Hey, everyone. Welcome back to ZacCast. I am Chad. That is Patrick. This is a much anticipated return after a couple weeks off. So Pat, it's been a while. How are you doing?

I'm good. A, a couple weeks off? I, I feel like we have vacationed for a solid six weeks at this point.

Yeah. My last trip was not much of a vacation. It was basically building furniture and moving stuff, but, uh, so I got maybe two hours of actual R&R on that trip.

But we're back to, we're back to work now, folks.

We're back to it.

We are engaged. The kids start, start school tomorrow.

They do.

Right? So-

We have-

Yeah

... so apparently we have stuff to talk about on that, so

We do. Yeah, we'll get to that at the end of the podcast when nothing really matters.

Yeah, when no one's listening. So our topic today, Pat, is sort of an evergreen topic, right? We're not digging into any kind of current events or things like that. Um, it actually stems from a conversation we had recently with a friend of ours who is looking for their first city manager job, right? They're, they're starting to put some feelers out, keep an eye on the market, and look for the right opportunity for their first CM role. Through those conversations, we, we had some interesting dialogues, uh, with this person about, you know, what are you looking for, what makes a good first CM job, and it just seemed like it was a ripe opportunity for a pod episode, so.

Yeah, I mean, f- first off, let me... You know, when I went through this process, uh, and was thinking about taking that first CM job and how that was gonna go and progress and things like that, first things first, this is a very small community of city managers, right? Uh, especially if we're just talking specifically Texas. A lot of people know each other. A lot of people know a lot of things about a lot of different cities. We're all very close. Um, and so my, my first step is talk to... do exactly what this person did, reach out to people that you know-

And trust

... have conversations, you trust, right? Those people, I mean, just giving shout-outs to people that helped me in that process. I mean, uh, I wouldn't be where I was right now if it wasn't for Robert Hannah, uh, or Hugh Walker or Dale Fisler, um, and, and some of the folks that I was able to bounce ideas off of and have conversations with, so that's extremely beneficial. So find those people first, uh, before you start looking, 'cause they... I, I used to say they would Swiss cheese everything I was looking at, uh, you know, specifically to kind of give me advice on where you want your first job to be. And a lot of these things we're gonna talk about come from those conversations that I had and you had and, uh, as, as we rose up in career, kind of what we looked at. First off-

Hold on, hold on

... if you're thinking about it-

By the way, so when you say-

Yep

... they Swiss cheese it, you mean they poke holes in all of your ideas?

Yeah.

Okay.

So ev- every, every-

Okay

... yeah, they poke holes in, in every idea.

I didn't know if that was like a-

But I-

... a South Texas phrase.

I, I think that is a South Texas phrase, yes. Uh, is... where is Swiss cheese from?

I think it's from Germany.

Is it? Okay. I s- we're gonna have to look that one up.

I, I really-

Anyways

... hope it's from Switzerland because I was being extremely facetious.

So I doubt it's from Switzerland.

It's from Switzerland.

Why... Is it? Okay.

Well, there may be some other types.

All right. So we-

They have North American Swiss cheese and Swiss-type cheeses or Alpine cheeses. They are now made in many countries.

Okay. Well, we digressed on that one.

We did.

St- straight-

It looks like a, a-

... straight down the rabbit hole of Swiss cheese.

Yeah. There's a-

All over cheese here

... there's over 475 varieties of cheese that call Switzerland their home.

It's... Yeah, well, I got really nerdy.

You did. Thank you, Wikipedia.

So all that be- Thank you, Wikipedia. So all that being said, we wanted to kind of talk about, you know, a couple of things, or the three things that you should look at before you go for a city manager job, right? How that starts, what that thought process is. And, and let me say, first off, if you're one of those few people that wants to become a city manager, we wanna help you get there. I, I mean, it, it is such a hard role to take on, and especially in today's world where an assistant city manager or a department director or a finance director gets paid very well, it is very difficult at the end of the day to go take 30, 40, 50, 50, you know, $70,000 additional mo- uh, uh, dollars a year to become a city manager. Uh, I used to joke all the time that my favorite job was the ACM job because-

I would agree

... I made less. Yeah, correct. I made less, but I didn't have to deal with all the stuff the city manager dealt with, right? My name wasn't on Facebook every day and on Nextdoor, and I didn't have to talk to council members constantly at 9:00 at night, all those type of things. So, and, and I worked in what I would consider to be a glorious city when it came to council relations. They were fantastic. That being said, um, that kind of takes us to the first thing that you should look at when you're trying to become a city manager, and that is how much crap can you deal with? I mean, really, from a standpoint of you as a person, what are you able to do and not do, and what are you able to deal with?

Now, I, I put this a little bit more eloquently in our notes. Which is, uh, know what challenges you're comfortable with in your first gig.

Also known as what-

What kind of crap can you deal with?

... level of crap can you deal with? Yes.

When you, when you're trying to jump into your first role as a city manager, it's a lot more daunting than when you have done it for many, many years, right? You have seen things, you have been around, you know, you've dealt with situations. And maybe in a different environment, you know, it's, it's going to be different, but when you've sat in that chair before, you've dealt with those things. So when you're looking at your first job, every city is different. Everyone has different challenges. Everyone has different political environments. So understanding what kind of challenges that you're comfortable taking on in that first job. Are you more risk-averse? Maybe you want a little bit more stable environment, uh, where you can-Kind of just steer the ship in the direction that it's already going, get your feet wet, um, you know, start working on the intricacies of managing large organizations or, or maybe not even large, but, you know, just managing the, the entire organization. Or do you just have a glutton for punishment and you wanna go find that city that is in dire straits and you don't care that you've never done it before, you wanna go fix it? Everyone has a dis- different level of risk tolerance, but it's important to understand what you are comfortable with before you really even start that process.

Uh, it's extremely important to understand what your boundaries are personally, right? I mean, if, if you are not able to handle highly stressful situations or walking into a city that may be absolutely broke, um, or walking into a city that's council members may be suing each other, uh, w- w- whatever that may look like, then don't look at that city first. I, I mean, it's just, it is what it is. But if, like Chad said, if you're a fixer and you like to go into those situations because you feel like you can bring something to them, it's riskier. And if you have that hero complex, go for it. But the reality is, is that you need to understand what that risk level is, and most importantly, for long-term success in the career, your first city management job has to last a decent amount of time, right? So we talk about this when people rise up in the career, uh, and, and, and maybe they hop city to city, and they do it in less than two years, right? Most folks that are TCMA, ICMA-centric are gonna look at resumes with less than two year experience in five different jobs, and they're gonna throw that resume away. The same thing happens in a search for a city manager. When you go before these city councils, they are looking for stability in the person that they're hiring. So if you go to your first job and then start looking for money nine months, two years later, you need to look at it a little longer than that and understand that, you know, it's... you, you actually have to invest in the community that you're going to be that city manager in. It's different when you're a department director or an ACM. Uh, sometimes you have arrangements that are different in, in those scenarios. But pretty much when you're a c- city manager, you have to be invested in the job that you're going in. So if you're gonna look at, "Can I make it three years? Can I make it four years?" It usually is easier to try to find a city that has shown stability at the city management role prior to that. The opposite side of that equation is, say they had a city manager for 25 years, and that person retires. That could also be a very difficult situation to walk into, especially if you're this young bebopping millennial that walks in the door, and they just got done with their baby boomer manager, right? And they still probably have all baby boomer department directors. You, you gotta be careful with that, too. Like you're gonna walk in there and just rock everybody's world-

Bebopping millennial

... as this young person. Bebopping millennial. You like that one? Yeah. So, I, I mean, all of those things, you have to figure out, "What situation am I looking at?" And I will tell you, you know, I got lucky that I kinda rose up in the same city, became a city manager in the same city that I rose up in. The thunder in the outside, if you guys hear that, I got a storm outside my window here. But the, the reality is, is I also consistently scoped out cities that I was interested in. I kept a shortlist, um, and maybe this sounds like stalker-ish from like a city level. But I kept a shortlist of cities that I had met mayors or city council members at TML, um, where I, I, I felt like they were a fit for me. So that when those jobs came open, I was a little bit more willing to pursue them mentally, um, than, than I was otherwise.

Okay, so two thoughts on what you've said here, aside from the bebopping. I don't know many millennials that listen to bebop. Um, so y- you talked about longevity, and, you know, the CM role is different than the roles that you take to get there in terms of what people are expecting. Um, and obviously, there's the two-year sort of minimum professional requirement, you know, that we have. But, uh, one thing to consider is if you're going into a turnaround job, like a, "The city is in bad shape, and we need someone to fix it," A, those aren't always intended to be long-term jobs. Sometimes they need someone to come in, shake things up, be the bad guy, and kinda get the city on the right course and then move on and let someone take it from there. One thing to think about is if you do a great job with that, that might end up being your role. Like you might be typecast as a, as a turnaround artist. And there is nothing wrong with that, but it's worth, worth thinking about that, you know, if you do a great job, you're gonna make a name for yourself. Um, that second job is where you might think, "Well, maybe I don't wanna do this again quite yet," you know, unless you, unless you really love it. Um, the second thing is you talked about coming in after a long-term manager.

Mm-hmm.

And one thing to think about when, uh, when you're doing that is, at least in my experience, and things that I have seen and read about, uh, sometimes when you go into a situation after a long-term manager has been there, there are things that people don't know about that are problems. So it can be harder to see that from the outside, um, because, you know, when you, when you have that much institutional knowledge, you kinda know where things are, and they don't always surface as much, right? If there are s- if there are things that do need to be fixed. Or that-

So let's-

... sometimes you don't even notice that they really need to be fixed until you have a change of, uh, leadership.

So let's talk about that. What can you do? So s- say you've identified a city that you're interested in. What can you do? This kinda gets to the second-

I was gonna say, this is a great segue.

Great segue.

Which-

What can you do as a candidate that is considering a job to get a better understanding of what you're walking into without picking up the phone and calling somebody who works in that city? What are the things you can look at?

Well, hopefully there's a good local news organization that can give you some information from an outsider's perspective about what's happening. Unfortunately, with the current media environment, a lot of local news basically is just press releases. Um, when I, when I ran budget for a city that had its own newspaper and I would get calls from that newspaper about the budget and what the city was proposing, essentially I could just write the story if I wanted to.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, they would just take exactly what I wrote to them in an email response and just print it word for word. Uh, which, which actually in some cases was better because when they, when they just jotted down notes and then wrote their own thing it was usually wrong . But-

Mm

... I say that just to say that sometimes you're not getting any different story in the news, in, in those local news outlets than you would if you just read the budget documents or things like that. But budget documents and audit documents are also great ways to see how the city has been progressing over the recent years and try to understand some of the decisions that were made in a shorter term window than like a comp plan, uh, or some other strategic plans. In the course of the conversation that precipitated this podcast, one of the things that we looked at was the budget document, and there were some red flags in that document. And obviously we're not gonna talk about, you know, who it was or anything, but, uh, there were some things that led you to question some of the decision making that have, has taken place over the past couple of years and how it's put a city in a particular situation that would be difficult to come into as a first time CM. Um, you have to, you have to kinda look at the words that are written, 'cause sometimes you'll have like a city where the council's has a certain direction and you can tell that the staff has pushed back a little bit depending on how things are written. Um, sometimes you can see that it's entirely driven by the city manager or if that person just, you know, delegates everything to staff. You, you can kind of pick out some of these things in terms of how the organizational culture is working just by reading the city manager's messages and by looking through the budget documents and seeing how things have changed, seeing what new programs or decision packages have been approved versus what was proposed and rejected. Um, seeing how property tax rates have been handled and how fund balance has been handled. You can get a sense of how aggressive or how conservative a city is from a cashflow standpoint. Um, are, you know, are they willing to take some chances for things that might pay off down the road, or is it, is it, are they a cash is king type of city? So th- those can really give you a good idea of how the city functions psychologically before you actually get in there. And then obviously the audit document can tell you if, if there are things that they don't want you to know.

Right, yeah. If there's a management letter you wanna see that, right, uh, in, in the audit. But that, that annual financial report shows you a lot. More specifically I always like to look at, um, the difference between the budget's fund balance number and the cash balance number the city that's found in the, uh, the annual audit. Uh, warning, those numbers are not always gonna match so don't, don't think they should match. But they're not gonna be drastically different. Um, liabilities, long-term debts, those type of things. Depreciation schedules or the depreciation side, understanding, uh, what level of expense depreciation has on the enterprise funds to see how aging your infrastructure is. So if it has a high level depreciation, your infrastructure may be a little newer, uh, more value. If it has a low level depreciation, there may be some aging assets in the ground that are gonna need to be replaced, things like that, right?

How, how much money is being siphoned from utility funds to the general fund.

Uh, it's a valid conversation.

That's a huge, huge thing to look for.

Huge, huge. Yep, yep.

Debt ratio in the general fund as well. What's that capacity? What is the debt rate and h- what percentage of your general fund expenses and your tax rate is going towards debt give you an idea of what you have to work with if, if you envision some kind of major program to redevelop por- portions of the city you may not have the ability to do it.

Yeah. What are the top 10 taxpayers both from a sales tax and a property tax standpoint? They're not gonna give the sales tax numbers, but they'll give the actual names of the taxpayers. Uh, they'll show you on the property tax side who your top taxpayers are, and then understanding how that relates to your actual full revenue source. And then also how do the revenue sources themselves relate to one another. So what percentage is property tax of the general fund's revenue versus what percentage is sales tax? Uh, that's something to look at. You know, obviously, um, you know, you're gonna be more stable with a higher level of property tax revenue, but also if, if that sales tax revenue is a small percentage, then you could be a little worried that you're not very diversified from an economic standpoint. And that, that would be a concern. You know, there are some cool cities out there that are sales tax dependent. There's very few of them, but there are. And, and so I wouldn't write them off. They usually carry really high cash balances because of the elasticity of the revenue source. But all of those things can be looked at and understood without ever picking up the phone to call somebody at the city, right? I mean, I wanna, I wanna point that out 'cause the minute you call somebody at the city, especially if they're using a search firm or a headhunter for this, they are going to check you out. The, the, the minute you call they're going to start looking into your background and your past. Um, and you know, it, that may not be the way that you want to roll, uh, through that process. And, and so that leads us to our third point which is, uh, specifically do you use a headhunter or search firm or not? Do you, uh, do you apply for jobs that don't have a search firm associated with them? Uh, do you only apply for jobs that have a search firm associated with them? What does that look like and what does that mean in the grand scheme of things, uh, is a, is a big question when you're in your job search.

Since you're the one of the two of us who has experience with that to the point where I built an entire website to help you navigate-

Perfect

... finding jobs without having to actually talk to a, a, a headhunter, why don't you go ahead and talk about the, the experience getting that, that networking built, um, how it actually works in terms of jobs coming open.And you get in contact and say, "Hey, would this be something of interest?"

Yeah, I think, uh, first and foremost, the relationships in the networking is the most important, right? So if you're not a extroverted, outgoing person-

Ahem

... you're really going to have to- Uh, the Chad, Chad, yeah. Uh, if you are like Chad, and you're an introvert, you will have to work hard at this. This is not something that comes easy for introverts. When you're at conferences, you have to stop by the table, and you have to talk to them. When you're, um, you know, at a happy hour, you have to go and introduce yourself and talk about your career and, and really give them the ability to actually understand who you are. Um-

You have to, you do have to sell yourself

... you have to sell yourself, specifically to the, the headhunter side of the equation, right? Because at the end of the day, even if they're doing a full-blown search, and you apply for that full-blown search, their credibility is on the line, right? So they are going to push candidates with more experience and more credibility in their eyes than they would candidates otherwise. Because the way that this works in a search firm is they go hire a city manager for a city, and that city manager doesn't work out within the first two years, they go do that search, that 30 or $40,000 search for free, right? So they're out 40 grand at that point. So they tend to want to have relationships with candidates. They, they wanna know exactly who they're dealing with, and they give opinions through the process of who this person is, and who they've worked under, and what cities they've been at, what their understanding level is of these specific types of issues. All of that matters, and the only way they know that information is if you sell it to them. And so you've gotta get out there and have those conversations. Now, I was, I was a little picky because I was in really good situations where I really only developed a relationship with one of those firms. Um, and I never would apply for a job outside of that search firm. Uh, that doesn't mean you can't. You really can. It doesn't matter at the end of the day. You can, you know, talk in search firms. You can go through Waters or SGR or, uh, any of the other ones that are out there. There's a couple small ones. There's really only four or five in Texas, but there's a couple small ones that do, uh, some West Texas jobs and some that do more Central Texas and San Antonio area. But the, the reality is, is that they need to know something about you, and I chose to go a path with a specific search firm. At the same time, I would stay in constant touch with those individuals, and constant touch was really, like, once every six months, I would pick up the phone, have a phone call, and just see what the market looked like, you know, what, what was going on. Uh, and I loved my job. I was never looking to leave my job, but I also understood that I was a commodity. And like a professional athlete, there are plenty of cities out there that are looking for a specific commodity that will pay for that commodity, and so I, I wanted to know what that market looked like. Usually every time I went into my review at Hudson Oaks, before my council was gonna review me, I always had a conversation with, with a headhunter, almost every time. 'Cause I wanted to know, okay, what's the market for me right now? What does this look like? Where should my pay rates be? Those type of things and, and I, and I would do that, right? At the same time, I would reciprocate. When that headhunter was having a hard time in a job search with finding candidates in that role, I would help them find other candidates to fill that role, people that I had networked with and, you know, uh, had careered wor- with at that point. I was helping them find their home, uh, within there, so I would help them network as much as they would help me network.

Do you think that there is a difference between a city that uses a headhunter for a CM job and one that doesn't?

So this is, this is gonna be super controversial that I say this. I'm, I'm just gonna say, there are gonna be city managers that listen to this podcast, and they're gonna totally disagree with me, so let me put it out there. But I will say if a city is serious about getting a great manager and opening up their applicant pool to managers that are happily in other jobs, they need to use a search firm, period.

Well-

If you-

... one benefit of it is that it gives you the layer between the public information requests and the, the applications, the job applications, um, and the search firm.

For, for a little while.

For a little while.

Right.

For a little while.

For a little while.

But-

Correct

... it essentially gives the potential candidates a little bit of extra space, just generally. It gives you a little bit of extra space, gives you a third party that they can talk to about, about the job without having to come to your HR or if you're hiring for a CM, I mean, depending on how big the city is, they may be going to the mayor to ask questions.

Correct. I, I will say the flip side of that is from a city perspective, if, if you don't use a search firm in today's world, it's really hard to find a manager. And, and that's just a, that's a numbers issue, right? There's just, there are not as many men and women that are getting in the city management field as there was 25 years ago. And so if you are still a sitting manager today and you're good, wow, you're gonna get paid a lot of money, and you're gonna be highly recruited, and it's gonna be constant. And the only people that have that c- those contacts, the only people-- I, I don't answer a phone when a mayor from another city calls because city managers just don't talk to mayors of other cities, right? But I answer the phone when that headhunter calls, every time. Uh, it's just different. If, if you want to be able to reach out to people who will answer the phone, you're gonna have to use that headhunter to do that. Um, and, and some of those search firms and headhunters have access to different candidate pools than others. Um, it just is the reality of our business today. It was not always that way, but in today's world, I do not know... And, and if you're still this way, reach out to me. I'm, I'm happy to help. I don't know many managers that are serious city managers that are looking for a job.I, I just, it, you don't. I mean, there are just not that many people out there, and there are lots of opportunities for them to be in a city management role.

So if you are a city who is looking, aside from the candidate pool and everything else like that, one benefit of the headhunting firm, the search, is that they also sell the job.

Mm-hmm.

Right? So they put together the brochures, the marketing material, the outreach, and when someone has questions, they have salespeople essentially who are pitching this job to possible candidates. So as a city, there's that a-added benefit, too. Like we're not... This is not an advertisement for headhunting but, you know-

Of course

... there, there are benefits from the candidate standpoint, uh, as well, not just f-from, from your standpoint as the, the hiring entity.

Well, a good candidate is gonna talk to the headhunter a lot about the city. They're gonna ask lots of questions. That headhunter's gonna go get answers for you, talk to the mayor, the council members, that type of stuff-

And there's probably already a-

... come back to you

... there's probably already a trust relationship there anyway.

There, there is. Usually there is a trust relationship there. The other side of that is candidates are gonna go through a process and they don't have to say yes, right? I, I wanna, I wanna say that a city management job is not you going after a city management job. It is you going on a date and trying to figure out whether you want to keep dating, right? And that's a two-way street. And, and I say that because, uh, outside of Hudson Oaks, I applied for three city management jobs that I got to the finalist position, and during the negotiation of contract decided not to take it. Right? So went, interviewed, went through the whole process, did the video interviews and the write-up interview and the actual in front of council interview, and then council comes in and says, "Hey, we wanna offer you this job," and we would go, "Sure." Now, one time it was financial. One time I was gonna have to move my family to an entirely different region of Texas and they just weren't willing to put the financial dollars on the table to get me to leave DFW. 'Cause let's face it, if you leave DFW or Central Texas, they better give you quite a bit of money to go there because you just don't have as many jobs in those areas. Just is what it is, right? The other two, I went on a date and I did not like the person on the other side of the table from me. I knew right away that my personality was not going to jive with their personality, either a mayor or multiple city council members. I never eliminated them because of one crazy city council member. Everybody's gonna have at least one. It is what it is. The reality is, is I eliminated them because I knew at the end of the day I wasn't going to be able to strategically work with that council long term. They were not going to listen to professional recommendations. And, and so those two jobs I just said, "You know what? They're not for me" and I decided not to get them. Now that helped me, though, when in Hudson Oaks the job opening opened up because I, I, I know for a fact 'cause I've been told by my ex-mayor, the first thing my ex-mayor did was pick up the phone and call a search firm who happened to be the headhunter that I worked with and said, "Hey, we have this opening. We really wanna hire Patrick, but we wanna know should we go through a search before we hire him?" And his response was, "I've put him through three jobs. He's been the finalist in all three of them, and if you don't take him he'll be somewhere else." And so there was that relationship intermediary that could have that conversation that I couldn't have. I couldn't walk up to my mayor and say, "Hey, by the way, I've been a finalist for three jobs, and if you don't hire me for this job I'm gone in a month." You know what I mean? Like, I'm not that guy. You don't wanna be that person. You don't ever wanna think that you're not replaceable. Uh, Ron Hartwan still works today for the city of The Colony, I believe. He, he told me when I was an intern there that you are as replaceable as a gra- glass of water. And, and I know that doesn't make a lot of sense, but it did to me. It was something that-

Especially with the droughts and everything.

Yeah, especially with the droughts and everything else. But the reality is, is don't ever forget. Don't give ultimatums. Don't have that relationship. Love the job that you're in all the time. Just understand what you have available to you outside of that.

So that was... I feel like we've been on a very similar page here so far today, which never happens. But, uh, my os- my next question actually was how far along can you go in this process before you can't back out? And your, your comment is to the very end. Like, so it's-

All the way to the end

... so don't feel pressured when you're going through this. If it's not the right place for you, don't take it, especially on your first job.

When they get on a knee and offer you the ring, if the diamond is not large enough or you are not comfortable enough, do not say yes. Now that being said, if you say yes at that point in time, which this has happened and, and I've seen managers do this, where they say yes to the initial verbal offer and then when it gets to contract terms they just say, "We're not-- I'm not gonna do it," y-you can't do that. Right? I mean, at the end of the day, you, you can't do that. Um, but you, you have to leave the interview, decompress, understand what happened, talk to your significant other, work through what you saw, and then understand that you're about to marry somebody for three to five years at least. So are you comfortable with that? That's up to you, and I think you can wait till the very end.

So you don't have to put your name in the hat, only if you already think that you're comfortable taking the job.

Correct.

That's important-

No, I mean-

... for people to kind of keep in the back of their mind.

A-and that's why going through search firms is helpful because you get to go through the process, right? Um, now when I, when I left Hudson Oaks we did not hire a search firm. Uh, but it was, it was a little bit of a different scenario. Council basically went to me, uh, after I told them, "Hey, I'm gonna leave in two years," and I think I left in, like, nine months. Um, thank you, Zach Customers, because I couldn't have done that without you. But the reality is, is that I told them, "Hey, I'm gonna leave in two years," and their response to me was, "We need you to go recruit your replacement." And so forThat entire time, I started having conversations with professionals in the field about, "Hey, there is this awesome job in Hudson Oaks that I'm about to leave that nobody knows I'm about to leave. Would you be interested in, in, in this position?" And we had an awesome candidate pool. Really, really good candidate pool. Um, a lot of that was because of relationships. A lot of that was because Hudson Oaks is just so stable. But the reality is that would have been a really good first job for people, and we had a couple people in that applicant pool that used it. They knew they weren't the most qualified candidate, but they had department director experience or a little bit of ACM experience, and they knew it would be a good opportunity to get in front of a council and practice the process of trying to become a city manager. There's nothing wrong with that. There's just not. Um, and, and I think you should. You should understand your worth, and you can be dedicated to your job, but also advance your career goal of what you eventually want to become, if that's not in the organization you're in.

So I think that the understanding your worth is probably the best part. Obviously, the networking, the having someone that you can trust who can kind of give you some honest feedback on whether you're a good fit for a job. But at the end of the day, the market for city managers is very, very small. I mean, there are only so many cities, and it's a very specific job. The nature of the job is you're gonna get thrown under the bus at some point, and that typically will not be held against you unless there's some kind of, you know, controversy that arises out of your departure, right? But if council turns over and you lose your job, that's typically not held against you. It's a very unique job environment in that regard. But because it's so unique, having, having someone else that's sort of in the middle who can, who can explain to you where you fit in the way things are trending at the moment is really helpful when you're trying to make your decision about what's right for you and your next step.

A-absolutely. And, and it-- that does not have to be a search firm. That could be another professional in the field, right? So when I came to Hudson Oaks, I came to Hudson Oaks 'cause Robert Hanna was the city manager there. I started as his assistant too. And he famously, we've talked about this on previous podcasts, left me six months after, right? And then recruited you to the next city that he went to and then left you six months after, right? But the reality is, is that I've always had a relationship with him where I've been able to bounce stuff off of him, and he's been in many of the same situations that I have, just, sorry to say that you're old, Robert, but just like fifteen years ahead of where I am, right? So-

Only maybe like ten.

But, you know, when I-- so I will tell you this. When I was the city manager of Hudson Oaks, I never applied for a job. Uh, and the reason was is 'cause every time a job opening would come, or every time I would get a call from that headhunter trying to see if I would go look for that job, I would reach out to my professional network, and one of those people w-was Robert Hanna. And at that time, Hudson Oaks was growing a lot faster than it was when Robert was there. And Robert would always say to me, "Don't leave that place." Like, it, it is an incredible-- it's a once in a lifetime opportunity from a career standpoint where you have just a really good city council and great residents, and they don't pay a property tax, right? So it's just the whole relationship is different. And so I didn't apply then because he told me that. But he was that middle. It wasn't the headhunter. The headhunter would call me and, and, you know, of course I was flattered. Anybody calls you and says, "Hey, you're, you're the prettiest thing we've ever seen," you get flattered, right? I mean, that's just the way it is. But ultimately, the grass is not always greener.

I get that all the time, actually.

Yeah. I mean, you actually are a little pretty. So, um, if you look at me, I'm not. Uh, but the reality is-

Don't sell yourself short.

I know. I'm getting, I'm getting bald on top though, Chad. It's getting very, very, very bad on top.

Yeah, I know. I-- While I was giving my kids a, uh, their bath a couple months ago.

Uh-huh.

And I like leaned down to grab something off the floor and my oldest goes, "Dad, you look like Papa." This is my dad, who is quite bald. So I was like, "Thanks. Thanks, bud."

Yeah. So, so all that being said, uh, have those relationships to where you can figure out your worth, not from yourself, not from a headhunter, but from some other professional who's involved in the field who can tell you what your worth is, right? Um, you trying to figure out your wealth on yourself, it depends what type of personality you are. Are you, uh, you know, self-deprecating, where your worth is always gonna be less than it actually is? Or which Chad raised his hand there 'cause he's a little bit more self-deprecating. Or are you me, where you always have a bigger head, right? You always feel like your worth is more than it probably actually is. Um, I'll be honest, I did not become complacent in Hudson Oaks, but I became comfortable. Um, I, I got to a point where I just stopped looking for jobs, where I was open with my city council that I would take a twenty percent discount because I didn't need the crazy. And, and in terms like I was willing to take forty thousand dollars less than what my market worth was because I didn't deal with a lot of stuff. So you gotta figure that out in your career. Like what does that look like? 'Cause the fact is, I, I had a conversation with another city manager a couple months ago, uh, who, who was thinking about looking and moving and, and, uh, he said something intriguing to me, which was, "Once you're making a hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year, what's a hundred and seventy thousand dollars a year?" Like, I mean, from a standpoint, it's-- I've heard people talk about this from a millionaire perspective, but you can also have this conversation at that hundred twenty, hundred and fifty, hundred and seventy-five level, which is your standard city management pay in Texas. It just, it doesn't give you all that much different in life. You're living in a good neighborhood, your kids are going to a good school, you make enough money to have a good dinner on a Friday night. Like, at some point, you're serving the public, and that's gonna fulfill you, but also you're gonna be financially stable because of your benefits and your, uh, retirement and your pay.

Service package.

And your severance package, yeah. Which is what I tell people all the time. I would always negotiate my severance package more than I would negotiate my salary, right? I mean, they're gonna pay you what they think you're worth at the end of the day. But I was in that situation where I had gotten to the point that it would become very difficult for a city of 2,100 to contin- continue to pay huge pay raises, right? At some point you get to a... Now, I was lucky that most of the people that lived in our city worked in a TV network matrix office.

I don't know, have you seen their sales tax growth over the past two years?

I mean, it's, it's pretty crazy. It, it is, uh, their, their sales tax growth is, is unreal. Um, and, and you're right, they could afford it. There's, there's no doubt, but there is kind of that line, like it's still-

It wouldn't be the best use. Yeah

... it wouldn't be the best use of taxpayer money. Like, you have to ... You're still working in the public sector. You have to realize that you're working in the public sector.

So I think to end it, it may be, uh, good to get kind of a contrarian view.

Right.

Because I stopped at ACM, right? Like c- out of, coming out of grad school, we were both wanting to get to the CM level.

Mm-hmm.

That was kind of our track. Um, you know, we worked our way up slightly differently. Um-

And out of 42 s- out of 42 students, there were only six of us on that track. Let's just say that out loud.

Right.

Right?

Which is why we say it's-

There's just not that many people out there

... small, yeah, it's a small world of people who actually-

Small

... want to do that job. But for me, aside from the fact that our side hustle had picked up to the point where we needed to decide if it was gonna be our long-term solution or just a fun thing to do.

Now you made that decision before that though, right?

I did.

Okay.

I, I, I did. Once ... When I, when I got to the ACM chair, having done transportation, having done budget, um, and then taking on a broader role of managing, you know, half of the city, basically, that was my opportunity to, to figure out what I actually liked about working in cities and what I didn't like about it. And for me, my personality, A, I'm super introverted, and, and B, the way that I work, I get really, really excited to work on things that I'm really interested in, and it takes a lot of effort to work on things that I am not interested in. And, you know- ... there were just elements of running a city that I couldn't get passionate about. S- just specific things, like specific parts of cities, like courts.

Mm-hmm.

I did not have any interest in municipal court. Um, a lot of the intricacies of planning and development, like I liked the big picture things and, but not the permitting side. So for me, that was my kind of wake-up. Like, I loved budgeting, I loved transportation. All of those things, they were a lot of fun. They're, they're big picture. They steer basically the course of the whole city in one way or another. But for me, that ... You don't get to pick and choose when you get to that role, right? You have to do all of it. And, and so, yeah, for me, that was kind of a, a switch, like c- like, I could do it, but I just wasn't quite as passionate about everything. So my, my options were kind of like stay where I am, uh, maybe go back and, and focus on budget or something like that. Or fortunately, f- like I said, for us, you know, th- this second or third option kinda came out and, uh, a- and, and grew over time. So that gave me an outlet there. But, you know, you might get to the point where you realize it isn't for you. And so not to be a Debbie Downer here at the end of this, but I just thought I'd kinda throw that out there 'cause, ' cause it, we were headed in the same direction, and then we kinda s-

Mm-hmm

... stopped in different places. And so, you know, a lot of this conversation has been about, especially the later portion, is about actually being in that chair, um, which I can't contribute to. So I thought it might be useful to just chat about-

Yeah, I think it's, I think it's ex-

... maybe the alternative, uh, scenario where you decide not to do it.

Yeah, I think it's extremely useful to have that conversation because the, the, the reality is, is that just because you do go take the chair, it doesn't mean you can't take a step back career-wise. Um, one of my favorite people of all time in this career field, um, is a person that I met. She was a city manager of a small town, and she is now an ACM of what we would consider a mid-major, you know, over 100,000 population. Uh, and, and that's Paulette Hartman. Uh, Paulette was in, uh, Joshua, also known as Joshy Way, and she made the move to become an ACM after being a CM. And there are a lot of people that make that decision to move. That could be family reasons. It could be I don't wanna talk to a council member at nine o'clock at night anymore. It, it ... Who knows? It could be all those different things. But in this business, there's nothing wrong with that. Like, nobody looks at you and says, "I can't believe you're an ACM now instead of a CM." By the way, Paulette did not get fired from that job. She was beloved there. Uh, could've kept that job probably until retirement. She just decided the best thing for her was to become an ACM again, right? And, and I'm kinda talking without talking to her a little bit there, but she's a very successful ACM, uh, where she is, and, and that can be an option for people too. Or it can be just like you. You come up through a city. You got to work in some fun departments. Let's, let's not be, like, coy about that. Let's, let's be honest, right? I always tell people the best way to come up a city is pretty much identical to how you came up a city. Budget, finance, right?

I think economic development-

Public works

... would've been, uh, uh, would've been fun. But-

Mm-hmm

... the hard stuff, the transportation and the numbers. Like, the budgeting gives you an amazing view of the entire city operation.

And it gives you direct access to the C-suite.

Yes.

Right? If you're a budgeting director or even, uh, even if you're, like, a budgeting analyst II or I, you're going to have direct access to a city manager or an ACM. So it just, it is what it is. Like, they are totally dependent on the, that budget department to do those things. Um, now famously called, uh, analysis departments in cities instead of budget, which is ... I love it 'cause-

Yeah. I mean, even if you're a budget analyst VI

Correct. Yeah. Oh, that goes back to an old podcast from, uh, gosh, that may have been, like, a year ago we talked about budget-

Yeah, probably so

... analytics there.

Yeah, yeah.

But, uh, yeah, I mean, o- otherwise, like, if you come up through a city, there are some paths coming up that are easier than others. That's also important to point out. Uh, generally it is assumed that taking a hard services route is easier than a soft services. What does that mean, Chad?

That means transportation, utilities, things like that, versus, say, parks, libraries.

Correct. Yeah. So, uh, things where you actually have to build stuff. So... And, and that is, you know, it... No offense to the folks that work in libraries, it's just the folks that run the library side don't have a lot of interaction with the public, and they don't have a lot of interaction, uh, in a negative way with the public, and they certainly don't have a lot of interaction with council members as well.

Well, they do. It's just a very specific subset of the public.

It's usually fairly friendly, too.

Fairly friendly, yes.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah. So, uh, so there are some different paths that you can look at. Uh, all those type of things, though, you can talk about with mentors. You can talk about with people that you're coming up in your career with or people that are 15 years ahead of you, like Robert Hanna was to me. Uh, all those type of things, you can have those conversations and you can, you can look at that. Uh, by the way, uh, because o- of all of what he's done, Robert Hanna, last year, year before last, he won the-

The mentorship award

... the, the mentorship award, uh, not just because of, of me, but because of numerous other people in their career that he did that with. Um, and there are lots of people like that that have won that award over time, and, and those are... I, I'll tell you, if you can leave anything behind in this, this career field, it's to mentor other people, and that was the greatest thing. Nobody was ever scared of me coming up in the career. They always supported me as, as I came up in the career. And, uh, I've seen that time and time again, men and women, um, across genders as well. I've had female mentors. So it's, it's extremely important that you find those people and have those conversations and form those relationships.

Awesome. That actually-

Can we talk about-

... went quite a bit longer than I was expecting, but, you know, for an evergreen pod, maybe the length doesn't quite matter as much. You can always go back and give it a re-listen.

You, you, you can always listen to it.

But-

But we have to bring up one more thing.

Okay. Go ahead. Go ahead.

Okay. So before we got started, before I was allowed to hit the record button on this podcast, Chad had a significant conniption. Yesterday was the first day for Meet the Teacher. Tomorrow's the first day of school for his son, who will be a kindergartner. I've been through this now a couple of times. And when you buy school supplies for kindergartners, you buy the school supplies through the school because they do it all at once. You don't have to, but it's a lot easier than having to go get a tissue box and everything else, and, uh, pencils and pens and crayons and all that by yourself. They just put it all in one package and you get it. Chad, can you explain to us what your problem is?

I just didn't expect that when we got into the classroom we would take about four things out of this packet and then throw the rest into a community pile. I just assumed that we bought them for him and that he would use them. Like, we bought school supplies growing up, right? But we al- We'd always go to the store and we'd get, like, the, the baseball folders that we wanted and, you know, all this other stuff. Um, uh, they had the, like, the Lisa Frank folders. You remember those? Those sort of trippy-

Mm-hmm

... like, acid inspired things. But, um, but you know, we always used what we had, what we got. And maybe I'm mem- remembering that wrong. I don't, I don't know. But-

No, I, I, I-

... I feel like we got to use the stuff that we picked out and bought.

I think we've gotten lazier with the school bought school supplies than we have been in the past, right? One, I think it's a fundraiser for PTOs. I think they make, like, a dollar or two on these things for every one they sell. But two, I find it hilarious that everybody is getting the same pack. Every, every folder is red, every folder is orange. Like, it's the same pack. Everybody's getting the same thing, yet you want your son to have the one that you bought.

I just ... I bought it. Like, if it's just gonna-

But it's the same as everybody else's.

But if they're just gonna be, like, general school supplies ...

It's the socialism of school supplies, Chad. They're all red folders.

Sharing is caring, apparently. But I guess- ... I just feel like if you're gonna ... If we have to buy the school supplies, then ... I know it doesn't matter at the end of the day 'cause they're all the same things. It just seems weird. I just wasn't expecting it. And then on top of that, ob- obviously I know that schools have funding issues, uh, and, you know, teachers have to buy things, um, but there's, like, a list of, of, uh, things that you can donate, like packing tape and paper towels. Why are we having to donate paper towels? And what, and what are we gonna do if we eliminate property taxes? Like, how many paper towels- ... are we gonna have to buy for donations to our schools?

So, so, so when I try to explain to people what Chad is like, right? And y- I, I think a lot of people, honestly, I think they think I lock you up in a dark room and make you code 20 hours a day.

My room is pretty dark. I don't know if you can see it right now 'cause it's so dark.

It, it is, it is a little dark, uh, but I think it's also storming outside of our houses right now. So, but the, the reality is, is that when I try to explain to people your personality, I don't think they believe me. So, like, this little snippet on the end of this podcast is, is beautiful because I, I cannot explain you well enough or better than you can explain yourself.

So I, I'm a slightly less extreme version of Larry David, because I, instead of being outwardly rude about the rules that I have for the world, I just keep them to myself for the most part, whereas Larry David will confront you. Like, I'm not, I'm not that confrontationalSo if you watch Curb Your Enthusiasm and, you know, he has these specific rules about how things are supposed to operate, he will go after you if you violate them. I just kinda keep it inside and bottle it up. Maybe one day it'll come out. I don't know. But I mean, I feel like if you've listened to any of the, um, what do we call them? The s- the segments we did one with, with, uh, Brittany. Oh, I Literally Can't Even. So we, we have these segments-

Yep

... every now and then on the pod called I Literally Can't Even, where we just vent about small things that irritate us. Like my brother sent me a video the other day in portrait mode on his phone. I'm like, "Dude, don't send me portrait mode video," and I w- I'm not gonna rehash this-

This really bugs you

... because we've gone through this before.

This has bugged you for years. This has bugged you for years where you could actually... you couldn't actually flip it. Like, this is... Now you can flip them.

No, it's, it's, it's still letterboxed and it's like this tiny little thing.

Yes.

And yeah, uh, we... I, I don't wanna rehash that, but yeah. I have-

Well-

I have very specific rules about how the world should work based on the idea that if everyone did something, would the world be better or would the world be worse, right?

So I have good i- uh... Yeah, correct.

But, but-

I get it

... I don't think that... I'm not saying that these things that I have in my head should be laws or anything. Like, I don't wanna enforce them at gunpoint. I just think that everyone should abide by the rules that I've created in my head.

That's a very interesting statement. So good news for everybody who's listening, uh, Chad will be, uh, flesh and blood available for people to see at TML in Houston, uh, early October I think is when that is.

Yeah, also, uh-

We're going

... we will be... Uh, uh, they're announcing it, right? The, the, uh, UMAN thing.

Oh, it's already on there. Yeah.

Oh.

Uh-

So UMAN-

The UMAN thing

... is hosting Chuck Marohn from Strong Towns next month. So availability is limited, so if they haven't sold out, you should probably go ahead and get tickets now. Um, I'll post a link in the show notes to that. And then, yeah, we're gonna be going to, to TML in Houston.

Hopefully my Astros will be in the playoffs and we can grab a couple playoff tickets.

I was gonna say, last time we were there we went to a playoff game.

Yep. We did. So, uh, should, should be a lot of fun, and I hope to see everybody there. Until next time, we'll see ya.

See ya, Pat.