Topgrading Your Staff
Topgrading Your Team
This article will discuss "Topgrading" your team and its importance as part of the Complete Sales System. Topgrading is a term you'll hear a lot of senior leaders speak to, and I know that in many smaller companies, the employees often view this as threatening. However, this doesn't have to be the case, if done correctly, topgrading will not only be seen positively, but the employees you want to retain will support it.
What Is The Topgrading Hiring Method and How Does it Work?
For those of you who may be unfamiliar with the term, topgrading is a practice whereby a company creates the highest quality workforce by ensuring that talent acquisition and talent management processes focus on identifying, hiring, promoting, and retaining high performers at every salary level. Hundreds of companies are topgrading their staffs, including GE, HP, Honeywell, and many others. Unfortunately, too few smaller companies do this, mainly because they fail to understand the importance of it. There are many calculators to determine the costs. This calculator is standard and straightforward. Let's say you are hiring a VP of sales in high tech, and their OTE is $350k. Once you add in a recruiting fee and lost opportunity cost, you can easily exceed $2M. This doesn't account for factors such as a decline in morale, disengagement from those reporting to them, and bad business decisions.
Here are a few simple suggestions when it comes to topgrading employees:
• Be transparent and make it a part of the culture.
• Help everyone understand the process and benefits of topgrading.
• Plan and set a specific time of the year to go through this process.
You will find that when you make it public and well-known, it's no longer a shock to people. Transparency is crucial so those you lead will understand and respect you more.
Topgrading Benefits
Be clear about the abundant benefits. When you topgrade and keep the basics above in mind, company performance can increase dramatically along with employee engagement. In addition, your A & B players will thrive in this environment because:
The team will be without dead weight and no longer have to pick up the slack.
The C players and below are no longer harmful or a distraction to those who push to be at the top of their game.
Topgrading drives performance and improves results across your company. In addition, all the employees tied to a company bonus or equity will make more money.
Topgrading shouldn't be viewed as coldhearted or not caring for your employees. Those who genuinely don't understand it may be too focused on not hurting feelings when it's a tool to motivate, retain, and improve the engagement of your best employees. The result is that you're taking care of the company's greater good.
Deliverables Sample:
Key criteria for Top Grading
When & how to Top Grade
Messaging to staff and company and benefits to them
Topgrading Interview Process
Measure And Evaluate the Current Hiring Process
First, look at any processes for your current interview process. Then, weed out what things you like that work and those that do not.
Develop A Job Scoreboard
A scorecard is the best way to ensure the skill required to do the job remains at the forefront. In addition, having the requirements of the role laid out will make choosing the best fit easier and not based on anything other than skill set and allow you to hire better people fit for the role.
Recruit Your Candidates
It is essential to have the job description listed and written out for candidates to see exactly what it entails.
Filter Candidates With A Work History Form
Learning more about a candidate's past can help you decide if this person is right for your company. Asking questions like why they left their previous job, what their likes and dislikes were about that role etc., can be an important part of learning who a candidate is.
The Telephone Screening Interview
First, set up a telephone interview that will act as a screening process before you get on to the next step. Allowing this part of the process will allow you to decide if this person could be a good fit or not without wasting much of anyone's time.
Conduct Competency Interviews
This portion of the interviews will allow you to learn much more about the candidate, their efficiency, and how they conduct themselves. By asking a series of questions relating to conduct, you will gather how the candidate deals with tasks, time management, and how to be an effective employee.
Conduct Topgrading Interview
Time to dive deep into the resume. In this interview step, you will dive deep and go back into their entire work history. Make sure you show interest and ask about every job listed on the candidate's resume. The more you ask, the more you learn and will be more confident in moving forward or not.
Implementing Topgrading At Your Company
Any interview process is just a quick way to get to know a candidate, and the topgrading process is a bit more in-depth. When hiring for your company, especially in a leadership role, there are many reasons why topgrading is the ideal vetting process. It allows you to dive deep into the person's work history, learn more about them on a career level, and ultimately make the right decision the first time.
Summary/Conclusion
Topgrading allows you to look at your current hiring process and improve. When you do this, you will hire quality candidates that will take your business to the next level. If you would like additional help in this area, please don't hesitate to contact us.
