03/27/2001

INTRODUCTION
In January 1999 we reorganized MTAS based on the results of our change management process. Now, we are going to make several additional changes in our organizational structure. I’ve included a copy of the new chart at the bottom of this email. Some of the lines are crooked and some are straight -- that’s not an editorial comment; it’s a limitation of the software. First, here’s a summary of the major changes and the advantages of the new alignment.

MAJOR CHANGES

I will no longer hold the dual role of executive director and manager of research and information (with the attorneys, codes, technology, training, and the library reporting directly to me).

Lisa is promoted to the new position of information and technology manager with responsibility for technology, publications, and the library.

Carole is assuming substantially full time responsibility for our publications and will report to Lisa. As a result, her job focus will change from field consulting to the management of our publications process.

The legal consultants will report to Mike.

Sally will report to Sharon.

We will reconstitute our management team to include Sharon, Lisa, Mike, and me.

ADVANTAGES

By reducing the number of people who report directly to me, I will be able to spend more time with those who do report to me and everyone else will have direct contact with a manager who will have more time to spend with them. It also will give me time to devote to relationships that MTAS needs to have outside our organization.

Placing the information and technology team under Lisa allows us to include responsibilities for our web site, publications, internal databases, and the technology that drives them in one team. During the APR process we assigned responsibility for a great many publications. This structure will better enable us to handle that workload, and more importantly, encourages the overlap that is necessary between the information we make available on our web site and in our publications.

Under our new process for handling calls to our attorneys, many of the calls they receive are from the management consultants so having them in the same work team makes sense.

Sally has done a terrific job working for Mike, Sharon, and me but we think that she deserves to have only one person to report to.

The management team will continue to meet monthly. I will have more time to make sure we communicate the results of our meetings either in the meetings database or as part of my monthly staff updates.

SUMMARY
One way of looking at this new chart is that it is a minor change. We are simply filling a position (manager of information and technology) that was part of our 1999 redesign but left unfilled at the time. While that is true, the major change is a renewed recognition of the importance of our publications and the potential to reinforce their impact with our web site and other electronic means. We can improve the help we provide to cities if we make more good information more easily available.

As always, if you have any questions, please let me know. Thanks.