Ask Dan Debicella whether, given one last job before retirement, he would become governor or chief executive officer of his employer PepsiCo, and he takes only an extra moment to respond.
“At the end of the day, public service is very rewarding,” Debicella said. “But I am not one who thinks you should be in public (office) as a career.”
For now, Debicella is juggling two careers, as director of strategy and innovation for Purchase-based PepsiCo, and as freshman Republican state senator representing his native Shelton, Conn.
Debicella, R-21st District, has a pedigree resume in business, with degrees from the University of Pennsylvania”™s Wharton School of Business and Harvard Business School. He learned the ropes as an analyst with consultancies Accenture and McKinsey & Co., also briefly running a dot-com at the height of the Web boom.
If not as formal, the apprenticeship he received in Shelton may have schooled him even more effectively for his second career in politics. After building connections as a member of his town”™s board of apportionment and taxation, he became campaign manager for George “Doc” Guenther, a Republican who was the longest-serving state senator in Connecticut history. When Guenther retired in 2006, Debicella outpolled a small-business owner in Shelton to fill Guenther”™s seat.
”˜Be realistic”™
Like Debicella, George Latimer, D-91st District, got his start in politics at the municipal level on the Rye City Council. He served seven terms on the Westchester County Board of Legislators, including stints as chairman between 1998 and 2001, before getting elected to the New York state Assembly last fall representing Rye, Mamaroneck and coastal sections of New Rochelle.
All the while, he pursued a marketing career at IBM Corp., ITT Corp., and Nestlé, among others, and consults today.
Latimer said the leap to statewide office has been particularly challenging given the added level of complexity in bills and the sheer size of the state Assembly, which creates mountains of work while limiting any one legislator”™s influence compared to local governing bodies.
“Right now as I am talking to you, I have a sheet in front of me of 12 bills coming down the homestretch,” Latimer said. “You have to be realistic about the amount of time it”™s going to take to do the job the way you want to do it.”
Hit with the same time crunch, Debicella made arrangements with PepsiCo to free up time for his senatorial duties. He will get somewhat of a breather in the 2008 session; after passing a two-year budget this year, the Connecticut General Assembly spends the second year of the cycle fine-tuning the state”™s finances rather than tackling major new initiatives.
“PepsiCo has been tremendous in their support of this ”“ it is a company that has always (been) supportive of nonprofits and people wanting to take on projects in the public interest,” Debicella said. “The last six months I have been (working) part time. You end up working a lot of nights and weekends to make it work.”
Substance, symbolism
During his term on the Rye City Council, Latimer said he was able to perform all his duties without the workload infringing on his professional career.
“You are not even really campaigning ”“ you are just living in the community,” Latimer said.
That began to change when he was elected to the Westchester County legislature; now that he is a state assemblyman, marketing has displaced politics as his “second” career. The irony is that there is a fair amount of marketing that goes into his political career, in attending community events even if nothing substantive occurs, simply to make himself available to constituents.
“This job is part substance and part symbolism,” Latimer said. “In business, it”™s not about how hard you worked ”“ it”™s about the bottom line. In government, it”™s not as clear.”
Whether or not they will follow Doc Guenther”™s example and serve in their state legislatures to retirement age, both legislators believe their respective government bodies would benefit from the presence of more business people.
“We need more smart people from the business community ”¦ to be willing to go into politics for a few years,” Debicella said. “You can bring a lot of the skill-set you have learned in business to make an impact in the community, as long as you are willing to deal with the inherent inefficiencies in politics.”
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