On Saturday, February 23rd the council met in an open meeting to continue the city manager search process. There were a total of sixty five applications made. Our hiring consultatant, Mark Nottley, reviewed those 65 applicants and reduced the number to 27 for us to review.

I was very pleased with how the council approached the review of these applicants. Mayor Stuart Bikson suggested a simple strategy that allowed the full council to move rather quickly, but efficiently, through the applicant resumes. After several hours of review, we were able to reduce the working number of applicants being considered to five.

Next Come the Interviews

The five remaining candidates will be scheduled for two hour interviews during the weekend of March 7th. These interviews will be orchestrated by Mr. Nottley, who will have 45 minutes of time to ask the candidates a number of pre-prepared questions.

After he is finished, each council person will have a short time (five minutes, perhaps) during which individual council members will be able to ask their own question(s).

Coming to a Consensus

After considering all the applicants, the council as a whole will begin deliberations about the candidates just interviewed with the goal of coming to a consensus about which candidate is the best person to manage our city. Assuming a consensus is reached, we will have identified the candidate who we would like to see lead our city into the future.

The Final Pieces of the Puzzle

Assuming a consensus was reached regarding a new city manager, it is the intent of the council to meet in closed session after the March 10, 2008 council meeting where we will discuss a compensation/contract package for the new manager.

Once this is complete, Mayor Bikson will be charged with making contact with our chosen applicant and “closing the deal”, so to speak.

My Thoughts on the Process

I was very pleased with the resume review process that we followed and with the resulting list of candidates. We were blessed with a very strong pool of candiates to review, and I am confident that we will be able to select a new city manager who fits the needs and expectations of the council and of the community.

The entire council has worked extremely hard on this issue. Each member has contributed directly to making the process a success, and I was pleased to see the manner in which we all worked together to reach this point in the hiring process.

From my perspective, the future looks bright. And it’s getting brighter every day.

This entry was posted Tuesday, February 26th, 2008 at 7:37 am and is filed under My Views. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.