Book Review: Greedy Bastards by Sheryl Sculley
I started the Bettering Communities Book Club in 2024 with the goal of creating stronger, intentional community with folks who love reading and learning. Our 2024 cohort consists of a dozen public leaders from around the U.S. We reviewed our first book of the year this month, Greedy Bastards: One City’s Texas-Sized Struggle to Avoid a Financial Crisis by Sheryl Sculley.
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Reactions to the Book:
In short, more than half of us enjoyed the book as it was a digestible length and reflected on a really challenging dilemma for a public sector leader. The book came in at just over 200 pages and was published in 2020. For most of us, it only took a few days to get through.
A word cloud of our reactions is included below.
We noted (as if often the case with memoirs) they do tend to be centered on the one individual / author as they are autobiographical in nature with lots of “I” and “me” statements. Another theme we noticed was an exhausting amount of name dropping. This may be (assuming best intentions here) that this is in an effort to not leave anyone out who was a part of crafting solutions.
Exercising Level-Headed Judgment in the Midst of Incivility
Our first discussion theme for this book was an examination of how level-headed and thick-skinned City Manager Sheryl Sculley was in the midst of some truly dirty politics and low, personal blows. Some thoughts from our group on how Sheryl managed these interactions over multiple years:
You have to maintain your own sanity and set boundaries around what goes too far as a public manager. Sometimes this means walking away, moving to a new role, or taking a step backwards professionally to put yourself in a better space for your mental health.
If misinformation is spread about you as a public official, you do need to correct the record, but also avoid throwing punches in the public eye.
We wondered if it is somehow easier to take criticism and personal attacks like this when you are at the END of your career versus at the beginning. If this is your final job before retirement, you have “less to lose”, so to speak as far as your professional credibility.
We also noted that unfortunately, kids and family members of public officials don’t seem to be “off limits” these days. Incivility and social media have only been exacerbated since this books publication. We wondered if Sheryl would have tolerated this treatment for quite as long if she had younger children living at home wtih her. We also wondered what her spouse did professionally, as this level of public scrutiny would have likely extended to him, as well.
San Antonio’s Successful Public Engagement in Bond Projects
We shared an appreciation for the City of San Antonio’s bond projects, where representative committees help to prioritize major projects for the City. This not only generates community ambassadors, but also educates community members in the difficult decision making and trade offs of prioritizing one need or project over another.
Some of our thoughts as a group included:
How challenging it can be to reach audiences in a day and age of social media, diverse news consumption sources, and distrust / apathy.
How community engagement is so important, but it can be left to the back burner (unintentionally) as a “nice to have” when we’re overwhelmed by day to day work.
How critical it is to invite vocal naysayers into the process, but to also control the room or dialogues to avoid them devolving into non-productive or constructive feedback.
Paying Municipal Employees a Living Wage vs. Competing with the Private Sector
Sheryl Sculley touted the fact that the City of San Antonio raised the minimum wage for the lowest paid city employees to $15/hour at the beginning of her tenure. We reflected on how challenging the labor market has been for municipal governments since the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. Some of our thoughts on this subject included:
We simply can’t fiscally compete with the private sector when it comes to base wages. It’s a never ending race and eventually taxpayers will say “enough!”
We have to focus on non-monetary benefits that enhance workplace culture as the key to attracting public servants. This could look like flexible leave policies, unique workplace benefits, or leveraging unique student loan repayment benefits.
We discussed the fact that the private sector is leveraging technology to rely on fewer employees, such as kiosks and AI tools. There were mixed sentiments on this - while we welcome efficiencies and new technology into government, there were some thoughts that remains deeply important that government services contain a human component of service.
Final thoughts and takeaways
We praised Sheryl for her forethought in succession planning - how many of her team members applied for the City Manager role when she retired, and how thoughtful she was about building a team of successors around her.
We reflected on how uneven the negotiating powers are for represented vs. non-represented employees, especially in states that passed broad anti-union legislation such as Wisconsin in 2011 with Act 10.
We expressed concern for the longlasting impact that the referendum noted in Greedy Bastards, which would limit City Manager’s earning potential and implement tenure term limits for the role. This is currently up for discussion now in San Antonio.
We also ended on the note that employees really need to do their homework to understand everything that could go wrong if you intend to take on an issue of this nature that could turn highly contentious in a moment.
