The community may wonder why the Fort Scott City Commission selected Managment Partner’s Jeff Hancock as the new interim city manager.

The city provided fortscott.biz with the contract made with Hancock. See the prior story https://fortscott.biz/news/city-signs-on-interim-city-manager

Under the scope of services section in the contract with Management Partners mention was made of a letter of proposal to the city on Nov. 10, 2020.

Fort Scott Human Resource Director Deb Needleman provided the proposal letter, below.

November 10, 2020

Deb Needleman, SPHR, IPMA-SCP

Director of Human Resources

City of Fort Scott

123 S. Main Street

Fort Scott, KS 66701

Dear Ms. Needleman:

Thank you for the opportunity to submit a proposal to provide interim city manager services to the City of Fort Scott. Management Partners has the expertise and skills necessary to provide this interim assistance and we would be pleased to do so. Before we tell you about our approach and the consultant we propose for this effort, we would like to share some brief information about our firm.

About Management Partners

Management Partners was founded in 1994 with a specific mission to help local government leaders improve their service to the public. We are a national consulting firm headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio. Management Partners has a well-established track record of helping public sector organizations throughout the United States, including all of the services provided by cities, counties, towns and special districts at the local level.

During our 26 years of service, we have earned a national reputation by delivering quality, actionable work products to our clients. We bring extensive experience to this project, along with first-hand knowledge of local government operations. We are distinguished by the fact that each team we assign is led and staffed by associates who have actual experience in direct public service and experience working together as a team. The work we do is not an academic exercise; it is grounded in the real world of customer service and accomplishment in the public sector. As a result, we have a bias for producing value-added work for each client that will be actionable and will be implemented.

The firm is staffed with about 100 professionals who are experienced public service managers as well as qualified management consultants. This group includes generalists as well as subject-matter experts. Our consultants have years of experience working in all aspects of local government management and have built a track record of extraordinary quality service for our clients.

The firm has extensive experience helping improve both the efficiency and effectiveness of local government services. We have completed organizational staffing and improvement projects in virtually every type of local government service, including reviews of entire governments as well as selected studies of individual departments and functional activities.

Management Partners’ services include everything required to support a local government leader, elected or appointed. Our full range of services includes the following:

• Organizational Analysis and Performance Audits – Also called efficiency studies and organizational reviews, identifies improvements to an operation’s efficiency and effectiveness.
• Performance Management – Encompasses a wide range of management tools that can be and often are developed independently of one another, including performance management and measurement, process management, performance budgeting, employee performance evaluation and strategic and process benchmarking.
• Process Improvement – Examines the processes by which customers are served, an important technique for developing a program for operations improvement, including process mapping.
• Strategic and Business Planning – Can be an important tool for focusing the efforts of an organization and fostering communication between leaders, staff and important stakeholder groups.
• Financial Planning, Budgeting and Analysis – Assists clients in analyzing their finances and planning for the effective and efficient use of taxpayer or customer dollars.
• Organizational Development and Training – Helps clients develop organizational capacity, a key to developing high performance organizations. Services include executive coaching, customer service training, employee and customer surveys and conflict management workshops.
• Sharing and Consolidation of Services – Offers a more efficient way to provide services, particularly on a regional basis. Options range from the complete integration of previously separate jurisdictions to sharing or consolidating the management of individually delivered services and operations.
• Interim Management – Assists government leaders by providing executive staff during transitional periods. Rather than just “treading water,” our approach to interim management combines continuation services along with organizational effectiveness analysis to provide a solid foundation for a new permanent employee.
• Executive Recruitment – Identifies top candidates for chief executive officer positions and department director level jobs in local governments.

We offer a balance of perspectives with a practitioner’s bias and a proven track record of successful consulting engagements. This experience gives us a sensitivity that produces positive outcomes. Each of our projects is individually tailored to the unique needs of the client. We have a deep understanding of the service environment of local government and we are proud to say that as a result of our quality work, many of our clients ask us to complete subsequent assignments.

Understanding of the Engagement

We understand you have need for interim city manager services, and possible help recruiting a new permanent city manager. One of our consultants, J. Jeff Hancock, is based in Missouri. He has many years of experience as a city manager/administrator in Missouri, Oklahoma, and Nebraska. We are proposing that Jeff would provide the interim services and assist with recruitment, if desired. He could begin providing interim services to the City in November on a date to be mutually determined. He is available to serve in this capacity for approximately four months. His brief qualifications are attached.

Jeff would work for and at the direction of Management Partners, while providing the full city manager service you need on an interim basis. Management Partners will provide all insurance, training, and administrative support (including company equipment) as necessary during the assignment. Our commitment is to provide continuous and seamless management services to you during this transition period.

Management Partners will provide interim management consulting services on a monthly basis at a cost of $6,000 per month inclusive of all expenses In addition to Jeff Hancock, Management Partners has other consultants available to provide assistance to Fort Scott, as needed and requested.

We are enclosing a draft contract for your review, and await further direction from you.

We appreciate the opportunity to be of assistance to Fort Scott. Please feel free to contact either myself at 805-320-1702 if you have any questions about this proposal.

Sincerely,

 

Andrew S. Belknap

Senior Vice President

Attachment

J. Jeff Hancock, Special Advisor

• Professional manager with 45-year local government career that includes serving as city manager/administrator in seven different cities.
• Has also served as interim city administrator, assistant city manager, budget officer and manager of economic development; cities served range from 7,700 to 495,000, mostly in Missouri

• Functions supervised include financial management, human resources, marketing, strategic planning, economic development, airport construction and management, capital improvements, fire, parks and recreation, community services to meet the delivery goals of efficient and effective service.

• Active leadership in community and regional economic development efforts.
• Life member of ICMA and Missouri City Management Association; former president of MCMA and Central Missouri Development Corporation and board member of the Missouri Municipal League; active in Lake of the Ozarks Council of Governments, Lake of the Ozarks Regional Economic Development Council, Johnson County Economic Development Corporation.
• Recognized with the 2009 Missouri Municipal League’s Innovation Award and the 2005 Missouri City Manager Award.