Dr. Michael Sanera, developer of a new course in public administration, was a tenured associate professor of political science and public administration at Northern Arizona University (NAU) where he served for seventeen years. He was the founding director of NAU's Master In Public Administration (MPA) program and developed an innovative weekend seminar program (before Internet learning) for working public managers in Northern Arizona. This program served the diverse community of public administrators in Northern Arizona including city and county managers, federal park service and forest service managers, state fish and game and land management managers and tribal managers from the Navajo and Hopi nations.
In the early 1980s, Dr. Sanera served as a political appointee in the Reagan administration. He was the Assistant Director for Policy and Evaluation at the Office of Personnel Management, the "personnel office" for three million federal civilian workers. In this position he evaluated all proposed changes in federal personnel policy including examinations, hiring, retirement, pay, health care, and discipline. In addition, he served as a consultant at the U.S. Department of Education reviewing the department's grant programs. His recommendations for tightening controls saved federal taxpayers millions of dollars.
In the mid 1980s, Dr. Sanera developed and implemented the Executive Development Program for The Heritage Foundation. This program conducted educational seminars designed to increase the policy-making effectiveness of senior political managers in the Reagan Administration.
Dr. Sanera contributed chapters on managing the federal bureaucracy in the Heritage Foundation's Mandate for Leadership II. Portions of those chapters will be required reading in Dr. Sanera's Public Administration course at Yorktown University.
At this same time, he was also a frequent speaker at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management's Executive Development Seminar program in Denver that provided senior level career employees with advanced public management skills. Dr. Sanera's presentation focused on the special (sometimes conflicting) relationship between political and career executives in the executive branch.
