Governance: The Final Frontier

In Governance: the Final Frontier, NCSC President Mary McQueen argues that court leaders should replace their longstanding focus on the model for governing private corporations and executive branch agencies with the more appropriate model offered by what are called “loosely coupled” organizations. State courts, like public hospitals and universities, provide services requiring extensive and specialized knowledge in a context of decentralized decision making.  Consideration of the processes and mechanisms developed by leaders of loosely coupled organizations provides a new direction for achieving effective court governance and delivering public satisfaction.  

Mary C. McQueen has served as president of the National Center for State courts since 2004. Before then, she was the Washington State court administrator (1987 – 2004) and the director of judicial services for that state’s Office of the Administrator for the Courts.