‘Star Talent’ Strategy Makes Apple & Google Employees 40% More Productive

According to a new report from Fast Company, researchers at Bain & Company found that companies like Apple, Google, Dell, and Netflix are 40% more productive than other companies.

The researchers show that the most productive companies have approximately the same percentage of star players as less productive companies, 16 percent versus 15 percent respectively. So what’s the difference?

The difference is that Apple, Google, and the others select a few roles that are critical to the business and fill 95 percent of those roles with star players. The remaining roles in the company have fewer star players. The researchers also found that the super productive companies get more work by 10 a.m. on Thursday than most other companies achieve in an entire week.

Employers must decide how to become as productive as possible based on their own culture and vision.

The most productive companies happen to be tech employers, which place a premium on star performers. Technology evolves at a fast pace, so these firms need “A-talent” teams that can get state-of-the-art products quickly off the drawing board and into the marketplace.