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B&G REPORT.
The B&G Report features newsy items relating to a wide variety of state and local government management topics, including state and local performance audit, state and local performance management, government budgeting, state and local human resource issues, and a variety of other public sector issues.
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WHEN CORRUPTION HITS SMALL CITIES
Walter Winchell, one of America’s most popular syndicated gossip columnists and radio commentators from the 1920s through the early 1960s...
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4 min read
WHY DO PEOPLE LAUGH WHEN WE TELL THEM WHAT WE DO?
When we attend social gatherings like weddings and are seated with people who don’t know us, one of the obligatory first questions...
greenebarrett
3 min read
POTHOLES ON THE AI ROAD
We’re not scared of AI. It doesn’t take much historical memory to know that pretty much any new technology brings out fear and...
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3 min read
NINE TIPS FOR IMPROVING MEETINGS
Over more than 30 years of covering state and local government, we can’t recall ever talking to a public sector manager who loved going...
greenebarrett
3 min read
THE GRAVEYARD OF GOOD IDEAS
A couple of weeks ago, we wrote a B&G report titled “Is Speedy Government Good Government?” in which we made the case that the pressure...
greenebarrett
3 min read
THE TWELVE BIG LIES ABOUT STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT
There are all kinds of variations on the theme of the three big lies that people tell in the normal course of day-to-day life. One of our...
greenebarrett
2 min read
IS SPEEDY GOVERNMENT GOOD GOVERNMENT?
Not to be overly blunt, but we’ve grown sick and tired of hearing people complaining about how long it takes state and local governments...
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2 min read
REBRANDING LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Over the years, we’ve chatted with high school and college students about the potential of careers working for state and local...
greenebarrett
2 min read
THE ACADEMIC-GOVERNMENT COMMUNICATIONS GAP
We spend a lot of time talking with government practitioners and a lot of time talking with academic researchers. We’ve often wondered...
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4 min read
OUR RESPONSE TO RESPONSE TIMES
When it comes to many vital public services, including police, fire and EMS, one of the primary – and sometimes the only – performance...
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3 min read
WHEN IT COMES TO DATA, CONTEXT IS KING
Back in 2020, then President Donald Trump proclaimed that “The murder rate in Baltimore and Detroit is higher than El Salvador, Guatemala...
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4 min read
FAILURE AS A KEY TO SUCCESS
We’ve just been catching up on one of our favorite podcasts, Freakonomics Radio, and came across a wonderful conversation with Samuel...
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3 min read
TASK FORCES: THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY
A few weeks ago, we wrote an item for this website about the executive orders that were pouring out of the offices of the nine most...
greenebarrett
3 min read
Government Management: Why don’t people care?
We are puzzled and frustrated with the ignorance of many people about the importance of state and local government management. They tend...
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2 min read
Budget Lessons from the States for the Feds:How to Radically Change Expectations about the Federal
by Dr. Carolyn Bourdeaux, Senior Visiting Scholar, University of Georgia; Board Member of the Concord Coalition; Former Member of...
greenebarrett
4 min read
Hide and Seek: A Researcher’s Quest for Contact Information
Leaders in state and local governments persistently claim that they want to be more transparent, and we believe that this is a sincere...
greenebarrett
2 min read
Bridging the Academic/Practitioner Gap: Public Finance Journal
by Craig S Maher, Director School of Public Administration, University of Nebraska, Omaha and co-editor of the Public Finance Journal...
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3 min read
A Road to Trust in Government
by Dawa Hitch, Communication and Public Engagement Director, Asheville, North Carolina. In historically disenfranchised communities,...
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3 min read
When the Vision Meets the Real World
We’ve just been reading a splendid book by Erik Larson, titled “The Splendid and the Vile,” that tells the tale of Winston Churchill in...
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3 min read
Negative Audits Can Be Good News
Several years ago – right before the start of the pandemic -- our book, The Promises and Pitfalls of Performance-Informed Management was...
greenebarrett
2 min read
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