[HBR] How many of your HiPo’s are about to leave you?

How many key High-Potentials on your team are about to leave?

Do you know? Or just think you know?

Even if they’re not leaving physically, how many have disengaged and left the proverbial building mentally?

According to Gallup, employee disengagement represents “a stunning amount of wasted potential, given that business units in the top quartile of Gallup’s global employee engagement database are 17% more productive and 21% more profitable than those in the bottom quartile.”

The war for today’s top talent has become fierce. Losing a key, high-potential team member in this environment can be more costly than ever and hard to recover from.

As a senior leader, how can you prevent both disengagement and the eventual exit of your HiPo’s?

A recent Harvard Business Review (HBR) article recommends that one of the best ways to retain high-potential employees is to give them a growth pathway:

“When your employees (and maybe even you, as their manager) aren’t allowed to grow, they begin to feel that they don’t matter. They feel like a cog in a wheel, easily swapped out. If you aren’t invested in them, they won’t be invested in you, and even if they don’t walk out the door, they will mentally check out.”

The most skillful leaders understand the learning curve of their teams.

HBR further states that teams are optimized when 15% are learning new skills, 70% are in their sweet spot, doing what they do best every day, and 15% have reached a level of mastery in their roles.

It is those 15% — your high performing team members — who are at risk of leaving if they’re not given the opportunity to jump to a new level of responsibility and begin the curve again.

This all begs a very simple question — how can you identify and engage your at-risk HiPo’s?

By using data.

The Urgency and Intensity scale on the Flippen Profile measures a person’s task focus and how much they value time. In other words, how focused they are on getting things done. If an individual’s self-score is in an acceptable range, but their 360 scores (how others rate them) are low, it can be a sign they have already begun checking out mentally.

Same with the Aggressiveness scale. People who are internally competitive and striving to win may not be viewed that way by their teammates if they are feeling unchallenged in their role.

And it goes without saying that employees scoring high on our Need for Change scale are even at a higher risk for leaving the real building!

Team members who are growing are more likely to give you their incremental effort.

Are you really helping your people grow?

Are you collecting behavioral data to get an early warning on the HiPo’s who may be heading for your door?

We can help! Contact us.

For more than 25 years, the Flippen Group has leveraged neuroscience, psychometrics, and adult-learning technologies to bring out the best in Fortune 500 companies, school districts, government organizations, and professional sports teams. We use analytics and coaching to help your team eliminate counterproductive behaviors, have fun, hit goals, and earn bonuses.

Learn how to overcome the “5 Pervasive Team Challenges” [Free Report]