Personio Pulse: How to identify and nurture your superstars

The high performance halo effect 😇

As you might expect, high performing employees are good for business, boosting culture, quality of work and productivity. But in 2021 alone, almost half of high-performing employees left their companies, taking vast amounts of skills and knowledge with them. That’s a tough gap to fill! 

Here’s how you can avoid the dreaded talent drain, while making your organisation a more attractive and supportive place for top achievers.    

4 ways to identify your star performers 💫

Observe behaviours 

Picture a person you work with who shows drive, initiative, and high-level strategic thinking (if you’re thinking of yourself, feel free to give yourself a pat on the back now). According to research by Indeed, these attributes are the tell-tale signs of a star employee. 

To help identify these people across your organisation, look for the following behaviours: 

• They’re natural role models and aren’t afraid to make executive decisions
• They’re always looking to innovate and are eager to take on new and challenging work
• They’re adaptable and can work through difficult situations.
• They enjoy their work and share your organisation’s vision and values 
• They seek feedback to learn how to improve
• They can make decisions quickly but also consider all outcomes and impacts.
• They’re self-motivated and can be trusted to manage themselves and their workload

Track those KPIs

While observing behaviours is subjective, using KPIs will add more rigour to your approach. Your metrics should be clear and easy to measure. These can range from goal-based metrics (such as revenue generated) to metrics that focus on effectivity and productivity (such as task completion rate). 

Go 360 

Use the 360 feedback model to get the full picture. After all, a coworker may have more insight than a manager when it comes to how an employee performs.

Use People Management Software 

Modern people management software like Personio can seamlessly track your employees’ behaviour, career progression and development. It gathers everything you need to identify a high performer, from performance reviews and feedback to absences and more.

Our top tips for nurturing excellence 🌱

If high performers don’t receive the recognition and development they desire, they’ll look for it elsewhere – and you could lose your superstars. Here’s how to nurture and retain them instead:

Identify skills and goals

Unlock potential by identifying high performers’ skills and goals, and creating a tailored learning and development programme to support their growth. 

Recognise achievements 

Lack of recognition can lead to demotivation, so make sure to recognise and celebrate achievements. 

Provide room to grow

Empower your high performers to thrive by providing growth opportunities such as challenging tasks, leadership responsibilities and new projects – but avoid overloading them.

Grant autonomy

Elevate your high performers’ productivity and creativity by granting them autonomy over their projects. This not only recognises their self-starter qualities but also allows them to innovate and feel valued.

Build a community

Create a flourishing community of high performers within your organisation by connecting them with each other, fostering a powerful team that inspires, networks, and is even more engaged. 

Tune in  

Actively tap into your high performers’ knowledge by listening to their feedback, suggestions and experiences, and involving them in the hiring process to identify other potential superstars.

Got those gold stars ready? This article is based on a blog post which includes even more detailed tips and advice, as well as a download of our Performance Review Template. Take a look here.