5 High Performer Mistakes that Are Avoidable

High Performer Mistakes Can Kill Your Talent Management Strategy
Smart talent leaders do not make high performer mistakes.  They ensure that their top talent is not tempted to go elsewhere.  They keep high performing employees engaged and productive right where they are — helping your organization to perform at its peak.

5 High Performer Mistakes that Are Avoidable
Your high performers are your most valuable asset and should be a major component of your talent management strategy and competitive advantage. Do not risk losing your best employees by making the following most common high performer mistakes from our leadership simulation assessment:

1. Giving Front Line Managers the Sole Responsibility for Developing High Performers
   Yes, line managers are the ones who know their team members best and should be able to help you to identify their high potentials. But, no, they are not the ones who typically have the time or the expertise to guide the training or hone the skills of their more promising employees.

   Get professional development help from the experts — either senior managers who can act as mentors or experienced performance coaches who know how to enhance strengths and improve weaknesses that matter most for you and your business.

2. Assuming Top Talent Will Continue to Succeed in More Challenging Roles
   A few will prosper, but many will not as the stakes and complexity increase. On average, only a small percentage of your current high performers will be able to adapt to and excel in successively more difficult roles. They may be high performers at their current job — in a role they know well and are perfectly suited for.

   You can’t just promote high performers and expect that they will continue to succeed within a new context with higher expectations, greater visibility, and more complexity. Even high performers need to develop the specific strategic leadership competencies for their new role and have the consistent support needed to succeed.

3. Protecting Top Talent from Failure
   The best leaders have learned how to deal with failure. They accept failure as part of any career.  They bounce back and reflect upon how to avoid it next time around.

   Give your high performers an opportunity to learn and grow from mistakes. This is how high performers will learn to face difficulties, test hypotheses, and rebound better and faster than before. Test your high performers with simulations and stretch assignments to assess their ability to learn, grow, and adapt. Do not overprotect your top talent.

4. Expecting that High Performers Are Highly Engaged
   Unfortunately, high performers are not necessarily highly engaged employees. In fact, we know from organizational culture assessment data that your highest performers often have lower levels of advocacy, discretionary effort, and retention.  All too often, high performers are at risk for leaving because they don’t feel that their personal goals are well aligned with the goals of the organization or because they don’t feel that their coworkers are as capable as they should be.

   In fact, according to our latest employee engagement research, almost 30% of high performers intend to leave their current companies within the next twelve months. This should be a huge red flag for any talent leader.  Make sure that you always know what your top talent wants and needs to stay highly engaged.

   Start by defining a career path for growing their future and see that there is reason for them to be confident in the talents and commitments of leadership and their team members. Then ensure that there is a match between their personal agenda and the corporate goals.

5. Being Indiscriminate with Compensation Plans
   Top performers generally work harder and are significantly more effective than the other workers on their team. Accordingly, they rightfully feel they deserve to be fairly compensated for their extra effort and productivity. If you don’t find a way to compensate them above others, they will quickly become discouraged and feel unappreciated.

   Make sure that your high performers feel as though the rewards they receive are commensurate with their contribution.

The Bottom Line
Winning organizations know that different employees contribute differently to their success. Because of this, smart leaders do what it takes to attract, develop, engage and retain their best talent. Especially for companies that rely on their people to succeed, performance depends on designing and implementing the right talent strategy for high performers.

To learn more about how to get the most out of your people, download The Surprising Top 3 Ingredients for Talent Management Success