Creating urgency key to change

As Gov. Gina M. Raimondo prepares to unveil her first state budget March 12 she’s using some time-tested leadership tactics to up the stakes, sway public opinion and — arguably more important — communicate indirectly with the General Assembly.

At a Feb. 18 cabinet meeting, Raimondo stood before staff, elected officials and reporters to list some bleak statistics associated with Rhode Island’s economy. They included nationally ranking second highest in Medicaid spending per enrollee, fourth highest in lost manufacturing jobs and third highest in public-employee compensation.

As a first-year governor, Raimondo can openly criticize the state’s current economic condition without sharing much of the blame. So she’s taking advantage of the window of opportunity – often referred to in political circles as the “honeymoon period” – to try to establish a public sense of urgency on the economy.

If her message resonates, it could lend itself to her more effectively pushing her budget priorities.

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But trying to effect change rarely comes without pushback. Late last month in Washington, D.C., Raimondo criticized General Assembly leaders and the role she says lobbyists have in shaping the budget each year. That evoked predictable public indignation from House Speaker Nicholas A. Mattiello, a fellow Democrat.

But Raimondo’s message of change on the budget is not just for legislative leaders but rank-and-file members as well.

“Establishing a sense of urgency is crucial to gaining needed cooperation,” John P. Kotter wrote in “Leading Change.” “With complacency high, transformations usually go nowhere because few people are even interested in working on the change problem.”

Kotter is a retired professor of leadership at Harvard Business School and “establishing a sense of urgency” is step one in his eight-step process of leading change.

“We have a lot of work to do and we have to get going now,” Raimondo said pointedly at that Feb. 18 meeting. “We have to commit ourselves to thinking long-term, thinking differently and being urgent.”

No. 2 in Kotter’s eight-step process is “creating a guiding coalition.”

Last week, Raimondo signed an executive order establishing a group of 28 health care professionals to restructure Medicaid, which she says makes up one-third of the overall budget.

Raimondo is no stranger to the fickle nature of change management. Before serving a four-year term as general treasurer, she came from the private sector, having worked with venture-capital firms in New York and Rhode Island. At that cabinet meeting she highlighted the state’s $190.4 million deficit for fiscal 2016, which she said could grow to nearly half a billion dollars in four years. How effectively she’s able to use those intimidating statistics will go a long way toward determining whether she will claim a leadership role on the budget, which historically has been controlled by legislative leaders.

Gary S. Sasse, director of the Bryant University Institute for Public Leadership, says Raimondo has done well identifying the issues with Rhode Island’s economy, but notes – like in health care – diagnosing the problem is easier than treating it.

“Leadership is both about communicating and doing, so I think she’s done a good job in connecting the dots and communicating the problems, but her communication is only as good as her execution and that remains to be seen,” Sasse said. •

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