New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: Name for the dynamic when new hires outperform those with seniority?
Ask HN: Name for the dynamic when new hires outperform those with seniority?
3 by parpfish | 3 comments on Hacker News.
I was reading a thread on HN the other day that introduced me to the concept of the "Dead Sea Effect" in companies that can't retain talent. The simple summary of the effect is this: if your company is unappealing in some way and can't/won't retain high performers, the high performers will leave and the company will become dominated by low performers. (The original article has been linked to a LOT if you search the archives, but here's another link for the curious: https://ift.tt/y3dOT4b) The dead sea effect reminds me of something I've seen firsthand at a few startups, and I'm hoping that somebody here can let me know if it has a name because I'd love to read up about it more. The phenomenon of interest works something like this: - A small startup doesn't have the means/clout to hire top talent at every position, so the make-do with some early employees that are poor-to-average performers. - Like the dead-sea effect, those poor-to-average performers will cling to the company because the don't have other options. - If the company starts to grow, two things happen: a) those early employees can use their seniority to move into leadership positions and b) the company starts attracting higher quality new hires. Resulting in departments with lots of talented new hires at the bottom of the org chart and poor-performing (but long-tenured) employees firmly entrenched at the top. The result is that if a startup undergoes rapid growth/expansion, you can have a situation where employee seniority is inversely related with their performance.
3 by parpfish | 3 comments on Hacker News.
I was reading a thread on HN the other day that introduced me to the concept of the "Dead Sea Effect" in companies that can't retain talent. The simple summary of the effect is this: if your company is unappealing in some way and can't/won't retain high performers, the high performers will leave and the company will become dominated by low performers. (The original article has been linked to a LOT if you search the archives, but here's another link for the curious: https://ift.tt/y3dOT4b) The dead sea effect reminds me of something I've seen firsthand at a few startups, and I'm hoping that somebody here can let me know if it has a name because I'd love to read up about it more. The phenomenon of interest works something like this: - A small startup doesn't have the means/clout to hire top talent at every position, so the make-do with some early employees that are poor-to-average performers. - Like the dead-sea effect, those poor-to-average performers will cling to the company because the don't have other options. - If the company starts to grow, two things happen: a) those early employees can use their seniority to move into leadership positions and b) the company starts attracting higher quality new hires. Resulting in departments with lots of talented new hires at the bottom of the org chart and poor-performing (but long-tenured) employees firmly entrenched at the top. The result is that if a startup undergoes rapid growth/expansion, you can have a situation where employee seniority is inversely related with their performance.
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