A city manager is chosen by the elected city council through a structured hiring process: the council agrees on a profile of the ideal candidate, recruits applicants (often with help from an executive search firm), interviews finalists with community input, and appoints the chosen candidate by a formal public vote followed by a negotiated employment contract. The whole sequence typically runs about four months. If you have been wondering how a city manager is chosen, the short version is that it looks a lot like a corporate board hiring a CEO, and roughly 59 percent of U.S. cities use this council-manager model.1Ballotpedia. Council-Manager Government
Who Actually Makes the Hire
In a council-manager government, the elected council is the legislative body and appoints a professional administrator to run day-to-day operations. The manager drafts the budget, appoints department heads, implements council policies, and oversees city staff; the council passes ordinances, approves the budget, and sets policy direction.1Ballotpedia. Council-Manager Government
This is different from a mayor-council city, where the mayor holds executive authority and often hires department heads directly. If you live in a mayor-council city, none of what follows applies in the same way, because there is no council-appointed manager to hire. The council-manager form is most common in cities with populations between 10,000 and 500,000.1Ballotpedia. Council-Manager Government
Step 1: Defining the Job and the Ideal Candidate
Before anything gets posted, the council has to agree on what it wants. ICMA’s recruitment guidelines call the administrator profile “the most significant decision point” in the entire process, covering the qualities, experience, and expertise the council considers ideal.2ICMA. Recruitment Guidelines for Selecting a Local Government Administrator A city facing a budget crisis writes a different profile than a growing suburb focused on land use and infrastructure.
Baseline qualifications tend to look similar across cities. Most managers hold at least a bachelor’s degree in public administration, political science, or business, and a master’s degree is increasingly expected. ICMA data shows 59 percent of managers and administrators hold a master’s such as an MPA or MBA, and some estimates put that figure as high as 71 percent among ICMA members.3ICMA. What It Takes to Be a Professional Local Government Manager Councils also want demonstrated municipal leadership, comfort with public communication, and financial literacy sufficient to manage a multi-million-dollar budget.
Some candidates carry the voluntary ICMA Credentialed Manager designation. To qualify, applicants must be full ICMA members with full-time appointed experience, hold a degree from a regionally accredited university, and pass a management assessment. Credentialed managers commit to at least 40 hours of professional development a year and submit annual reports on their learning.4ICMA. ICMA Voluntary Credentialing Program Not every city requires it, but it carries weight with councils that want evidence of ongoing professional growth.
Step 2: Running the Search
ICMA outlines three ways to run the recruitment: entirely in-house, through an executive search firm, or as a hybrid where staff handles some tasks and a firm handles others.2ICMA. Recruitment Guidelines for Selecting a Local Government Administrator In-house saves money but demands significant council and staff time. A search firm brings expertise and a wider candidate pool, at a fee that typically runs into tens of thousands of dollars. The hybrid splits the workload and requires a written agreement spelling out who does what.
Postings run through professional channels rather than general-circulation newspapers. ICMA’s Job Center is the primary destination for local government recruitment, reaching the right audience through promoted search results and email distribution.5ICMA. ICMA – International City/County Management Association An ideal recruitment timeline allows at least 60 days from the start of the search to the application deadline, 30 days for interviews and selection, and another 30 days for the new manager to relocate if needed.2ICMA. Recruitment Guidelines for Selecting a Local Government Administrator
Internal Candidates
Some councils promote from within, picking an assistant city manager or department head who already knows the organization. Internal hires bring institutional knowledge and can start faster, but councils sometimes worry about fresh perspective. A common compromise is to run internal candidates through the same competitive process as outside applicants.
Confidentiality
How confidential to keep the search is an early decision that gets underestimated. Many sitting city managers will not apply if their current council might find out. ICMA notes that assuring confidentiality produces a larger and stronger applicant pool, particularly from candidates who are currently employed.2ICMA. Recruitment Guidelines for Selecting a Local Government Administrator Some states’ open-records laws limit how much confidentiality is even legally possible, so councils need to understand their obligations before making promises to applicants.
Step 3: Community Input
Most councils build in some form of public participation. Common methods include online surveys asking residents what qualities matter most, open forums where finalists answer public questions, and advisory panels made up of neighborhood leaders, business owners, and nonprofit representatives. Some cities appoint a formal search committee that collects community feedback and passes it to the council.
Residents do not vote on the hire, and how much weight their input carries depends on the council. But a candidate who bombs a public forum will struggle to earn council support, and a council that ignores community preferences risks political backlash. Public-facing stages also let finalists demonstrate the communication skills the job requires.
Step 4: Screening, Interviews, and Assessments
After the application deadline, the council or its search committee screens resumes against the qualifications profile. Candidates who clear that cut become semifinalists and usually go through preliminary interviews, often virtual.
Finalists get a more intensive round. Multi-stage in-person interviews are standard and often include sessions with department heads, community leaders, and individual council members. Comprehensive background checks verify employment history, credentials, and any legal or ethical concerns. Reference checks go beyond confirming dates; they probe how candidates handled budget shortfalls, personnel conflicts, and council relationships in previous roles.
Some cities and search firms add structured assessment exercises. These include inbox simulations where candidates prioritize competing demands, role-plays such as coaching an underperforming department head, fact-finding exercises that test analytical thinking, and formal presentations on how the candidate would approach a specific city challenge. Personality and cognitive assessments sometimes supplement the simulations. The goal is to move past polished interview answers and see how someone actually makes decisions under pressure.
Step 5: The Council Vote and Employment Contract
The council makes its final decision through a formal public vote. The hiring ends the same way any major council action does: a motion, a second, and a recorded vote in an open meeting.1Ballotpedia. Council-Manager Government
Then contract negotiations begin. The agreement covers salary, benefits, and the terms under which either side can end the relationship. Median annual pay for top executives in government was $105,350 as of 2024, though city manager compensation varies significantly with city size and cost of living.6Bureau of Labor Statistics. Management Occupations
ICMA recommends that employment agreements use an “evergreen” structure, meaning the contract stays in effect indefinitely until the council terminates the manager or the manager voluntarily resigns. Fixed-term contracts, which some jurisdictions require, force renegotiation on a set schedule that does not always work in either side’s favor. Severance provisions typically range from six to twelve months of salary, with six months being the average based on ICMA survey data.7ICMA. Negotiating Employment Agreements and Compensation Once both sides sign, the city announces the appointment and the start date.
When a Vacancy Comes First
Sometimes the process starts because the seat is empty. Most cities appoint an existing senior employee, often the assistant city manager or a department head, to serve as acting or interim manager while the council launches a new search.8ICMA. Resources for the Interim or Acting Local Government Manager ICMA recommends beginning recruitment immediately after a resignation, retirement, or termination becomes official, to keep the time under interim leadership as short as possible.2ICMA. Recruitment Guidelines for Selecting a Local Government Administrator From there, the council walks the same five steps: profile, search, community input, interviews, and vote.