明星員工就該獲得明星待遇嗎？（上）

How vital are your vital few? In any team or organization, a small number of individuals will account for a substantial amount of collective output. These “stars” are able to systematically outperform the majority of their peers and confirm the well-established Pareto effect whereby 80% of collective output can be attributed to 20% of the people in a group, or even fewer.

在你的公司裏，那些重要的少數人有多重要？在任何團隊或組織中，一小部分個人將佔集體產出的很大一部分。這些“明星”能夠系統地超越他們的大多數同行，並證實了帕累託效應，即80%的集體產出可以歸因於一個羣體中20%的人，甚至更少。

Contrary to popular belief, there are universal traits that predict whether individuals will be part of an organization’s vital few, such as their higher levels of intelligence, work ethic, and social skills. In other words, people who are smart, nice, and hard-working tend to outperform their peers. They also learn faster and are more likely to adapt to new demands, which means they have higher levels of potential even for jobs they have not done in the past.

與普遍的看法相反，有一些普遍的特質可以預測個人是否會成爲組織中少數重要成員的一部分，比如他們的智力、職業道德和社會技能。換句話說，聰明、善良、勤奮的人往往比他們的同齡人表現更好。他們也學得更快，更有可能適應新的需求，這意味着他們有更高水平的潛力，即使是他們過去沒有做過的工作。

Because of this, stars are more likely to be in demand than their peers, so they will be approached by recruiters and rival organizations, who will try to entice them with better job offers and career opportunities. As McKinsey predicted 20-years ago, there is a War for Talent, and, in the age of human capital, a company’s stars are the commodities being fought for. This is particularly critical in high-complexity jobs, where the average output difference between average and star employees is 800% (as opposed to 50% in low-complexity jobs).

正因爲如此，明星們比他們的同齡人更有可能成爲搶手貨，所以招聘人員和競爭對手會聯繫他們，他們會試圖用更好的工作機會和職業機會來吸引他們。正如麥肯錫20年前預測的那樣，人才爭奪戰正在打響，在人力資本時代，公司的明星是人們爭奪的商品。這在高複雜度的工作中尤爲關鍵，在高複雜度的工作中，普通員工和明星員工的平均產出差是800%（相比之下，低複雜度工作的平均產出差是50%）。

So, what can you do to keep your star performers motivated? Since engagement is a critical driver of performance, minimizing the gap between what your stars can do and actually do will be vital to achieving the highest level of collective output. Here are a few data-driven suggestions:

那麼，你能做些什麼來激勵你的明星員工呢？由於敬業度是績效的一個關鍵驅動因素，因此儘量縮小明星們能夠做什麼，和實際做什麼之間的差距對於實現最高水平的集體產出至關重要。以下是一些數據驅動的建議：

1. Know who they actually are:

This may sound obvious, but since most organizations rely on subjective ratings of managers to identify their star performers, false positives are the norm. Unfortunately, this unreliable methodology turns the pivotal exercise of internal talent identification into a popularity contest whereby politically astute employees who manage up and take credit for others’ achievements are more likely to emerge as high potentials — though they more faux po’s than hipo’s. Consider that a seminal meta-analysis on the main predictors of career success identified that political skills are the strongest predictor. As I argue in my forthcoming book, this is one of the reasons why men are more likely to emerge as leaders, even when they are incompetent. In order to ensure that you know who your star performers really are, you should: (a) put in place reliable quantitative performance indicators to compare people’s relative contribution to the team’s performance; (b) use valid psychological assessments to identify their potential (beyond their past performance); and (c) pay attention to your employees’ reputations, particularly what their peers and colleagues think of them (you can’t fool all people all the time). And remember: some people will always get annoyed when they find out they are not regarded as stars, but fair rules and transparent criteria will significantly reduce the number of complainers.

這聽起來似乎很明顯，但由於大多數組織依賴於管理者的主觀評價來確定他們的明星員工，錯覺也是常態。不幸的是，這種不可靠的方法將內部人才鑑定的關鍵實踐變成了一場人氣競賽，在這場競賽中，管理得當、爲他人成就爭光的政治精明員工更有可能脫穎而出，儘管他們比高潛力人才更假。考慮到一項關於職業成功主要預測因素的開創性薈萃分析發現，政治技能是最強有力的預測因素。正如我在即將出版的新書中所言，這也是爲什麼男性更有可能成爲領導者的原因之一，即使他們不稱職。爲了確保你知道你的明星員工到底是誰，你應該：（1）建立可靠的量化績效指標來比較人們對團隊績效的相對貢獻；（2）使用有效的心理評估來確定他們的潛力（超越過去的表現）；（3）注意員工的聲譽，特別是他們的同事和同事對他們的看法（你不能總是愚弄所有人）。記住：有些人發現自己不被視爲明星時總是會生氣，但公平的規則和透明的標準會大大減少抱怨者的數量。

2. Let them know that you know they’re valuable:

Although many organizations refrain from telling their stars that they are stars, there are several problems with this approach. First, if your concern is that by telling your stars that you consider them stars they will become entitled, then you should note that true stars have the capacity to remain motivated and humble even after their contribution to the firm is acknowledged. In other words, if their performance decreases because you told them, then they were not real stars (and you will not lose too much if they go). Second, fairness is not treating everyone the same, but treating them as they deserve to be treated: if you make your stars feel that they are just like everyone else, they will feel unfairly treated, and rightly so. Third, no matter how much potential people have, they will need to be developed in order to live up to it. This means investing in them, and since you cannot invest in every single employee — and investing in your stars will produce the biggest ROI — you will probably want to tell them that they are worthy of investment. And if you are worried about the risk that they might leave after you invest in them, remember that, as Henry Ford noted, “the only thing worse than training your employees and having them leave is not training them and having them stay.”

雖然許多組織不願告訴他們是明星員工的事實，但這種方法存在幾個問題。首先，如果你關心的是，通過告訴你的明星員工們，你認爲他們會有資格成爲明星員工，那麼你應該注意到，真正的明星員工有能力保持積極性和謙遜，即使他們對公司的貢獻已經得到認可。換句話說，如果他們的表現因爲你告訴他們而下降，那麼他們就不是真正的明星（如果他們走了，你也不會損失太多）。第二，公平不是對每個人都一視同仁，而是按照他們應該得到的待遇對待他們：如果你讓你的明星元覺得他們和其他人一樣，他們會覺得自己受到了不公平的對待，而且這樣做是正確的。第三，無論人們有多少潛力，他們將需要發展以達到它。這意味着對他們進行投資，既然你不可能對每一個員工都進行投資——而對你的明星員工進行投資會產生最大的投資回報率——你可能會想告訴他們，他們值得投資。如果你擔心他們可能在你投資後離開，請記住，正如Henry Ford所指出的，“唯一比培訓員工、讓他們離開更糟糕的事情，就是不培訓他們，讓他們留下來。”

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