The Promise and Perils of Reorganization

• Author: Ashley E. Nickels
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.12863
• Published date: 01 November 2017
• Date: 01 November 2017

Book Reviews 943

Public Administration Review,

Vol. 77, Iss. 6, pp. 943–945. © 2017 by

The American Society for Public Administration.

DOI: 10.1111/puar.12863.

The Promise and Perils of Reorganization

Ashley E. Nickels is assistant professor

of political science at Kent State University,

where she researches and teaches

courses on urban politics, nonprofit and

community-based organizations, and public

administration. Her current research focuses

on the politics of municipal takeovers.

Nickels also serves on the board of editors

for

Journal of Public Affairs Education,

is chair-elect of ARNOVA ’ s section on

Community and Grassroots Associations,

and co-editor of

Grand Rapids Grassroots:

An Anthology

.

E-mail: anickel5@kent.edu

Book Reviews

Stephen Heidari-Robinson and Suzanne Heywood .

ReOrg: How to Get It Right ( Boston: Harvard

Business Review Press , 2016 ). 186 pp. $19.62 (cloth),

ISBN: 163369223X .

O n August 8, 2017, after more than two years

of planning and deliberation on the part of

the city ’ s elected charter review commission,

the residents of Flint, Michigan, voted to approve a

new city charter which, in many ways, will determine

the shape and character of the city going forward.

After years of emergency managers, who had the

power to disregard the city charter and implement

structural, procedural, and employment changes with

little transparency or accountability (Nickels 2016 ),

it seems residents were optimistic about the chance

at government reform and charter change, or they

were simply frustrated with the status quo. The new

charter retains a strong mayor and nine city council

members, but puts into place a new ethics and

accountability board, a more structured budgeting

process, and stricter guidelines for appointee

qualifications (City of Flint 2017 ).

The new charter includes changes to structure,

process, and people—key considerations in any

reorganization, according to Stephen Heidari-

Robinson and Suzanne Heywood, authors of ReOrg:

How to Get It Right . Unlike business, however,

changing the form, structure, and even various

processes of local government takes more than a

“reorg,” and may require a vote of the people, a

municipal takeover, or, at the very least, consideration

of political and policy contexts. What, then, can

public administrators glean from the Harvard Business

Review ’ s how-to guide to reorganization? What can

public servants take away from a book written by two

business consultants from McKinsey and Company?

I am typically skeptical of books written for the

business community and marketed to both public

and private sector leaders. I adhere to the principle

that “government shouldn ’ t be run like a business,

it should be run like a democracy” (Denhardt and

Denhardt 2007 , 3). However, ReOr g , while limited

in its general applicability to the public sector, does

provide some important insights worth considering.

While restructuring local government as a whole

may be challenging, in part because of that whole

democracy-thing, public agencies continue to be the

target of reform efforts aimed at streamlining bloated

bureaucracies, reducing redundancies (e.g., layoffs),

and increasing governmental efficiency—rhetoric

often associated with the new public management

(NPM) movement that took off in the 1990s (see

Osborne and Gaebler 1992 ). For example, as Kuipers

et al. ( 2014 ) note in their review of public sector

change literature, “many of the drivers of change in

the public sector fit into the NPM tendency to create

more effective and efficient public organizations” (15),

and are thus, unsurprisingly similar to the motivations

driving reorgs outlined by Heidari-Robinson and

Heywood. Based on a 2010 McKinsey survey of

“1,800 executives whose companies had undergone

a reorg,” the authors highlight that the top three

motivations for launching a reorg are facilitating

growth, cutting cost, and moving to a best-practice

model (16–17).

To be fair, advocates of participatory governance

or new public service (NPS), like me, also call for

organizational change—though typically focused on

implementing processes and procedures that foster

equity and civic engagement, rather than efficiency

(see Denhardt and Denhardt 1999 ; Nickels and

Rivera forthcoming ). Thus, the authors ’ five-step

process for reorg, which calls for more participatory

engagement, increased transparency, bottom-up

planning, and a focus on value creation (rather than

cost-cutting hatchet jobs), are welcome tips from the

private sector.

The authors of ReOrg argue that, if you want to

improve your organization, “chances are you need to

change an aspect of your organization: the structure

Danny L. Balfour , Editor

Ashley E. Nickels

Kent State University