People Skills for Policy Analysts

Michael Mintrom

• Publisher: Georgetown University Press
• Year: 2003
• ISBN:
  9781589013858
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Public Policy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Policymaking is of its very nature a people-centered business-a good reason why highly effective policy analysts display not only superb technical expertise but excellent people skills as well. Those "people skills" include the ability to manage professional relationships, to learn from others about policy issues, to give presentations, to work in teams, to resolve conflict, to write for multiple audiences, and to engage in professional networking. Training programs for policy analysts often focus on technical skills. By working to enhance their people skills, policy analysts can increase their ability to produce technical work that changes minds. Fortunately, this unique book fills the gaps in such programs by covering the "people side" of policy analysis.

Beyond explaining why people skills matter, this book provides practical, easy-to-follow advice on how policy analysts can develop and use their people skills. Each chapter provides a Skill Building Checklist, discussion ideas, and suggestions for further reading. People Skills is essential reading for anyone engaged in public policymaking and public affairs as well as all policy analysts. Completely changing how we think about what it means to be an effective policy analyst, People Skills for Policy Analysts provides straightforward advice for students of policy analysis and public management as well as practitioners just starting their professional lives.

1
Policy Analysts and People Skills

People become policy analysts because they care deeply about society. They want to help improve how we live our lives. This book is designed to aid those training to be policy analysts, and junior practitioners, to become more effective at what they do. The focus of the book is people skills. People skills are habits we cultivate that allow us to make good use of our time, to work well with others, and to communicate our ideas so that they are influential. I hope to make policy analysts more self-conscious of their behavior and to encourage the widespread improvement of their people skills. Beyond the other direct and spillover benefits to be gained from well-developed people skills, becoming an effective people person can add immeasurably to the sense of fulfillment and the pleasure that policy analysts attain from their work.

Over the past few decades, the training of policy analysts has grown increasingly standardized and sophisticated. University programs in public policy, policy analysis, and public management routinely offer courses designed to ensure that their graduates are familiar with the microeconomic foundations of policy analysis and that they know how to utilize qualitative and quantitative research methods. In addition, students in such programs typically take courses drawing on insights from a range of academic disciplines that are designed to build their knowledge of, among other things, organization theory, the politics of policymaking, public finance, and program evaluation. Undoubtedly, these advances in how policy analysts are trained have raised the quality of the analytical work and advice that inform public policy decisions. Despite these positive developments, however, practicing policy analysts and policy scholars continue to lament the frequency with which policymakers in a wide variety of public contexts appear to pay little attention to the work of policy analysts when it is laid before them (Beam 1996; Mooney 1991; Shulock 1999; Weiss 1977). Can we do better?

Highly effective policy analysts display both superb technical expertise and excellent people skills. The premise of this book is that, although considerable strides have been made in the technical training that policy analysts receive, the task of guiding policy analysts in the development of their people skills has been all but ignored. This neglect works to the detriment of the policy analysts themselves and to that of policymaking more generally. Perhaps such neglect is inevitable. As a society we often discount the importance of people skills to the quality of our lives. We frequently assume that some people are just naturally gifted at getting along with others, managing their time, making presentations, working in teams, or networking. Sometimes, it is said that such skills need not be taught in university programs because smart people will pick them up on the job. Such discounting of people skills, and what it takes to develop them, serves to arbitrarily demarcate what sort of knowledge is most valuable for policy analysts.

Policy scholars and practitioners have long worked to develop technical approaches and procedures that can usefully inform the ways that policy analysts assess the feasibility and merits of alternative approaches to addressing policy problems. Likewise, many people have contributed ideas and suggestions for how we might improve our abilities to communicate and collaborate with others. Nevertheless, though many technical approaches and insights have been codified and integrated into the training of policy analysts, no such effort has been made to do the same with the disparate contributions that could inform how policy analysts interact with people around them.

Policy analysts are not born; they are made. Because we believe this, a great deal of thought has gone into the structuring of university programs on public policy, policy analysis, and public management so that technical skills are well taught. Yet, if we believe that good policy analysts are made, we should also pay closer attention to the relevance of people skills and think seriously about how to impart them. As to whether excellence in the use of technical skills requires more analytical sophistication than does excellence in the use of people skills, I have yet to make up my mind. For those who claim that technical skills are obviously the “hard stuff,” I ask, “How so?”

This book has much to offer individuals seeking to increase their effectiveness as policy analysts. Just as many textbooks lay out how to analyze policy issues appropriately, here I provide guidance on how policy analysts might present themselves and their work so as to improve the likelihood that they will produce quality advice and receive a good hearing from others in the policymaking community. By placing the spotlight on people skills for policy analysts, I also hope this book will contribute to a rethinking of what we mean when we say someone is an excellent analyst and of how policy analysts are trained.

To develop the advice presented in the following chapters, I have drawn on ideas, insights, and suggestions offered by scholars and practitioners from a wide range of disciplines and social contexts. As the suggestions for further reading contained at the end of each chapter attest, many authors have already made important contributions to our understanding of the various people skills that I cover here. Until now, however, no one has synthesized these scattered ideas and insights and demonstrated their potential value to policy analysts. In this work, I identify a set of people skills that are highly relevant for policy analysts, explain why these people skills matter, and give advice on how policy analysts might work to develop these skills. In so doing, I hope to lower the barriers that have previously kept many policy analysts from building people skills that complement their technical expertise.

POLICY ANALYSTS AND THE POLICYMAKING PROCESS

There are no hard and fast definitions of what it means to be a policy analyst. Over time, our understandings of the roles played by policy analysts have tended to change (Radin 2000). Also, because policy analysts perform roles that share similarities with those of other actors in and around the policymaking process, it is often the case that individuals holding a broad range of positions can legitimately claim to be policy analysts (Weimer and Vining 1999).

I think of policy analysts mainly as people who, using their expert knowledge and skills, produce high-quality information and advice for elected and appointed government officials, with the purpose of increasing the capacity of those officials to make sound decisions on the public’s behalf. In this definition, many policy analysts will be government employees, but they need not be. Policy analysts can also be employees of political parties, interest groups, think tanks, and foundations. In addition, many people who are employed by consulting firms, universities, or are self-employed often serve as policy analysts, producing policy reports and advice, on a contract basis, to government officials and their staffs. Increasingly, we find people trained as policy analysts also being employed by private corporations. Such individuals tend to serve as interpreters of government policy, analyzing new and current policies with the purpose of determining their implications for the business strategies of their employers. All of these individuals have one thing in common: they produce policy analysis and advice with specific clients in mind. This client orientation has often been noted as a core attribute of the policy analyst’s role (Behn 1985; Weimer and Vining 1999). We might also think of many scholars and journalists as policy analysts, because they often produce careful studies of public policies and their implications for various groups in society. Of course, the policy analyses of those who work at arm’s length from government and the day-to-day world of policymaking cannot be thought of as having the kind of short-term impacts on policy-making as analysts employed by governments. Nevertheless, there is evidence that work by those standing at the periphery of the policymaking process can, in the long-term, influence the making of public policy, often profoundly (Derthick and Quirk 1985; Kingdon 1995; Mead 1985; Nelson 1984; Weiss 1977).

When thinking about the role of policy analysts in the policymaking process, it is important to differentiate between policy advice and policy advocacy. I associate advice with the role of the policy analyst. In contrast, I associate advocacy with the role of the politician, interest-group lobbyist, or policy entrepreneur (Mintrom 2000). What makes for the difference here? Most importantly, I see the difference as having to do with who gets to set the agenda for policymaking. Agenda setting, the determination of what issues will receive the attention of policymakers, involves high levels of advocacy, what we might call politicking. Politicking inside and outside of government helps to shape the broad public agenda at any given time. Politicking inside of government, among politicians and their political advisors, shapes the actual government agenda (Cobb and Elder 1983; Eyestone 1978; Kingdon 1995). Policy analysts are not employed to engage in politicking. The advisory work of policy analysts should be based on analysis and expertise; advocacy of specific policy positions should be downplayed.

Although some basic theoretical and practical distinctions can be drawn between advice giving and advocacy, there remains a gray area where the practicalities of drawing those distinctions make it difficult, if not impossible, to do. For example, policy advocacy will often take the form of advice giving. Furthermore, policy analysts who have toiled long and hard to develop their advice for their clients might find it irresistibly tempting to use their advisory role as a platform from which to advocate the adoption of specific policy alternatives. For my part, I like to conceive of policy analysts as highly creative individuals who use both their technical and people skills to help government officials redefine policy problems, who explore new ways to undertake their investigative and analytical work, and who develop new realizations of the policy alternatives that are available.

Wildavsky’s (1979) notion that policy analysts are people who “speak truth to power” continues to hold appeal. Yet, as Radin (2000, 51) has observed, the one-to-one relationship between the policy analyst and the policymaker implied by Wildavsky’s phrase is rarely found in the policymaking process. The policy analysis profession has become highly variegated. In Radin’s words, “We are a field with multiple languages, values, and forms and with multiple individuals and groups as clients for the analyst.” In such an environment, what constitutes “truth” is open to serious debate, and the view that power flows inexorably from a fixed center is also cast into doubt. In light of the complexity of interactions that define the policymaking process, how might policy analysts act so as to increase the odds that public decisions are informed by sound, appropriate evidence and advice?

A provocative way to think about the motivations and actions of policy analysts in the policymaking process is to consider how they might differ from those of the intellectual in society, as described by Said (1996, 23):

The intellectual … is neither a pacifier nor a consensus-builder, but someone whose whole being is staked on a critical sense, a sense of being unwilling to accept easy formulas, or ready-made clichés, or the smooth, ever-so-accommodating confirmations of what the powerful or conventional have to say, and what they do. Not just passively unwillingly, but actively willing to say so in public. This is not always a matter of being a critic of government policy, but rather of thinking of the intellectual vocation as maintaining a state of constant alertness, of a perpetual willingness not to let half-truths or received ideas steer one along.

In light of my definition of the policy analyst, where might we want to draw the line between what is reasonable and appropriate behavior for such an individual and what is reasonable and appropriate behavior for an intellectual? First, unlike intellectuals, who are ultimately accountable to themselves for what they do and for what they say in public, policy analysts are accountable to those who employ them. Often the employers will be government officials. Thus, if a study of relevant facts leads a policy analyst to believe that he or she should be critical of government policy, that criticism should initially be voiced privately to the client. If the client considers the criticism to be valid and appropriate for sharing with a broader audience, it is the client’s role to determine how the voicing of that criticism should be done.

Said suggests that the public intellectual should shun the roles of pacifier or consensus-builder in the interests of maintaining a critical distance from the behavior of others. This points to a second difference between how intellectuals and policy analysts might go about what they do. Policy analysts will no doubt also consider it appropriate at times to present evidence and make arguments that could create conflict. But having differences of opinion with others, even when those differences are sharp, is no reason to abandon efforts to be diplomatic in our interactions. Thus, I would suggest that policy analysts should think carefully about ways to maintain the peace and to work toward consensus with others in the policymaking process. This is where having excellent people skills is crucial. Policy analysts should seek to advise and persuade on the basis of the quality of their analytical work and the clarity of their thoughts concerning particular policy issues and the best ways to tackle them. When people are regarded by others as highly argumentative or as “hotheads,” they are likely to gain fewer opportunities to engage in policy discussions than would otherwise be the case.

A third difference also exists between the intellectual, as defined by Said, and the policy analyst. The task of the intellectual is accomplished through public commentary and criticism. Such individuals face no obligation to support public efforts to bring new programs or projects to fruition. In contrast, policy analysts are expected to furnish analysis and advice that will contribute to the broader public good, understood by their clients. Argument and critique assuredly can add positively to policy discussions and debates, but where the task of the intellectual might approximate that of the house critic, policy analysts must search for ways to ensure that policy alternatives viewed favorably by decision makers are indeed able to be implemented. Useful policy analysis suggests ways to get beyond endless discussion and debate.

In light of what has been written here, policy analysts would do well to distinguish themselves from intellectuals with respect to the making of public pronouncements about government policy and how they raise their points of disagreement with opponents. There remains, however, merit in policy analysts seeing themselves as kindred spirits with intellectuals. Policy analysts should exhibit strong critical-thinking skills and be constantly alert to the ways half-truths and received ideas enter into the policy discourse. Raising difficult questions should be thought of as part of the job. It is part of being a valuable, faithful advisor. But searching for feasible solutions to pressing policy problems is another key aspect of the job, and none of this is easy. With respect to the role of the intellectual, Said suggested that it requires “a steady realism, an almost athletic rational energy” (1996, 23). If that is so for those whose raison d’être is question, critique, and confrontation, surely the role of the policy analyst calls for even greater intelligence and energy. That might be asking too much of some policy analysts. Yet, to be working with others on difficult policy questions, to be steeped in the literature, empirical evidence, and folklore surrounding specific policy issues, and to be pressing on to make a positive difference for society can be enormously exciting. At their best, policy analysts represent a force for clarity in the dense, murky policymaking process.

PEOPLE SKILLS AND TECHNICAL SKILLS

My effort to highlight people skills should not be viewed as an affront to the importance of technical competency among policy analysts. Excellent policy analysts need both kinds of skills. I highlight people skills here because they have mostly been ignored by authors of policy analysis textbooks, where the central purpose has been imparting technical skills. A shift of balance is in order. This does not mean there should be a retreat from teaching technical skills, but only that people skills should also be given the emphasis they deserve.

Shifting the balance in what we emphasize as important for the training of policy analysts would undoubtedly lead to a change in ho...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Preface
• 1 Policy Analysts and People Skills
• 2 Managing Your Resources
• 3 Building Expert Knowledge
• 4 Interviewing Informants
• 5 Giving Presentations
• 6 Working in Teams
• 7 Facilitating Meetings
• 8 Writing for Multiple Audiences
• 9 Conflict Management
• 10 Professional Networking
• 11 Pursuing Excellence
• Appendix
• Bibliography
• Index