To monitor or intervene? City managers and the implementation of strategic initiatives
通过对16位美国地方政府城市经理和项目负责人的访谈，研究城市经理在战略举措实施中扮演的监控与干预双重角色，揭示其如何平衡执行团队与利益相关者的需求。
Strategic initiatives represent a government's response to constituent and organizational needs, but are only effective if properly implemented. In local governments with a council‐manager form of government, city managers face a unique dilemma as compounding challenges of implementation often require them to step into leadership roles typically reserved for elected officials. For this qualitative study, 16 city managers and project leaders from US local governments were interviewed regarding the implementation of nine varied strategic initiatives. The responses indicate that city managers play an important dual role in implementation—first, monitoring the progress of the implementation team and the satisfaction of the stakeholder coalition; and second, choosing to intervene directly in implementation decision‐making when they observe missteps by the implementers or discontent from the stakeholders. These conclusions contribute to the practice perspective of strategic management theory and a better understanding of the institutional leadership role of city managers.