sector side,
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: where there's somebody in the public sector side of the
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: government where they may may not have enough, they don't
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: may they don't feel like they know enough, so then
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: they kind of are a bit of a roadblock because
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: they don't want they want to kind of, you know,
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: if they can understand and appreciate. Again, nobody's trying to
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: take advantage of each other, but just like how do
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: we work together and and you know, especially like this
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: is what I'm thinking about the private side. When the
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: private side is going to pay for or build or
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: put some infrastructure in place as part of a larger
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: project where you couldn't get the funding like you said,
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: Otherwise you're like, hey, look, we can't get the funding. However,
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: if we can figure out a way to do this
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: in a collaborative way and not a combatative way or
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: like you know, and I feel like sometimes they you know,
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: there's a misunderstanding and it's like, how do we achieve
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: this together or like you said, just the communication skills alone,
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: sometimes just how to collaborate because we just don't have
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: the skills. I've noticed that in the younger generations particularly unfortunately.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: I've had a just on my podcast, had a career
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: coach talking to millennials and Gen zs because they're not
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: even picking up the phone or maybe they send an email.
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: They're just not building the collaboration. And it's like, who
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: do you like to work with? The people that you know,
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: that you like, that you trust, and if you don't
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: have a relationship, it's very can be very transactional.
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And to your point out projects, there's two things
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: that I think really help with that. One it is
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: what we call in California progressive design build. The rest
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: of the country just calls it design build. But it's
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: a forced collaboration on purpose to get people to work
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: together towards a common guaranteed maximum price, so it creates predictability, accountability,
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: and everybody has a role and has chips on the table.
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: If you will mhm.
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: The other can be a public private partnership, a formalized
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: one where there's a cat price, where the private entity
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: is taking some risk and the public entities taking some
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: risk and paid for the financing. So anytime you have
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: shared risk and you're increasing predictability, that's going to force collaboration, which,
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: to your point, then helps both parties perform better.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Shane, there there's You've covered so so many great
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: areas today. I know we're just scratching the surface as
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: we're wrapping up the podcast, and you know, we're going
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: to provide your link and you look, you guys can
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: stand on LinkedIn and I'll make sure his website's available
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: to you. But you know, Shane, what is you know
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: is your closing thoughts and takeaways there that you want
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: on part both working on a coup and private sector
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: to be considering company to improve in these areas, both
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: public and private sector projects.
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: I think a couple of things real quick. One, don't
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: beat up on your local government too much. They're doing
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: the best they can with with the resources they have. Secondly,
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: support funding initiatives when they come up, especially for infrastructure.
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: It seems like people are always willing to pay higher
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: taxes for schools, and they should, but then when it
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: comes to infrastructure, for some reason, people are suspect about that.
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: So support support those infrastructure needs. And then the third
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: thing I would say is continue to advocate with elected officials,
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: both at your local, state and federal level. One of
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: the things in my DC trip I just went in
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: April for about a week, you can walk into any
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: congressional office on the Capitol Hill. You know, you've got
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: to go through security and all that stuff and get in,
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: but you can go advocate for your position and.
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: Without being involved.
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: What is important to you and what should the federal
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: government focus on, whichoud the state focus on and the
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: local focus on. So that's my final thought is people
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: should advocate, however and whenever they can make your voice heard.
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: I agree, Shane, that's so important. I feel like some
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: people don't do that.
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: I was just talking to the lawyer yesterday and she's like,
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: if if you tell me I can help advocate, I
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: can be there. I Meanyah but if you don't tell me,
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: I don't know what's important to you. And we need
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: to be o make our voice heard. And like you
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: said you were saying earlier, putting out the bapital of
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: a program or whatever the case might be, putting it
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: out there, you're looking for some pressure in a good
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: way to refine it. And I elected officials need to
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: hear from you what's important to you for sure. Thank
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: you so much for being on the podcast, Shane Is.
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: It's a pleasure having you here. So many great insights
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: help everybody really connects with Shane. Check out his book again.
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: We'll provide all the resources here in our show notes. Again,
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: thank you again Shane for being here on the Business
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: round Table podcast.
• 42:55
  Speaker 2: Thanks David, Thanks for everything you're doing in the industry.
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: Thanks for having me on.
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: Absolutely thanks everybody for listening. Of course, like and subscribe,
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: leave your comments, we'll be sure to get those back
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: to your respond to them, and again thanks everybody. You
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: will