Managing high performers
High performers are often intrinsically motivated so rewards for good performance should be tailored to reflect this. This article discusses some aspects of how best to reward and manage high performers.
Identifying high performers
Many employees can excel at a task or have charming personalities but a high performer is someone who delivers exceptional value towards achieving business goals either individually or by enhancing their teams productivity. An example of someone who is not a high performer is an Engineer who is an extremely productive coder but who disrupts his teammates ability to work efficiently with his rude behavior.
Be fair
It is really important that high performers feel appreciated and recognized for their contributions but this does not mean that they should not be receiving a much larger chunk of your time and attention than other team members and they should not become your buddy or favorite.
Stretch Exercises
High performers tend to be interested in growing as individual contributors and leaders so the best way to reward them is to give them the opportunities they crave. When one of my high performing reports said he wanted to try being a Scrum master I talked my boss into letting him have that role on another team part time. I also let him be in charge of the AWS environment on one of our projects. Even though he did not have AWS knowledge going into it, he learned fast, did a great job and was really happy to come to work each day.
Learning
High performers love to learn and they often request to go to conferences and trainings. I say yes to these requests as often as possible. I do hold them accountable to sharing the knowledge they gain with others upon their return.
Feedback
One of the key aspects of my job as a manager is providing honest evidence based feedback. I point out areas of improvement and speak honestly and specifically about strengths with all my reports. High performers are more likely to take the feedback to heart and improve themselves.
It is also very important to recognize contributions by saying thank you.
Influence
High performers usually establish that they care deeply about the team and the work and so I let them have influence on how we do our work. In addition high performers are great at mentoring junior reports and this helps them as well as the junior team members.
Work life balance
High performers tend to over function. While this might seem like a good thing it can sometimes lead to burnout. I keep an eye out for a balanced workload on my team. I reassure my high performing team members that they are entitled to a good work life balance.
Promotions
High performers are often already performing at the next level and often need to be officially promoted to match their contributions.
