Promotion shatters technical purity
Councils and government agencies teem with clever professionals: policy analysts, accountants, scientists, engineers, lawyers, et al. In a technical role, you can lean into your expertise. But in a leadership position, the game changes. This can be a shock for new managers when they realise the trade-offs needed to get things done.
In public leadership, good ideas and best-practice recommendations swim in a chunky soup of public scrutiny, shifting political agendas and organisational change. Managers are expected to cut costs, improve customer service, boost productivity, fix morale, set direction, deliver community outcomes, protect reputation, mitigate risk, and innovate, all at once. If this feels like a contradiction, it is. That's the job.
(Private sector leaders face similar battles. They, too, strive to please multiple masters, negotiate competing priorities, and do more with less. But they navigate these tensions under a unified master objective: to maximise profit. Read more about the differences between the private and public sector here.)
Public leadership is structurally paradoxical
Democracy is built on the contest of ideas: compromise, representation, and transparency. These attributes also shape the organisations that run the machine.
Leading in this environment means navigating irreconcilable tensions - long-term value competes with short-term news cycles, practical needs butt up against political agendas, and efficiency is compromised by bureaucracy.
Long-term vs short-term
You deliver long-term, intergenerational outcomes that take time to come to fruition. You will be judged on short-term visible results inside budget and election cycles. Lean too long-term and lose your mandate. Lean too short-term and become ineffective.
Political vs practical
You craft high-quality technical solutions that are operationally feasible. You also need to satisfy public and political whims. Technically correct solutions without political support will fail. Pet projects without operational backbone also fail. Lean too practical and lose support. Lean too political and achieve nothing.
Accountability vs flexibility
You plan your work years in advance, to the day and dollar, in a tightly regulated reporting structure. You do that in a complex environment with shifting priorities and dynamic, unforeseeable events. Lean too precise and you constrain innovation and responsiveness. Lean too loose and you erode accountability.
Equality vs equity
You need transparent, robust policies that deliver fairness and consistency. You also need to make humane, context-sensitive decisions that put people first. Lean too rigid and you embed harm. Lean too loose and you drive inequality.
Speed vs legitimacy
Decisions are made in public, with the public, or both. Every stakeholder adds time and cost to a process that is also expected to deliver urgent outcomes, frugally and responsibly. Minor decisions drag on, but major ones can be made overnight. Force speed and trigger resistance. Move too slow and waste time and money.
Advice to navigate these tensions
With time and experience, leaders get better at reading the room, spotting opportunities, and working with stakeholders and politicians. But there is no way to resolve these tensions permanently - frustration is a sign the system is working.
For a satisfying career in public leadership, consider the following advice.
Take nothing personally
Your job is to provide free and frank advice, then implement political will - regardless of how you feel about it.
That's not to say you're powerless. Your decision and influence skills can make a big difference. When you bring affected stakeholders in early to shape choices, they're more likely to buy in to the outcome. When you frame your recommendations clearly and connect them to the big picture, you get more cut-through.
But the public sector is subjective, uncertain, and complex and you are a tiny part of the machine, so never take the outcome personally.
Practice institutional realism
Institutions are living systems shaped by politics (Big P and little p), history, legislation, personalities, budgets, informal norms and accumulated compromises. Sometimes, they behave rationally. Often, they don't.
You work inside those imperfect institutions to implement decisions you didn't make, under governments you may not have voted for, alongside stakeholders you might disagree with, in systems you can't control. Minor things take years, major things happen overnight. Accept this.
You can make a big difference in the public sector, but it not might be fast, linear, or visible. Realism will make your career more sustainable and enjoyable.
Control the controllables
Everybody - your boss, their boss, the politicians, the media - feels constrained and frustrated. Those constraints are important checks and balances; democracy is working as designed.
You don't control the system. At the same time, you are the system, so everything you do has the power to change things. Hold these two truths together, and do an excellent job of the things inside your control.
Run full, fair, and focused decision processes. Develop focused strategic plans to channel your limited resources, and do a great job of connecting your team to the big picture. Build high-quality relationships. Prioritise your time, money and energy toward the stuff that makes the biggest difference. Leave things better than you found them.
A career of these things consistently adds up to a meaningful contribution, even if you can't see the big shifts inside the daily grind.
In summary
Your job is to make meaningful progress inside an imperfect, contradictory system (much like the rest of your life.)
It's challenging work. But what would you rather do? Work in a bank?
Til next week,
AM
