I’ve been thinking a lot about talent. Talent as in the employees that comprise an organization. More specifically, talent as the single most important variable in making (or breaking) a company. This obviously isn’t an original thought, and I doubt any of what I’ve written here is either. That said, I’ll go ahead and let it fly.
Before diving in, I’ll caveat everything by saying there are (and will always be) exceptions to any rule. There will always be extenuating circumstances which make a principle impractical at best and untrue at worst. As such, it may help to view what I’m about to write through the lens of “normal conditions”. It should go without saying that these are personal opinions formed from a combination of experience, deductions and ideas drawn from different sources. Take from it what you will, and I hope folks find it useful on some level.
Plus-level talent density
The culture of an office/organization/company is for better or worse, the sum total of its talent. The combined tapestry of knowledge, skill, personalities, motivations and quirks. Everything companies do to help inculcate and build culture (e.g. a nice office space, free lunches, social activities) are force multipliers acting on the base formed by that talent. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying those things aren’t important, because they are. However, they require a primordial energy to act on in the first place. It’s possible to have an excellent culture without all the traditional trappings/perks if that base talent foundation is in place, but not the other way around. In the words of Jim Collins:
"...first get the right people on the bus (and the wrong people off the bus) before you figure out where to drive it."
It is leadership’s job to remove inhibitors and obstacles that can obstruct talent from full expression but again, that’s force amplification. The raw firepower still needs to be there.
In my years working, regardless of organisation/office/country, the single constant that has held true within each and every single “peak” period was a high density of what I call “plus-level talent”. I define this as individuals who, across a combination of material “doing” and “being” metrics, produce at a higher level than the average individual at his/her level in a similar position within the same industry. I’ll get more into this concept in the next section, but the salient point is that plus-level leaders and employees attract more plus-level talent. Success carries its own inertia. Thinking back to the early parts of my career, I can clearly recall how inspired I was to be in an environment where I was the metaphorical (and likely literal) dumbest person in the room. I wasn’t motivated because we had some amazing operating model or great office perks (again, force multipliers), but because I was surrounded by badasses who knew how to hire other badasses. This became a virtuous cycle that kept pushing up our plus-level talent density. These individuals are the ones who were able to show others what “great” really looked like, that there are levels to every game. If you have a high enough density of these individuals, that becomes the company culture.
On the other hand, if the density of plus-level talent gets low, the culture will move in the opposite direction and you end up in a situation where the remaining plus-level talent gets pushed away and/or susceptible to the pull of other companies.
VORP for talent evaluation in the workplace
Value Over Replacement Player (VORP) is an advanced baseball statistic developed to demonstrate how much a player contributes to their team in comparison to a “replacement-level” player who is average for their position. A replacement player performs at “replacement level,” which is the level of performance an average team can expect when trying to replace a player at minimal cost, also known as “freely available talent.”
When referring to plus-level talent in the previous section, I basically transpose the concept of VORP to the workplace. Obviously there’s no existing practical means to calculate a statistic like VORP in an office setting, but the idea as a mental model remains useful as a default lens through which talent can be evaluated. The question one should ask is how much value does this individual bring to my company/account/team compared to the “average” market talent at this level for this function? If he/she is not a plus overall, don’t hire (or move to replace where the practical opportunity arises). Obviously there can be extenuating circumstances which make this difficult (if not impossible) to enforce, but that shouldn’t stop it from being a fundamental principle to operate under. If this type of approach isn’t in place, you run the risk of diluting an organization’s plus-level density. If that happens, the number of people in the office (as a proportion of total employees) who know what “great” looks like decreases and the dissolution of process knowledge begins.
I get frustrated when I hear statements attempting to justify minus-level performers along the lines of “well he/she is still contributing/can contribute in some areas…” . What should be asked is whether the net balance of this individual’s contributions are above-replacement. Can we (with reasonable effort) source someone from the open market, onboard that individual, and expect him/her to perform better than the minus-level employee? If the answer is yes, then we should not hire/pass/retain the poor performer.
Companies/leadership/managers should focus the lion’s share of developmental time, energy and resources on plus-level employees. This may sound obvious, but the truth is most HR SOPs tend to work towards the opposite. It’s not uncommon for me to hear something along the lines of “yeah he/she is struggling, but if I just find the right position for him/her or place him/her in an area where they won’t cause damage…” . I know this sounds cold and harsh, but I believe this mode of thinking to be fallacy in 90% of cases. Put another way, if you’re having this conversation with yourself, you’re probably already in the red.
Generally speaking, if an individual is strong, you’ll know it very early on. Plus-level talents are generally high performers no matter what they do. That doesn’t mean there isn’t an optimal (or more ideal) role for him/her, but these individuals can find a way to be above replacement in just about any function within reason. Conversely, I’ve rarely met someone who’s turned it around to go from minus-level all the way to plus-level. At best, they are able to reach replacement (average) level, and that can take months if not years of work. It’s not worth the investment, because here’s what happens when one spends all that time and resource on the minus-level talent:
- You incur the opportunity cost of the energy/resource you could have spent to nurture the strong performers (the individuals who are critical to positive company culture).
- High performers will need to pick up the slack for the low performers. Over time, this creates friction, likely resulting in your team becoming jaded. Then the whispers will start about why so and so who isn’t pulling their weight is receiving all this attention and why we need to constantly cover for him/her.
- This tension becomes cracks within the team, grows into dissent and suddenly everyone is 15-30% less happy at work. This negative vortex compounds over time.
