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Recognizing the confusion in the field of leadership research, a study has been reported in this article that attempts to describe the context within which public executives operate. It is based on the assumption that the executive's operating environment determines the extent to which leadership is possible. Critical-incident methodology was used to determine how selected public sector executives conceptualize their environment and how they operate based on that conceptualization. The political executive's environment is characterized by three distinctive elements. First, in the public sector, the recruitment and selection process almost guarantees that the executive will lack knowledge in at least one of three areas like departmental operations, the organization's substantive area, or state partisan politics. Therefore, as a prerequisite to leadership, the executive must first gain intellectual and operational control over the organizational and political environment. This executive learning is complicated by a pattern of short tenure which requires the executive to balance long and short term goals and deal with issues or policy continuity.