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Game Changer
How to Be 10x in the Talent Economy
Game Changer (2020) is a guide to attracting the superstar talents that power the modern economy. By explaining how to identify and manage top talent, it will help you understand what strategies are needed for firms and workers to stay on the cutting edge.
- Recruiters looking for the next big hire
- Managers responsible for great talent
- Skilled workers looking to level up
Michael Solomon and Rishon Blumberg are talent managers who got their start in the music industry. After representing musicians like John Mayer and Vanessa Carlton, they expanded into the tech world, creating talent management company 10x Management in 2012 to help change the way top programmers find work.
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Game Changer
How to Be 10x in the Talent Economy
- Read in 13 minutes
- Audio & text available
- Contains 8 key ideas
Synopsis
Game Changer (2020) is a guide to attracting the superstar talents that power the modern economy. By explaining how to identify and manage top talent, it will help you understand what strategies are needed for firms and workers to stay on the cutting edge.
Key idea 1 of 8
10xers are employees with skills, talent, and motivation that make them 10x more valuable than other employees.
It’s time to talk about the best of the best. The crème de la crème. The game-changers. Are there any in your organization?
Don’t just think about people who are good at their jobs; think about the single best worker you know – someone who does things others wouldn’t dream of and is always pushing to be better.
That’s a 10xer, someone who goes above and beyond to deliver 10 times the value of normal performance. Not surprisingly, managers want as many of these workers as they can find. And in the talent economy, having 10xers on your team is what will set you up for success and differentiate you from other organizations in increasingly crowded markets.
The key message here is: 10xers are employees with skills, talent, and motivation that make them 10x more valuable than other employees.
Understanding what a 10xer is and, just as importantly, what motivates that person, is an essential part of building a modern organization. So what exactly makes someone a 10xer?
Though 10xers can be found in any field, the concept comes from the tech industry. What sets them apart is their combination of high IQ and high EQ, or emotional intelligence. They’re smart, creative, and always interested in learning more.
For example, a large share of 10x tech workers contribute to open-source coding projects, which are networks dedicated to developing and sharing software at no cost. It may seem odd that someone would spend time giving his work away for free, but passion for their work is at the core of what 10xers are all about. They truly love what they do and want to get better at it.
This combination of skills and personality leads to truly amazing outcomes. For example, one start-up Solomon and Blumberg worked with had a 36-member team, but still couldn’t get the outcomes or the efficiency they needed. The authors sent over three 10x developers, and the results were astonishing: two weeks later, the three 10xers were so effective that the team was able to operate with just three of its original 36 members. “Great” is worth far more than “good” – 10x more, in fact.
Key ideas in this title
- 10xers are employees with skills, talent, and motivation that make them 10x more valuable than other employees.
- Give your 10xers space and flexibility to thrive.
- For peak performance, managers must learn what drives their 10xers.
- To find potential 10xers, look for people with a “success impulse.”
- To build trust with 10xers, managers need to communicate well and check their egos.
- To get other people to understand your value when negotiating, have a third party speak for you.
- In the modern workforce, you need to know how to be both manager and talent.
- Final summary
