Purpose
The purpose of the Senior Advisor program is to make the counsel, experience and support of respected, retired managers of the profession available to individual members. The program is designed primarily to help with personal and professional issues. While a Senior Advisor may occasionally provide some minimal technical advice to members, the program is not intended to address substantive problems in local government.
Program
Senior Advisors are retired managers/administrators with extensive experience who volunteer their time to provide a unique source of outside counsel to their colleagues.
ICMA Senior Advisors for KACM are available to meet periodically with members of the association to discuss the profession and concerns of managers/administrators. Discussion topics range from problems with mayors and councils, overall management questions, relations with KACM or ICMA, responses to local controversies such as referenda on the council-manager plan, to career development counseling.
All discussions are confidential. Senior Advisors are friends, colleagues, and counselors to the profession—not consultants. The Senior Advisor program is designed to help with personal and professional issues, not to provide technical assistance or solve substantive problems in a local government. Senior Advisors also help communities interested in adopting or retaining council manager government. However, Senior Advisors may consult with local governments as individuals on a part-time basis as long as the consulting does not impair the effectiveness of the Senior Advisor. ICMA Senior Advisor guidelines contain advice for Senior Advisors who do part-time consulting.
ICMA Senior Advisors for KACM are not compensated. Only expenses are reimbursed. Those expenses include such things as the following: reimbursement for hotel/motel, telephone expenses, mileage, luncheon fees, meeting registrations, postage, and other reasonable expenses not to exceed the amount budgeted per Senior Advisor in the KACM and ICMA budgets. Senior Advisors determine their own schedule since their time is donated for the betterment of the profession.
