Anatomy of Excellence
Top Performers, High Potentials, Organizational Influencers
by Kelly Lewis, Vice President at TurnkeyZRG
2023 was a year marked by significant shifts in the talent marketplace. Following the trends of 2021, we experienced the continued impact of the “Great Reshuffle.” Employees reevaluated their career goals and jobs that better aligned with their values and preferences. With the advancement of technology, there was an increased demand for digitally skilled professionals across various business sectors, with proficiency in digital marketing and tools, data analytics, and data security being top competencies.
Economic uncertainties and post-pandemic adjustments resulted in substantial layoffs and restructuring to stabilize business operations. As we look to 2024, which is forecasted to see periods of stabilization and recovery following previous tumultuous years, the relationship between talent and operational excellence becomes more apparent than ever.
This edition of Kelly’s Culture will unpack the anatomy of achieving excellence in the workplace through the identification and support of top performers, high-potentials, and organizational influencers. To better understand the differentiation between the three, let us draw upon a parallel between organizational dynamics and a stingingly similar yet distinct arena of sports—specifically, the 2023 National Champions, Team 144, the University of Michigan Football team (Yes, I am a proud alum).
With a myriad of skills and potential, this team mirrors the interplay of talent within our organizations. Our top performers (e.g., J.J. McCarthy or Blake Corum) are the players who consistently make remarkable plays. They are stalwarts, setting high standards and delivering exceptional results. Akin to our utility players with dynamic abilities, high potentials (e.g., Semaj Morgan) are those brimming with the promise to be future stars.
And then, there are our organizational influencers, often behind-the-scenes champions, who, irrespective of their official titles, wield considerable impact through their ability to inspire, engage, and mobilize their peers. For Michigan football, this would be Greg Harden, former Executive Associate Athletic Director, Student-Athlete Health & Welfare, and now a consultant. Each member essential, each unique.
Drawing lessons from this championship team's success is a blueprint for developing talent to its full potential. It starts with recognizing and appreciating everyone’s unique abilities, followed by a commitment to their development and growth, concluding with skillfully harmonizing these diverse abilities among each other and more.
Recognize and Appreciate
High Performers and High Potential Talent
Differentiation between high performers and high potential can substantially impact a company’s bottom line. However, it remains one of the most overlooked challenges facing business. Companies often turn to high performers for promotional opportunities when it comes to talent progression. The guise of ease to spot amazing performance, and often, exceeding expectations yields managers to assume readiness for the next step. In some instances, outstanding work in a current position could equate to maximum potential.
Ask yourself how many times have you witnessed a new manager falter in their new role and the requirements of people management, including delegation, resolving conflicts, and influencing others, proved too much. Ultimately, illustrating the ability to perform individually does not always translate into leading others to achieve similar outcomes. Researchers describe this reality as the performance-potential paradox (Silzer, R., & Church, A. H. (2009). To ensure optimal talent management, there must be clarity in differentiating who they are and defining what makes high performers and high potential different.
What we know about them:
High Performers: Besides what was previously shared, studies suggest “that only 30% of high performers are actually high-potential employees, and 90% of high performers have difficulty adjusting to higher levels of responsibility.”
High Potentials: demonstrates an aptitude for the job but exhibits future potential to make a significant impact on the team and the broader company. They are often overshadowed in the workplace. However, according to Gartner research, “high potential (HIPO) employees bring 91% more value to the organization than non-HIPOs and exert 21% more effort than their peers.”
How do we define them:
Identification of future leaders is complex. Companies must look beyond manager nominations and task-specific key performance indicators. Here are some key components to consider:
Aspiration: the desire to rise to senior roles.
Ability: demonstrates capabilities to be effective in more responsible and senior roles. HR often views this as the capacity to step into a role two levels or more above their current role.
Engagement: to commit to the organization and remain in challenging roles.
Strategic thinking: the ability to devise effective strategies based on understanding the business, industry, and market trends.
Emotional Intelligence: handles interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathetically while remaining aware and in control of one's emotions.
Art of Influence and Communications: skilled in communicating effectively, persuasively, and clearly, both in speaking and writing.
Business Acumen: keen understanding of business operations, financial drivers, and market dynamics that impact the organization.
Leadership Potential: presents characteristics that align with the organization's leadership model or framework. Skills often include the aptitude to lead others, make tough decisions, and drive results.
This grounding will allow any company to have fruitful conversations regarding talent. It will also enable companies to understand if the high performers in your organization naturally exude leadership competencies. This must be a behavioral and competency model tailored to each level in the business. So, suppose your high-performer sales associate is not taking charge of motivating their peers, identifying inefficiencies or opportunities in work, or has tunnel vision on earning as much money as possible. In that case, they may not be the best candidate for leadership.
However, when you identify talent that has expressed interest in leadership, radiates the values of the company, possesses leadership level gravitas, and has great performance, they may warrant a look into the classification of high potential. Evaluating high-potential talent against these competencies can provide a comprehensive view of one's potential for leadership and alignment with the organization's future needs.
Organizational Influencers
While high-potential talent and top performers can influence, they are not necessarily deemed organizational influencers. Instead, organizational influencers are individuals who, regardless of their role, significantly impact the company. By way of reputation, charisma, and informal networking, they can steward change and collaboration. They are traditionally valued for their indirect impact through cultural contributions versus their direct contributions to their roles and tasks.
When coupled with high potential and performers, organizational influencers can support and enhance the growth of this population and the productivity of the organization at large. They advocate for top performers and high-potential talent to senior leadership, resulting in involvement in stretch projects, promotions, and even executive sponsorship. The breadth and depth of their relationships allow top performers and high-potential talent to connect with key individuals inside and outside the company.
This can be new sponsorship leads for sales reps, and for community-centric executives, connections to nonprofits with similar missions toward community organizers. They advise individuals on navigating the organizational landscape, provide informal internal brand/reputation assessments, and offer mechanisms to develop leadership skills. Similarly, they have their ear and pulse on employee sentiments and can help garner support for new initiatives as well as bridging silos by facilitating cross-functional collaboration and linking official and nonofficial communication channels.
Appreciation
The acknowledgment and appreciation of these three contributions are essential. Collectively, these three act as the stewards of a winning culture, enhancing organizational resilience, and boosting employee satisfaction and well-being. Winning cultures require each employee to be seen as a valuable team member based on skills, capabilities, and competencies.
By acknowledging the achievements and influence of these employees, companies are showcasing to employees that every contribution at every level is valued. It is a culture that does not force one to believe that achievement in the form of ladder climbing is the only way of recognition. Hence, greater organizational resilience.
When employees are in their best-fit roles, companies can navigate through periods of change or crisis more intentionally. These three will be the first to adapt to new challenges. They will set a positive example of flexibility and innovation. They will collaborate with leadership to identify financial and operational risks.
With high potential talent’s agile leadership, organizational influencers' strong communication and staple in organizational culture, and high performers’ grit, organizations are more likely to pull together and support each other in tough times, resulting in a boost in employee satisfaction and well-being. The greater sense of transparency and collaboration will reduce stress by way of the collective working as “one band, one sound.”
Development
Once you have identified your various workforce segments, it is important to develop them strategically. This approach must be unique to each segment to ensure the initiatives set deliver the desired outcomes. Since high-performers and high-potential employees know they outperform their peers, they are our most significant risk for leaving. It will be critical to begin the development process before they feel underappreciated, resulting in waning motivation and consideration of outside opportunities.
For High Performers, there will come a point where performance rewards (e.g., bonuses, public recognition, etc.) are not enough. This group will often yearn for more opportunities, and while we have traditionally suggested that this should be increased leadership opportunities, it is imperative to evaluate this subsection diligently. Excluding those high performers, who are indeed high potential, here are some ways to satisfy this population's need for development and growth.
Specialized Skill Training: Offering opportunities to enhance their skills and depth of expertise will prove beneficial. Companies should tie this training to the needs of the business and the direction in which the function is heading. Remember, digitally skilled professionals are essential today.
Special projects: Consider projects that match their skills and performance level. Allow them to be high-profile and challenging. The perspective of being critical in helping solve a vital business issue will help them remain engaged and aid in professional growth.
Mentorship/External Recruiting opportunities: By allowing them to mentor others or serve as an external representative for the company, you are acknowledging their expertise—which they will love— but also assisting in developing their leadership capabilities.
High-potential employees have leadership promise, yet they are often not ready. It will be upon the organization to curate specialized leadership tracks for this population. While this can vary, I suggest the following best practices:
Continuous Growth: skill and leadership must be a delicate balance. From formal education to certification to online learning, offering a robust amount of traditional learning opportunities is recommended. Grow their skills within their function and in areas with talent gaps. This level of investment will showcase your confidence and long-term vision for them within the company.
Leadership and Managerial Development: Focusing on both leadership and managerial development will ensure holistic development. Often, the two are conflated when they are not equal. Be sure that these programs feature opportunities like executive coaching, inclusive leadership training, strategic thinking, and vision-setting activities, people management skill development (e.g., conflict resolution, the art of feedback, delegation, etc.), and business acumen (e.g., budget management, market analysis, understanding financial statements, etc.)
Cross-functional Connections: Great leaders understand the inner workings of the business. Provide them with chances to work within or with different aspects of the organization to broaden their understanding of roles, responsibilities, and the intricacies of the business.
Empowerment of Self: whether in one-on-ones or elsewhere, creating space for leaders to deepen their self-understanding and autonomy. What is their leadership style? How do they respond to stress? In what ways do their unique identities allow them to be impactful? Ensuring affirmation of their decision-making yet offering a thoughtful person along the way.
Beyond role-related skill development, organizational influencers' development will focus on the mobilization of people. Their program should include training that maximizes this ability, which includes conflict resolution, emotional intelligence, and cultural competency. Others include:
Influence Opportunities: Offer chances to support committees or task forces. How can they galvanize people around a central goal or resolve project misunderstandings? Encourage leadership and participation in internal and external professional networks to broaden their perspectives and connections.
Skill Development: Focus on advancing advanced communications capacities. This would include public speaking and negotiation techniques. Consider developing them into trainers or mentors within the organization. Equip them with dedicated change management skills. They will serve as constant representatives who consider the impact of changes when implementing new strategies and shifts within the organization.
Personal Brand Development: Implement mechanisms for regular 360-degree feedback explicitly tied to influence and areas of improvement. Offer workshops on defining and building a personal brand; participants should walk away with a brand that aligns with their role as influencers and the organization's values.
Harmony
As we move forward in 2024, leaders must recognize and sincerely appreciate individuals' strengths and actively curate a culture that supports their development and aspirations. This process requires moving beyond accommodations and transitioning to the harmonious integration of each identity to propel the organization toward its objectives. The harmonization of a diverse workforce that includes high performers, high potential, organizational influencers, and others ultimately lies in intentionality.
For organizations seeking to create cohesion, efficiency, and maximized productivity, the environment must focus on three strategies: Culture of Inclusion and Respect, Collaboration and Cross-Pollination of Ideas, and Recognition and Development of Individual Talents. By doing so, leaders can transform their collective potential into dynamic success. This dynamic approach to talent management ensures that everyone’s unique contributions are amplified, leading to a synergistic outcome where the whole is far greater than the sum of its parts.
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ABOUT TURNKEYZRG
Founded in 1996, TurnkeyZRG is a highly specialized talent recruitment/executive search firm filling C-level, senior-level and mid-management level positions throughout sports, entertainment and media. Over the past 25 years, TurnkeyZRG has filled more than 1,400 positions throughout sports, entertainment and media. TurnkeyZRG helps teams, leagues, stadiums, arenas, theaters, college athletic departments, events, sponsors, agencies, media companies, private equity companies and other clients identify, recruit and hire the very best management talent. Turnkey now benefits from ZRG’s global footprint, full array of industry practice groups, data-driven, analytical search tools, and technology investment in changing the way executive search/talent recruiting is done. TurnkeyZRG becomes a tech-enabled disrupter of the prior executive search model.