Retaining Rockstars

While cutting chameleons, criminals, cancers and communists

10% of your employees deliver 75% of the value

40% deliver 75% more value

35% deliver no value

And the last 15%, the 4 C’s (chameleons, criminals, cancers and communists) deliver negative 50% of the value

Let’s break this down:

10% of your workforce keeps your company in business. These people are insane. Their obsessive behavior likely drives many people crazy but if you’re lucky enough to employ them, you need to work like hell to retain them because your corporate profits depend on convincing them that these individuals deserve maybe 30% of aggregate employee wages IF your company excels at employee evaluations.

Because most companies do not excel at employee evaluations, they will artificially normalize performance and attempt to pay these gifts from Heaven 15-20% of aggregate wages, and will lose many of them due to corporate greed and misevaluations. At times, your own employees will try to root them out because they expose the incompetence above them and they are seen as a threat.

Your next 40% of your workforce contributes 75% of total employee value. Surprisingly, these individuals simply do what they are told to do, and rarely any more. How do they amount to 75% of value contributed? Because an employee who does their job without conspiring against your company is actually worth nearly twice their wage.

The next 35% do nothing. But you’re still paying them because your performance reviews suck. They’ve gamed your system, effectively outsmarting you, and you haven’t devised away to measure and document their non-performance.

And the last 15% of your workforce are the worst. Chameleons, criminals, cancers and communists.