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• We Don't Make Widgets
• Overcoming the Myths That Keep Government from Radically Improving
• Written for middle- and senior-level managers in state, city and county government, We Don’t Make Widgets: Overcoming the Myths That Keep Government from Radically Improving explodes the myths that prevent dramatic improvement in government operations. If you’re interested in a new way of thinking about what you do, who you do it for and why you do it, this book — part of the Governing Management Series — is for you. Read it and manage with the best!

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• Measuring Up 2.0
• Governing’s New, Improved Guide to Performance Measurement for Geniuses (and Other Public Managers
• Now available: a new, updated edition of the book that started it all — in government, anyway. Nearly a decade ago, the first edition of Measuring Up took an irreverent, entertaining approach to introducing public managers to a management tool with staying power: performance measurement. The new edition provides the same clear introduction to linking resources and results, while showing how managers, executives and policymakers at every level of government are putting the techniques to use to improve services across the board.

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• Good Press, Bad Press, De-Pressed
• Governing's Media Survival Guide for Public Officials
• The latest book in the Governing Management Series is a roadmap for public officials who want to do a better job of dealing with the media in all its forms, from getting the word out when good things happen to avoiding becoming media roadkill when something bad happens. Author Jonathan Walters is in a unique position to help public officials understand how the press works and how to cope with it: In addition to being a veteran journalist, he is also a public official. And he brings the same irreverent approach to De-Pressed that made his Measuring Up books best-sellers.

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• Governing States & Localities
• The fifty states and the many cities and localities are about as diverse as can be—but why do they differ? And how do political scientists account for those differences? In a unique collaboration, political scientist Kevin Smith has teamed up with Governing magazine journalists Alan Greenblatt and Michele Mariani to provide the answers.

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• The Price of Government
• Getting the Results We Need in an Age of Permanent Fiscal Crisis
• The authors show policy makers and financial managers how to get a grip on the problem by determining the price of government (what percent of personal income citizens are willing to pay in taxes, fees, and charges), agreeing on the outcomes most important to citizens and setting the price to deliver each one. Osborne and Hutchinson provide targeted tools and strategies for leaders who want to master the politics of reinvention, with cogent examples of Budgeting for Outcomes and smart government in action.

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• Governing by Network
• The New Shape of the Public Sector
• Governing by Network examines, for the first time, government's transformation from centralized control over public programs to facilitating services through networks of nongovernmental entities, as seen through the experience of dozens of public innovators. In this model, the role of government is transformed from direct service provider to generator of public value.

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• Playing with Fire
• When the voters award themselves a tax cut, Trillium must find a way to make do with less. A proposal to reorganize the fire department — to make it more efficient and less costly — quickly escalates beyond a dry policy debate. It divides the community, pitting council members against each other, the firefighters against the city, and business against business.