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This doesn't describe why, in effectively the same system, almost everywhere I've worked has had people vastly outperforming others. I say this as one of the pe

This doesn't describe why, in effectively the same system, almost everywhere I've worked has had people vastly outperforming others. I say this as one of the perennial bottom quartilers.

kqr 7y ago
Sometimes there are significant individual differences. Sometimes some people have figured out how to work "in a different system" that is more effective. Good use of manager time is to figure out what those people do differently and then have them teach their ways to the others. This will, in effect, "improve the whole system" as someone else put it. Put another way: when there are individual 10x performers on the team (note that this is 10x the average, not 10x the worst), there is also massive untapped training potential, and management has already failed to make use of this. If anyone should have a bad performance review in that situation, it sure isn't the individual contributor who didn't get the tools they needed to do the job! It should be the manager who didn't give them those tools. That said our business has a tendency to overvalue individual contributions over team contributions. My going example is that a person that spends all day getting other people unblocked on their issues might well be the greatest facilitator of productiveness in the team, but they will appear to be the person that never gets anything done.
- paxunix 7y ago
  > Good use of manager time is to figure out what those people do differently and then have them teach their ways to the others. What if the greats do that, and the others just don't care enough to learn, like this is a blue collar job with white collar pay to them? They could be greater than they are; they think they're great already, but they're nowhere near the true greats on the team. You can't make them care and you can't make them want to be great.
  - kqr 7y ago
    Given how little most managers actually care about creating a great workplace, I'm not surprised things like "you can't make them care" are assumed to be true. In a great workplace, people start to care. They feel pride over their workmanship and social responsibility with other employees. (In general. As always, there are outliers that need to be handled differently, but they're a small minority.)

This doesn't describe why, in effectively the same system, almost everywhere I've worked has had people vastly outperforming others. I say this as one of the perennial bottom quartilers.

kqr 7y ago

Sometimes there are significant individual differences. Sometimes some people have figured out how to work "in a different system" that is more effective. Good use of manager time is to figure out what those people do differently and then have them teach their ways to the others. This will, in effect, "improve the whole system" as someone else put it. Put another way: when there are individual 10x performers on the team (note that this is 10x the average, not 10x the worst), there is also massive untapped training potential, and management has already failed to make use of this. If anyone should have a bad performance review in that situation, it sure isn't the individual contributor who didn't get the tools they needed to do the job! It should be the manager who didn't give them those tools. That said our business has a tendency to overvalue individual contributions over team contributions. My going example is that a person that spends all day getting other people unblocked on their issues might well be the greatest facilitator of productiveness in the team, but they will appear to be the person that never gets anything done.

paxunix 7y ago
> Good use of manager time is to figure out what those people do differently and then have them teach their ways to the others. What if the greats do that, and the others just don't care enough to learn, like this is a blue collar job with white collar pay to them? They could be greater than they are; they think they're great already, but they're nowhere near the true greats on the team. You can't make them care and you can't make them want to be great.
- kqr 7y ago
  Given how little most managers actually care about creating a great workplace, I'm not surprised things like "you can't make them care" are assumed to be true. In a great workplace, people start to care. They feel pride over their workmanship and social responsibility with other employees. (In general. As always, there are outliers that need to be handled differently, but they're a small minority.)