Executive Highlight Interview: Mayor John Sullivan
Mayor Sullivan, thank you so much for taking the time out of your busy day to meet with me. Please, tell me a little bit about what a “typical day” is like for you as Mayor in this beautiful Southwest City of Cape Coral, Florida.
I come into the office but I complete a lot of the work from home as well because I get a lot of e-mails from residents regarding various concerns, suggestions, complaints, etc. In the event of a complaint, I’ll give them a call and have them provide that достопримечательности Кабардинки to me in a detailed e-mail so that I can pass it to the City Staff for follow-up.
What do you consider to be your very first, most pressing daily issue that requires your attention?
For 2013 one of the big pushes is to try to bring in more commercial development. In order to maintain or sustain a community, our revenue stream should be about 25-30% coming in from commercial entities. Right now, it’s between 8 and 9 percent here in Cape Coral. What that does is puts a greater tax burden on the residents, per-say. If we can build up more commercial business here and create a bigger revenue stream than we can make life, from an economic standpoint, a lot better for our residents.
Mayor John Sullivan of Cape Coral, Florida
How have you managed to remain successful, in light of all the changes in the housing market these days AND also ensure that your staff continues to provide efficiently in public service?
As you know, our revenue stream, for all intents and purposes, has really cut back. I don’t want to use the word obliterated, but its pretty close. So this has forced us to become more efficient. We have to deliver the necessary services and also bring down the costs of those services any way that we can; within reason, of course. You still have to keep your public safety in mind. We really had to consider how to bring down the cost of government for the people. There is still a lot of work to be done in order to become a success. The city or the government type related measures of success, from what I learned, is a moving target. It’s pretty hard to say we’ve won or we’ve lost or have been successful or unsuccessful. It’s more of an opinion. As long as the residents feel that they are getting the services that they need and that we are not being too drastic in as far as what we are charging for those services, this would probably indicate, to some extent, the definition of success.
As a prominent leader in the South Florida community and Mayor of Cape Coral, how do you manage the impact of changing circumstances on your staff and the residents of Cape Coral?
Simple answer is that you find different ways of doing things. In some cases, you may have to privatize certain units within the city. You have to look all the time for different ways to make a dollar, hopefully do the work for two. Sometimes, it’s painful and it is not easy. But, you have to think more like you’re a private business than you do like you’re a government. Obviously, you can’t run a government like you would a private business but I don’t necessarily believe that is true. There are a lot of pieces and parts to government that are actually businesses. For example, here we have our sewer and water department. That is run like a business. We have SunSplash Park, that’s a business. We have a golf course, that’s a business. So we can take some of the things from the private sector and reapply it to our government. We did that in some cases. For example, we have a road widening project that is happening here and it was going to cost the residents $54 million; it was always “assumed” that it was going to cost this. We had a city manager at the time who said that we were going to have to do it and we said “no, find another way.” Guess what! They found another way. We were able to put together a bunch of small grants and we wound up with a package where it may only cost us a million or two instead of $54 million. At another instance, we had bonds that were out. They were callable bonds that were out at a rather high percentage rate so we looked at it and analyzed it and decided that it was better to pay a charge up front to call these bonds in and then put them back out at a lower interest rate. I believe we saved about $96 million on that; which is money the tax payers do not have to pay.
So there are ways, many different ways to “skin a cat” so to speak, but you have to be a little bit inventive and you can’t be so rigid in your thinking- that it’s always easier just to raise taxes. That is the easier way out. You have to think at a different level. You have to try to figure out what the problem is and then break it down into the small and simple parts and pieces and figure out multiple solutions and then determine which solution is the more efficient solution. Mind you, you still want to get the job done. So you are not going to pick something that may become a bigger problem in the future. You want something that is going to be viable and last, and be more efficient.
What would you consider to be the most significant challenges many South Florida communities are facing and how are you leading Cape Coral to overcome these challenges?
I think one of the biggest challenges that we face of course, is the collapse of the construction industry. This was a big piece of our economy; there is no question about that. But, there are other ways to do things. One thing that we have to do is never become so dependent on one industry; and I’m not blaming the construction industry. That was an economic thing that happened and that will continue to happen from the standpoint of the Federal Government. Part of what has happened here is not local, it was Federal and that happened in a lot of other places too. If we are smart, however, we can turn this downturn into an advantage. Right now we are in a position to be able to offer real estate at very low prices; and these are very good parcels of land and very good homes that were built that we can now offer under the cost of production. It doesn’t get any better than that if you are a buyer. This can attract new people and new businesses into the Cape (Cape Coral). What you’d have to try to do is turn what conceivably is a disadvantage into an advantage. The way you do this of course, is with a little bit of positive thinking and you have to be open and be able to use some ingenuity.
The next section has to do with Human Capital, basically the “people” of the organization. What have you learned, through your many years of successful leadership that you could identify as the top two most important qualities in business and building relationships?
You have to be fluid to begin with. You can’t have tunnel vision or be set in your ways and stubborn. You have to be able to listen to people and what they have to say. You have to take that into consideration. I used to work with a fellow that had a saying that was burned into my brain. If I didn’t hear it at least once a day I’d hear it 4 times a day. “None of us is as smart as all of us.” So that’s one of the things that we have to do. We have to embrace other people’s ideas. I constantly ask residents for ideas. I want their input. This is their town, it’s not mine. I work for them. We have some people that are very talented that live here. A lot of these people are sitting around the house hoping for something to do and I’m only too happy to put them to work. We have a lot of resident volunteers in the Cape and these volunteers are very valuable; it’s not just that they save us money but they come up with a lot of ideas that enable things to run a lot smoother.
What have you discovered to be, essentially, a waste of productive time in regards to business and building relationships (i.e., what are your efforts that have not become productively fruitful)?
Well, I don’t want to answer that question directly, but to coin an old phrase, “one must pick their battles.” IF you want to be productive, you have to be able to figure out the ones that you can win and don’t bother with the rest of them because you are just going to spin your wheels. So what you have to do is try to pick the most important issues that you feel are more supportive to the residents and the business community; which are one and the same by the way. Try to get done what you can get done and what you know you can get done. You can’t reach for the impossible. If you look back in history and at Ronald Reagan, when he went into office he had about 3 or 4 major objectives and he made every one of those objectives and those were big objectives. He didn’t let the small stuff get in the way.
Regarding leadership, how would you describe yourself as a leader and what traits do you think are necessary for a leader to possess?
I think you have to be very willing to listen because “one” does not know all the answers. We don’t know what we don’t know. It’s the truth. You have to be open minded. I was a consultant for 17 years and I’ve worked in many different businesses. That kind of background is invaluable for the simple reason that the city is involved in a lot of different issues and businesses. For example, we talked about bond refunding. We wouldn’t have been able to consider that if we didn’t have someone with that experience in the bond market. I was into everything from fast food, to warehousing, fabricated steel, banking, brokerage, etc. It gives you the opportunity to look at systems; not only the good systems but also the bad systems. What you can’t learn from the good, you can learn from the bad in many cases. When you look at the bad ones you can say, “boy, I’m not going to make that mistake.” Here’s how we fix it. This is where the analytical part of thinking has to kick in. When you’re looking at something that is not working right, you have to roll up your sleeves and get down to work and get it fixed and working.
What has been your most challenging leadership decision in this past year as Mayor of Cape Coral?
Well, that’s hard to say. Probably the hardest thing I would say is to go against the flow and go against the majority vote on the city counsel. You do have your opinions and your opinions, of course, are formed by your experiences over a lifetime and to stand up and say “no” is not a bad thing. No one thinks alike. You can put two people in a room that are very philosophically tied together and they are still not going to agree on everything. You have to have the fortitude to step up and say “no” sometimes.
So in many cases, it is just easier to go with the flow and follow the path of least resistance, so to say?
Unfortunately, a lot of people do that. When you are in a leadership position you can’t afford to do that. That is a challenge that is ongoing. Which piece was the hardest? I don’t know, that is kind of hard to say. I would just say that the hardest part is to say “no.” I have a soft heart but a lot of people don’t see that and it’s hard for me to say no to begin with. If I know it’s wrong though, I’m going to stick to my guns and I’m going to say no.
Who has been your biggest influence, with regards to leadership, and why?
I worked for a gentleman many years ago that nobody could get along with. I was just a young kid at the time, maybe 23 or 24 years old. His name was Leo. I figured out how to work with him, how to get along with him. He taught me more in 3 ½ years than what I could have learned in 30 years on my own. The company, my boss, that I was working for told me that “when it gets to be too much, don’t quit, just tell me and I’ll pull you out of there.” They felt that this guy, Leo, was too hard or difficult to work with. I mean, Leo was probably old enough to be my grandfather at the time and he had over 50 years of experience in the business. I think he worked for them for about 50 years and the only reason why he had that many years is because he started working before they had child labor laws. I think he was probably the biggest influence on my life over anyone with the exception of my father.
How would you say you influence your senior leadership team and staff to be productive; to be able to perform at the level you desire?
A lot of times I’ll bring in somebody that I feel is an expert; and usually they are. This goes back to the volunteerism in the city. We have many experts and I lean on them because they know more than I do and I’m smart enough to know that they know more. If I feel that we’ve taken a bad path then I’ll bring one of these people in and have them sit down and talk to the city manager or other department head. We have several of these people in the city that are very influential with the city staff because they know what they’re talking about and know what they are doing. People are assets, they are tools. All of us have certain knowledge. None of us has all the knowledge.
Final thoughts: We’ve covered your general daily job routine as Mayor of Cape Coral, Human Capital regarding the people of the City’s Leadership, Leadership regarding yourself, and then Productivity regarding expectations. Do you have any final thoughts? What helpful tips could you offer to other leaders and emerging leaders in the South Florida community?
I cant stress enough and its very important if you’re in a political office, to listen to the residents/people. The residents as a whole are the city, the county, and the state. We need more of our politicians and organizations to listen to what they have to say. Many of these people are experts in their fields and if we don’t take their advice then we are being very foolish. We can tap into this reservoir of knowledge. It’s important to get out and talk to the people. Their issues are supposed to be our issues. We are here for them they are not here for us.
Mayor John Sullivan can be contacted via letter at:
P.O. Box 150027
Cape Coral, FL 33915 – 0027
via e-mail at:
jsullivan@capecoral.net
Office:
239-574-0436