When Promotions Are Frozen but Ambition Isn’t. What’s Your Next Move?

This is the latest edition of my new work advice column — Dear Dr. Jo! If you have a work issue you’d love my insight on, please email me at advice@incitetoleadership.com or DM me here on LinkedIn.

What would you do if your top performer is ready for more but your hands are tied because of current company policies? In my advice to this worried reader, I explore the possibility that not all employees want a promotion and there may be other ways to reward your star team member.

Dear Dr. Jo, 

I have a situation that's keeping me up at night. My star team member, who's been on my team for three years, is clearly ready for the next level. She consistently delivers exceptional results, has great leadership potential, and has become the go-to person for our most challenging projects.

The problem? We're under a company-wide promotion and raise freeze due to recent market conditions. This freeze is likely to last at least through the next two quarters. Meanwhile, I can see her taking on more and more responsibility - staying late, missing family dinners, and working weekends to deliver excellence.

Just last week, she mentioned getting calls from recruiters, and while she assured me she's not looking, I know our competitors would love to have her. I'm torn between giving her more growth opportunities (which she craves but might lead to burnout) and pulling back (which might make her feel stagnant and more likely to leave).

To make matters worse, I've noticed she's starting to show signs of strain - missing her usual workout routine, looking tired, and becoming slightly short with junior team members, which isn't like her at all.

How do I keep her engaged and growing without burning her out? How do I have honest conversations about the promotion freeze without losing her? What can I offer when my hands are tied financially?- Worried About Losing My Best

Dear Worried,

You’re not wrong to worry. Honestly, I think more leaders should be thinking about how to manage their team members for both growth and sustainability. We want our employees to feel challenged, yet we don’t want them to feel burnt-out or under appreciated. Of course, this issue feels a lot more relevant and worrisome when there’s a star performer you desperately want to hold onto. So I want to acknowledge how much you clearly care about this employee, value her work, and want to meet her needs for growth while also recognizing the strain that growth might be having on her right now.

First let’s take a step back and talk about what you can do: Your “Star” has already opened the discussion by mentioning calls from recruiters. This might have been a wake-up call for you, but it’s also a signal that now is the time to talk to her about what’s important to her rather than waiting until she has an offer-in-hand. So set aside a generous amount of time (lunch outside the office?) and ask Star some key questions:

• What work are you enjoying right now that you’re doing? What would you like to do more of?
• What parts of your job are less fulfilling? How could we think together about how to make those parts easier (e.g., train up a junior staff member, lessen their frequency, add in some AI helpers)?
• As you know, promotions (and raises?) are currently off-the-table at our company, but how else could we make you feel rewarded or appreciated?  

Oftentimes, we have the assumption that everyone wants to be promoted, but what Star might appreciate more is not having people text her at night or on the weekends. Star might love the support of an executive coach to help her manager her time better. (Do you like how I slipped that in? But truly, most of my clients feel incredible valued when they are prioritized for external coaching). Or perhaps Star has a problematic junior team member (thus her shortness) that she would gladly give up to another leader to performance manage. The truth is that neither of us knows what would make Star happier at work, but she probably has some good ideas.

In this same conversation, you can feel free to share some of your concerns about Star’s work habits, her lack of good boundaries around work, and even her shortness with other team members. What high performers tell me every single day is that they wish they had more honest feedback from their managers. Nothing signals your true investment in mentoring a direct report more than being willing to have challenging conversations in support of their growth and development. 

Don’t assume only praising Star is the way to keep her happy.

Finally, and while I’m saying this to you, it really applies to every leader reading this. You can be the best boss in the world, at an amazing company that lives its values everyday, be willing to guide, mentor and support your directs—and still have people leave. Yes, people do leave when they’re unhappy, but happy people leave too. They want to try out a different company, they want to learn a new skill or industry, they want to live in a different location, they’ve always wanted to try a start-up. . . the list is endless.

What this means is that you are actually taking on a lot of unnecessary stress if you’re trying to control someone else’s decisions and thought process. What can you do instead? Make sure you’re making your own contingency plans: How will you run your group without Star? Who should start being cross-trained now? Is there a solidly-performing employee you’ve overlooked while over-focusing on Star?

Often the things that we over-prepare for don’t happen, but the preparation in, and of itself, can make you a more resilient leader. So have an honest conversation with Star about how to keep her feeling rewarded and also think about how your function would work without Star, without other key employees, perhaps even without you? As Mike Tyson famously said, "Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face.” So start thinking strategically about the punches you might foresee and make sure you’re keeping yourself mentally strong and sustainable for the curves that are always around the corner.