The Performance Paradox
The Performance Paradox (a term I’ve just coined) is the practice of hiring a person for their strengths and managing them to their weaknesses. I’ve seen this over and over again, and have even been guilty of it at points in my career. We hire a star performer and then, as we try and recast them, we wonder why they no longer shine. This not only frustrates us, I believe it also contributes significantly to disengagement and turnover. Let’s look at two examples of this paradox.
Steve is a top salesperson in an organization. He is well-known in the industry and well-respected by his clients. He is incredibly customer-focused, taking the time to learn about them, their organization, their priorities, and their challenges. His clients often tell him how much they appreciate his ability to act as a thought partner for them. His customer engagement scores, customer retention scores, and customer lifetime value per customer are impressive. Or, at least, they were. Recently, customers have been complaining that Steve doesn’t seem to be around as much, and when he is, he’s not his usual highly engaged self. It turns out that the company implemented a CRM (customer relationship management system) and was requiring Steve to enter detailed information about each of his clients into this system. The shift from spending time in front of his customers to spending time in front of his computer was significant enough that it demotivated him. In this case, they’ve taken an individual whose strength is building strong relationships and managed him (in part) in terms of his capability to keep the system up-to-date.
Barrett is a stellar software engineer. She loves nothing better than to create code and find (and shore up) bugs in code. Her peers lovingly call her Sherlock because when they’ve hit a wall, they know they can hand their conundrum to her, and she’ll find the solution. Her manager has been so impressed with her work that he promoted her. In her new role, she is responsible for a team of engineers. Now, rather than playing in the code, she finds herself hiring, onboarding, and performance-managing people. What her boss thought would be a way to incentivize her by recognizing and rewarding her efforts backfired miserably. She no longer loves her job and her team does not feel they are getting the support and leadership they need to be successful.
I am not suggesting that we tailor jobs to fit individual needs. I am, however, proposing that by understanding and leveraging an employee’s strengths, both the employee and the organization have the opportunity to achieve greater success. As an example, might the organization have given Steve an AI tool that he could speak his notes into as he traveled from client to client, minimizing the time he needed to be in front of the computer? Might Barrett’s boss have put her on a team dedicated to innovation or skunkworks projects on behalf of the company which allowed her to leverage her coding passion on a more impactful scale?
Organizations grapple with hiring, developing, and retaining top talent. How are you examining and addressing the policies and practices that may be creating a performance paradox for your employees?
