I think the value of low performers becomes much more obvious when you separate out the concept of a toxic employee. Toxic employees hurt the team or organization whether low performing or high performing, and with rare exceptions it’s almost always worth getting rid of them. Toxic employees are the people getting into arguments and conflicts all the time, dragging others down constantly. Or they’re the managers who cause attrition or can’t retain their team or lie to their peers and own leadership until it catches up to them, often dramatically.
However, low performers are not always toxic. Often, low performers are just kind of lazy, or they take longer than they should to finish their work, or they take too long to reply to emails or messages, or their work needs extra review and checks and balances, or they are only capable of delivering on a relatively small set of fairly simple tasks, or they just want to work on the same part of the same product forever and can’t emotionally handle change, or …
Non-toxic low performers can be great because they’ll often do the unglamorous work for you for relatively low pay, and all you have to do is not bother them too much. The worst thing you can do with non-toxic low performers is try to force them into high performers. It won’t work, because they’re either not capable or they just don’t care. For some people, their work just isn’t that important to them, and there’s nothing you can do to change their perception of the relative importance of their job to the other aspects of their life. What might look like low performance in a corporate environment can just be someone setting boundaries and refusing to let work infringe too much on their personal life.
However, low performers are not always toxic. Often, low performers are just kind of lazy, or they take longer than they should to finish their work, or they take too long to reply to emails or messages, or their work needs extra review and checks and balances, or they are only capable of delivering on a relatively small set of fairly simple tasks, or they just want to work on the same part of the same product forever and can’t emotionally handle change, or …
Non-toxic low performers can be great because they’ll often do the unglamorous work for you for relatively low pay, and all you have to do is not bother them too much. The worst thing you can do with non-toxic low performers is try to force them into high performers. It won’t work, because they’re either not capable or they just don’t care. For some people, their work just isn’t that important to them, and there’s nothing you can do to change their perception of the relative importance of their job to the other aspects of their life. What might look like low performance in a corporate environment can just be someone setting boundaries and refusing to let work infringe too much on their personal life.