How to Keep A-Players in Your Business

Let’s talk about working with “A-Players”, or “Stars”.

Everyone has heard the advice, “Hire A-Players”. But very few people have multiple A-Players on their team. Why is this?

Is it fear? Fear that the A-Player will be unhappy and leave?

I think it’s more than that. I think it’s a certainty that the A Player will be unhappy and leave.

See, one does not simply “hire A-Players”. Hiring an A-Player is 1% of the battle.

The rest of the 99% is working with the A-Player. Keeping the A-Player.

If you know how to keep an A-Player, you’ll have a lot more confidence in hiring one.

So, how do you keep an A-Player, long term? 5 or 10 years?

I think it comes down to 1 key important thing:

Fearless delegation.

If you want an A-Player on your team, you had better have the guts to say to them:

“Here’s an extremely complicated task that I have no idea how to solve. Could you figure it out?”

This may sound obvious, but you’d be surprised.

Many, many of my colleagues are terrified of such delegation. They refuse to believe that someone else could possibly produce quality work for them.

They think that without their constant direct input, nothing in the company could ever work. That is a fateful trap. Nothing puts the brakes on a growing company like that attitude.

Very few people have become extremely successful without the ability to fearlessly delegate complex projects to smart team members. That ability is a requirement for you.

For you to succeed in building a team of A-players, you must let go of any fear of delegation. Can you do it?

– Aleksander Vitkin