True Green: Executive Effectiveness in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

In the 42 years since the Environmental Protection Agency was created, its executives have found their job an endless challenge. Pressured from many directions, EPA units have had to learn to collaborate with state and local governments, businesses large and small, environmental interest groups, and other parts of the federal establishment. That they navigated that challenge with considerable success is evident in eight contributions from former senior executives reflecting on their experience. Editors Emison (Mississippi State Univ.), an EPA veteran, and Morris (public policy, Old Dominion Univ.) draw a clear set of lessons in a concluding chapter on how to lead in a complex political and administrative web that demands at the same time commitment, innovation, and pragmatism. Executive leadership in many areas of government requires specific skills such as planning, resource management, and political negotiation, combined with an inner sense of when and how to apply them. Lacking any well-marked path to follow, the executives portrayed here had to learn by doing and in hindsight accomplished much of what they set out to do. These are valuable insights for students and practitioners in public administration and environmental management. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduate, graduate, research, and professional collections.

In this well-conceived volume, Jerry Emison and John Morris gather together scholars and practitioners to explore the challenges of executive leadership of the nation’s premier environmental institution. Their studies reveal lessons from environmental leadership that are broadly applicable to public and private firms confronting complex problems: success requires a willingness to experiment, while embracing consistently-applied simple core principles, including a dedication to the ideals that shape the organization’s mission. This book needs to rest on the desk of every senior executive in the public service.