We always try to learn how to engage and motivate our employees. But which employees do we concentrate on - our "high performers" or "low performers?" (We assume low performers may not be worth the investment as they may engage themselves right out of the organization).

Most of you would say your high performers. But we at WorkWonders would propose that in order to develop and retain your high performers, you must uncover the potential of your average performers. When we need a project with a tight deadline, who do we turn to - most likely your high performers. When a crisis occurs, who do you turn to - your high performers. When we turn to our high performers again and again, we abuse them and we burn them out.

Meanwhile, there are a whole group of B "middle performers"

What do they see? They sit there and see the high performers as being overworked and always stressed, sending emails at 2am and working on week-ends. They think to themselves "who wants that kind of life?"

In order to retain your high performers and uncover the potential of your average performers, you must share the load. About 80% of middle performers have tremendous untapped potential: they could become high performers. But we're making huge mistakes in how we manage them. Read more...