Lets Get Wellington Moving

Seagull Politics.

This is an article I have submitted to City Watch NZ. See also my previous posts, A Flawed Governance Model and Performance Indicators Don’t Work.

Councils all over New Zealand are having major problems. I have used Tauranga City Council as an example in my previous two articles. In this article I would like to discuss Wellington City Council’s Lets Get Wellington Moving project (LGWM). Wellington City Council managed to spend $180million just for a bus lane and cycle way, a roundabout, a pedestrian crossing, and speed signs ($180million Spend On Lets Get Wellington Moving LGWM paywall).

The LGWM project was supposed to have been a major overhaul of the city’s transport system, including a light rail network. Instead most of the money was frittered away on endless planning, consultation, and busywork, without achieving anything substantial. Wellington City Council no longer has the competence to perform it’s core functions. This is just one more example of councils around New Zealand losing their core competence.

So what went wrong?

Firstly, I think that there is a lot of weariness amongst voters for local government politics. It does not seem to matter who they elect, they still get the same bad results. There is a tendency for wild swings in voter sentiment. In Wellington, the voters chose a left wing green council, with Tory Whanau, a young Maori woman as Mayor.

Tory Whanau’s experience is in Green politics. She is very ideological. The trouble is that ideology does not fix water pipes. Looking at the situation from way up here in Tauranga, I get the impression that Tory has been overwhelmed by the size of the job she has taken on. Green Party ideology is not enough to solve Wellington’s problems. So the first problem, is that Wellington has elected a poorly perfoming Mayor and Councillors.

Wellington City Council, at its core, is a multi billion dollar civil engineering organisation. Most of what the council is supposed to do is civil engineering. It therefore makes complete sense to somebody, but not to me, that the ideal candidate for chief executive is an ex librarian. It should be stating the obvious, but perhaps it is not obvious to everyone, that the ideal candidate to run a large civil engineering organisation would be an experienced civil engineering manager. So the second problem, is that the Wellington City Council does not have a suitably qualified chief executive.

The third problem is that the Wellington City Council organisation is not fit for purpose, and does not have the competency required to perform its core business.

Barbara McKerrow in her own words is:

An astute, strategic, authentic and collaborative leader with a strong focus on building high performing organisations that deliver on a collective vision and the key priorities. Barbara inspires people to work together towards common goals within an engaged, inclusive and team based culture. With more than 30 years experience as a senior executive, in challenging and dynamic environments, she is currently the Chief Executive of Wellington City Council.

The problem is, her high performing organisation is only good for busywork. Her high performing organisation completely failed with the LGWM project. Her high performing organisation does not have the competence to run the core council business. They only know how to do busywork.

I am sure that at least some Wellingtonians have noticed that busywork does not fix water pipes. Busywork can not run projects. Busywork can not do the LGWM. Busywork can not solve Wellington’s problems.

So what is the answer?

Firstly, Wellington voters should forget political and ideological candidates, and elect a Mayor and Councillors who are capable to do the job. Politics and ideology will not solve Wellington’s problems.

Secondly, the Mayor and Councillors need to select a good chief executive. I would recommend that they select an experienced civil engineering manager as chief executive.

Thirdly, the Mayor and Councillors should support their new chief executive to restructure the City Council organisation. Bring back technical competence into the organisation. Restore the organisational culture. All the busywork managers need to go.

It should not be very difficult, if the Mayor and Councillors know what to do. I think that Wellington residents and ratepayers would be pleasantly surprised at the results.