In an ideal world, every employee in your organization would be a high performer with high potential-but that's obviously not realistic. The appropriate question is how to move employees toward the upper-right quadrant or at least to the high-performance tier.

It is not always possible, nor always the desired goal. There is no one size fits all strategy but a general framework is provided below:

☛ High performance or high potential:

1. Keep them where they are or promote

2. Constant encouragement

3. Challenging assignments

4. Soft skill development

5. Provide autonomy

☛ Low performance or low potential:

1. Performance plan

2. Termination

3. Pair with a High Performer

4. New role better aligned with skills

5. Training

6. Test with more responsibilities