We’ve recently had a business leader come to us stunned by the unexpected resignation of a high performing team member.
“We didn’t see it coming, he has been with us for three years; he does an amazing job, goes above and beyond, delivers great results, takes total responsibility for his role, is totally trustworthy, we just don’t have a bad word for him. We thought he’d take over the top job at some stage. And without warning, he’s quit. We tried to convince him to stay, offered him a significant pay increase, but he’s just not interested. But he has agreed to do an exit interview with someone independent, can you help?”
So often managers and business leaders focus their ‘people’ time and energy on under performers and (worse) troublemakers. They assume that just because someone is high performing, they are also engaged and committed to the business, and therefore they don’t need any thought or attention from their leader. And many also assume (as we saw in this case), that more money is all that is needed to retain high performers and keep them motivated.
Regardless of industry, size of business, or level of role, if you have high performers in your business, here are some keys to managing and keeping them:
Challenge them – they can get bored and start looking for the next challenge; if it’s not with you, then they’ll look elsewhere
Aligned with this, give them the right work (not the most work). High performers often get all the important tasks dumped on them because you know they’ll handle it – but be careful not to end up in a situation where they feel taken advantage of and burnt out.
Provide development opportunities – generally speaking, high performers are hungry to learn and improve; again, if you’re not providing them with this opportunity, they’ll look for this growth in a new opportunity
Be clear about your goals and expectations – they find the satisfaction of a job well done rewarding and motivating, so it’s critical that they know when they’ve met expectations
Hold them to the highest standards – this is important intrinsically for the high performing team member, but also for others – these team members set the standards for everyone else
Don’t micromanage them – ensure they know you trust them by telling them what to do, not how to do it. Autonomy is critical to high performers.
Recognise them – don’t take them for granted. High performers need to feel the love, though this can look different for different people. For some that’s about recognition and praise in front of the team; for others this public recognition isn’t wanted, and in fact, can have a detrimental effect – get to know your high performing team members and understand what kind of recognition will be most meaningful for them.
Don’t forget the money – while it isn’t the motivator many think it is, it can certainly be a demotivator if you’re not in the ballpark. And even worse when they see an under performer getting paid at higher levels.
In the case of the exit interview that we conducted for the business who came to us recently, the high performing team member was doing a job he enjoyed with people he enjoyed, and he felt like he was doing a good job. But he left anyway – to take what is arguably a sideways step with another company in the same industry. When we drilled down into the why with him, we found:
He never got any feedback (good or bad), so he didn’t really know if he was doing a good job or not
He was incredibly busy, with more and more work being loaded onto him, while he sees others in the business not working nearly as hard as him
There were no clear goals that he was aware of – either for him to achieve within the business, or his own growth goals, and he wanted both of these
He acknowledged that he was on a steep learning curve when he started, which he enjoyed, but for the past 12 months he felt he’d plateaued, and wasn’t being challenged, other than by the volume of work he has
He had no idea that the leaders in the business saw him as a future CEO; no one had ever had any conversations with him about the future
Some of this seems obvious on reflection, and simple enough to have avoided, but the reality is that in all business – and particularly small business – it’s easy to assume that your high performers are okay, and trust that they will let you know if that’s not the case. Don’t let your under performers suck all of your ‘people’ time and energy – be deliberate about managing your high performers – that’s where you’ll get more bang for your buck!