PHILADELPHIA, May 7, 2008 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- One hundred city leaders from Mayor Michael A. Nutter's administration attended a two-day leadership program delivered by the University of Pennsylvania's Fels Institute of Government, the Leadership Center at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and Wharton's Aresty Institute of Executive Education. The program was the brainchild of Mayor Nutter and supports his goal of building a new governmental culture based on a customer service centered business model.
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"Government can and should learn from the things that the private sector does well," said Mayor Nutter. "Sending the executive team to the leadership training seminar at Wharton underscores my commitment to bringing business practices such as customer service to the city."
The Wharton/Fels program focused on building leadership strengths from an interdisciplinary approach, integrating leadership from Wharton's business perspective with legislative and policy insights from the Fels Institute. The program represents a launching pad for an ongoing collaborative relationship between Wharton and the city, according to Tom Colligan, vice dean of Executive Education.
Academic co-director and Wharton professor Michael Useem helped to design the leadership training program in support of the mayor's vision for improving education, expanding jobs, improving health, enhancing ethics, reducing crime, and strengthening services.
"In terms of bringing the mayor's vision into reality, the leadership of the mayor and his team will make all the difference," Useem explains. "And to that end, the Fels Institute and the Wharton School worked with the city to help his team sharpen and strengthen its leadership -- an essential ingredient for achieving the mayor's vision during the months ahead."
Academic co-director Don Kettl, director of the Fels Institute, says that the program represents a unique collaboration of Wharton's best faculty with cutting-edge ideas from Fels for improving government performance. "This signifies the very best of interdisciplinary partnerships, in service of one of the most important urban transformations under way in the country."
The mayor, who is a Wharton alumnus, visited on the second day of the leadership training program to address his team. "We've set the bar high, and people want us to be successful," Mayor Nutter told city leaders. "Providing customer service should drive all that we do. Ultimately, we are all accountable to the citizens of Philadelphia."
The mayor views the city as a 24-hour-a-day business. It is a $4 billion enterprise with a million and a half shareholders -- the people of Philadelphia -- who expect a return on their investment. Mayor Nutter has dedicated his efforts to reshaping the city's culture for both immediate and long-term benefit. "It's not about who gets credit," Mayor Nutter said of his plan for improving the city. "It's about where Philadelphia will be 20, 30, or 40 years from now."
The change in the city's culture is one that his managing director, Dr. Camille Barnett, expects to be one of the greatest organizational and city transformations ever. "This program gives our people the tools they need to execute our five-year plan to achieve the six results," she said. "Our two days at Wharton have given us a common experience and a common language."
The six areas of Mayor Nutter's plan for Philadelphia include the following immediate and long-term goals:
-- Transform Philadelphia into the safest large city in the country
and reduce the homicide rate by 25 percent in 2008.
-- Make Philadelphia one of the country's premier education cities,
reducing the high-school dropout rate by 50 percent in five to
seven years and doubling the number of Philadelphians with a
bachelor's degree in five to 10 years.
-- Increase jobs, raise incomes, and add 75,000 people to the
population in five to 10 years.
-- Foster vibrant neighborhoods, decrease litter, and increase
recycling.
-- Maintain the highest standards for ethics and increase the
number of citizens who trust in their government.
-- Become a national customer service leader, meeting
customer-service standards for all city services as measured by
citizen surveys.
The Wharton/Fels program covered subjects such as reengineering government, learning from successes and failures in city governance, and developing strategic leadership skills. The experience gave attendees a more in-depth understanding of how they could actively work toward implementing the mayor's ambitious goals.
"Michael Nutter's vision for Philadelphia requires city leaders to think very differently about the organization and its mission. This program gave them the focus and opportunity to think of themselves as inspirational leaders and change managers as they steer their teams through this transition period," says Sandhya Karpe, Wharton Executive Education senior director.
The program also gave executive team leaders who attended the time to reflect on their roles and process what they learned, according to Deputy Mayor Everett Gillison. "We don't get that kind of time on the job. The faculty understood the culture we're working in, and gave us tools we could put to use immediately."
Anuj Gupta, one of the mayor's team leaders who attended the program, says that the experience at Wharton represents a great step in what the mayor hopes will be an ongoing relationship with the university. "It is vital for the administration to work with civic institutions like the University of Pennsylvania to achieve results for the city."
Executive Education at the Wharton School
The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania -- founded in 1881 as the first collegiate business school -- is recognized globally for intellectual leadership and ongoing innovation across every major discipline of business education. The most comprehensive source of business knowledge in the world, Wharton bridges research and practice through its broad engagement with the global business community. Executive education at Wharton brings together over 10,000 executives each year from all corners of the globe in a partnership of learning. The best and the brightest business minds today tackle real-world issues in a highly collaborative environment.
Informed by in-depth, groundbreaking academic research and extensive industry experience, Wharton programs can span anywhere from a few days to a year or more. Each executive education program offers a supportive and challenging context where participants gain the skills necessary for their next level of executive development. Participants who come to Wharton from a diverse range of industries engage with faculty who are the most cited, most published faculty of all top-tier business schools. With a profound influence upon global business, Wharton faculty are the sought-after, trusted advisors of corporations and governments worldwide.
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