Changing the Culture of "No"

The 150 employees of Clark County, WA's community development department are responsible for long-range planning, code enforcement, and land-use, engineering, and building plan review for roughly $500 million a year in new development. When the author became department director in January 1999,...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inPlanning Vol. 70; no. 11; p. 16
Main Author Carson, Richard H
Format Trade Publication Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Chicago American Planning Association 01.12.2004
Subjects
Audits
Building permits
Case management
Corporate culture
Counties
Customer services
Employees
Fires
Government agencies
Local government
Perceptions
Turnaround management
Clark County Washington
United States > US
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Summary:The 150 employees of Clark County, WA's community development department are responsible for long-range planning, code enforcement, and land-use, engineering, and building plan review for roughly $500 million a year in new development. When the author became department director in January 1999, the board of county commissioners and the county administrator told him that the highest priority was to "change the culture" of the department. The public perception was that the department was inefficient, indifferent, and unresponsive to the needs of its customers. It didn't really matter if this perception was real or not. First the author needed to assess the situation using a performance audit, an objective, systematic examination of government organizations, programs, and activities. But it takes more than an audit to change a culture. Cultural change is about people and their values. However, the department has gone from being an inflexible bureaucracy to one that is too flexible.
ISSN:0001-2610
2162-4577