Alumni Profiles in Government
Audrey Seymour MBA ‘91
Assistant City Manager, City of Menlo Park
Bridging the non-profit and public sectors has been a central theme of Audrey Seymour’s work since graduating from Stanford in 1991.
Seymour recalls how an internship supported by the GSB’s Summer Management Internship Fund showed her “the need for the nonprofit, city, county and school programs serving children to work more collaboratively and focus on prevention services in order to make a real difference.” With the goal of making the collaboration happen, Seymour was awarded an Echoing Green Fellowship to work at the County of San Mateo and then to establish the Peninsula Partnership for Children, Youth, and Families.
After leading the Peninsula Partnership for four years, Seymour transitioned to local government management when she was named the Assistant to the City Manager for Palo Alto. Four years ago, Seymour became the Assistant City Manager of Menlo Park.
At the City of Palo Alto, Seymour was instrumental in the creation of a new child care center by working to secure the city council’s support to devote a piece of city-owned property to the project and managing its design and implementation.
At the City of Menlo Park, Seymour is currently seeking innovative ways to approach the city’s $2.9 million budget deficit by developing a community-driven process. As second in command to the City Manager, Seymour manages the city council’s meeting agenda and oversees city staff in their analysis and reporting to the council.
Seymour stresses the benefits of working in local government. Not only does it provide “the greatest access to the democratic process and the most direct impact on the quality of community life,” local government provides “tremendous opportunities to lead and to address the same type of management challenges that one would encounter in the private sector, all while making a real difference.”
For more information on careers in local government management, check out the online resources provided by the International City/County Management Association: http://icma.org/nextgen/sc.asp.