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There will always be high performers and low performers on a team, both in a relative and absolute sense. Yeah, although the more heterogeneous the tasks, the

There will always be high performers and low performers on a team, both in a relative and absolute sense. Yeah, although the more heterogeneous the tasks, the trickier it even is to define these terms. Many years ago I was on a small (2-3 people) team with a truly genius-level coder. He was close to what you'd call a savant. He was (despite being a sweet guy at heart) incredibly difficult to work with - he was unfiltered and abrasive, and would write reams of code to solve pet problems that didn't really need solving in the context of whatever the hell it was that we were trying to do at the moment, because they were "fun" coding challenges that captured his imagination. The end result was that while he could do the work of several engineers, you also... needed an engineer or two to work with him nearly full-time just to keep him on the rails and actually working towards the project goals, and to act as a buffer between him and people outside the team. So who was the high performer on our team, and who was the low performer? Well, I didn't suck, but he was certainly the better engineer! But was I really a "low performer" when I did some of the equally crucial work of keeping him on the rails? Was he really the "high performer" when he required lots of people-hours from others just to keep him on task? Those terms really lose all meaning when you're all engineers but are contributing different things to a team... the high/low performer stuff really only works when people are working in true isolation under identical circumstances. Like maybe for ditch-digging or weightlifting competitions or whatever.

pjc50 8y ago
Ah, rockstars. If you get one without the craziness they're amazing. But the situation you've described is basically Stakhanovism with code rather than coal.
halbritt 8y ago
I've worked with folks like that. They usually do more harm than good and generally need to be managed out or into roles more suitable for how they like to work.
- JohnBooty 8y ago
  Yeah, we were able to do it with this guy. Things worked with this guy because at his core, he was actually a very sweet person! (And we were very patient and interested in making it work, if I may say so. Not that we did everything right, not by a longshot) He was just kind of socially clueless, as opposed to actually malignant...
prepend 8y ago
It’s incredibily difficult and why managing is so difficult. Your comparison of who is the best performer is more important maybe for bonuses. This article is about firing the worst performers. So unless the process was “keep the very best single performer, fire the rest” the question of who is a better engineer is moot and doesn’t need to be solved. It’s very difficult to evaluate articles like this without knowing the process. I could see it working if you had a simple process that relied on strong training and judgement with some governance to limit the impact of errors. But if people get ranked based on some stupid ML algorithm and just sliced out of the company, that’s unpleasant for the fired staff, and for remaining staff. Fortunately, I think companies that do a dumb version of bottom 5% will fail or get corrected by their board and directors.
tboyd47 8y ago
I should have added "for any given metric of performance." You have to use SOME kind of objective metric, to check your own personal biases if nothing else. But you're absolutely right in that performance metrics will never do your employees' various talents justice.
klenwell 8y ago
That's a great example. I think basketball, especially the NBA, is an interesting correlate for thinking about team dynamics, especially programming teams which in my experience have often been about the size of a basketball team. I read The Jordan Rules last year about the Bulls' first championship season and before the season begins, Phil Jackson says something like, "If Michael Jordan wins the scoring title again this year, we won't win a championship." This was after they had reached Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals the year before. If I remember correctly, Jordan did win the scoring title that year as well as his first championship ring. But even in a sport like basketball where there are stats and increasingly sophisticated metrics and data analysis, I find it most interesting reading about the less visible contributors and the crucial roles they often play. (Breaks of the Game, the book that inspired The Jordan Rules, I think does even a better job of getting into this aspect of the team dynamic.) This is also related to the big idea popularized by Moneyball. But where Moneyball struck me as more relevant to hiring, reading about the NBA has led me to think about how teams perform together more carefully where the metrics as you say are often trickier.
- JohnBooty 8y ago
  Yes. There are a LOT of guys in the NBA who could score 30 points a night (good enough for the scoring title, most years) if their teams offense constantly funneled them the ball, but they'd be scoring those points due to taking ungodly numbers of shots at relatively low shooting percentages, at the expense of their teammates. Basketball analytics have already begun to phase out guys in the mold of Kobe Bryant, Allen Iverson, or Carmelo Anthony who were great players who scored a ton but did so with (at times) low efficiency.
- kamaal 8y ago
  >>If Michael Jordan wins the scoring title again this year, we won't win a championship. In the 1990s, in cricket, we would see something like this from Sachin Tendulkar. He would reach 90s, then eat 8 - 9 overs to just get his century. Net result was, he would continue to set new records for maximum centuries scored- but the team would lose. >>This is also related to the big idea popularized by Moneyball. It's fairly obvious to arrive to this conclusion. Having a team full of super stars doesn't win you things. Though this is counter intuitive to understand- Quality exists at various other levels apart from heroism.
sys_64738 8y ago
It’s easier to build somebody’s tech skills than fix their personality. That’s why team dynamics trump tech skills. If your attitude causes bad vibes in the team then you’re out.
stareatgoats 8y ago
This! Which comes down to the basically stupid categories that we use to tag people (high/low performers, smart/dumb, even good/bad). Sometimes I wish for a better developed vocabulary for context, as context is much more important than any individual trait in most, if not all, cases.

pjc50 8y ago

Ah, rockstars. If you get one without the craziness they're amazing. But the situation you've described is basically Stakhanovism with code rather than coal.

halbritt 8y ago

I've worked with folks like that. They usually do more harm than good and generally need to be managed out or into roles more suitable for how they like to work.

JohnBooty 8y ago
Yeah, we were able to do it with this guy. Things worked with this guy because at his core, he was actually a very sweet person! (And we were very patient and interested in making it work, if I may say so. Not that we did everything right, not by a longshot) He was just kind of socially clueless, as opposed to actually malignant...

prepend 8y ago

It’s incredibily difficult and why managing is so difficult. Your comparison of who is the best performer is more important maybe for bonuses. This article is about firing the worst performers. So unless the process was “keep the very best single performer, fire the rest” the question of who is a better engineer is moot and doesn’t need to be solved. It’s very difficult to evaluate articles like this without knowing the process. I could see it working if you had a simple process that relied on strong training and judgement with some governance to limit the impact of errors. But if people get ranked based on some stupid ML algorithm and just sliced out of the company, that’s unpleasant for the fired staff, and for remaining staff. Fortunately, I think companies that do a dumb version of bottom 5% will fail or get corrected by their board and directors.

tboyd47 8y ago

I should have added "for any given metric of performance." You have to use SOME kind of objective metric, to check your own personal biases if nothing else. But you're absolutely right in that performance metrics will never do your employees' various talents justice.

klenwell 8y ago

That's a great example. I think basketball, especially the NBA, is an interesting correlate for thinking about team dynamics, especially programming teams which in my experience have often been about the size of a basketball team. I read The Jordan Rules last year about the Bulls' first championship season and before the season begins, Phil Jackson says something like, "If Michael Jordan wins the scoring title again this year, we won't win a championship." This was after they had reached Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals the year before. If I remember correctly, Jordan did win the scoring title that year as well as his first championship ring. But even in a sport like basketball where there are stats and increasingly sophisticated metrics and data analysis, I find it most interesting reading about the less visible contributors and the crucial roles they often play. (Breaks of the Game, the book that inspired The Jordan Rules, I think does even a better job of getting into this aspect of the team dynamic.) This is also related to the big idea popularized by Moneyball. But where Moneyball struck me as more relevant to hiring, reading about the NBA has led me to think about how teams perform together more carefully where the metrics as you say are often trickier.

JohnBooty 8y ago
Yes. There are a LOT of guys in the NBA who could score 30 points a night (good enough for the scoring title, most years) if their teams offense constantly funneled them the ball, but they'd be scoring those points due to taking ungodly numbers of shots at relatively low shooting percentages, at the expense of their teammates. Basketball analytics have already begun to phase out guys in the mold of Kobe Bryant, Allen Iverson, or Carmelo Anthony who were great players who scored a ton but did so with (at times) low efficiency.
kamaal 8y ago
>>If Michael Jordan wins the scoring title again this year, we won't win a championship. In the 1990s, in cricket, we would see something like this from Sachin Tendulkar. He would reach 90s, then eat 8 - 9 overs to just get his century. Net result was, he would continue to set new records for maximum centuries scored- but the team would lose. >>This is also related to the big idea popularized by Moneyball. It's fairly obvious to arrive to this conclusion. Having a team full of super stars doesn't win you things. Though this is counter intuitive to understand- Quality exists at various other levels apart from heroism.

sys_64738 8y ago

It’s easier to build somebody’s tech skills than fix their personality. That’s why team dynamics trump tech skills. If your attitude causes bad vibes in the team then you’re out.

stareatgoats 8y ago

This! Which comes down to the basically stupid categories that we use to tag people (high/low performers, smart/dumb, even good/bad). Sometimes I wish for a better developed vocabulary for context, as context is much more important than any individual trait in most, if not all, cases.