Will Humphreys argues that top performers leave organizations not because of pay or conditions, but because companies keep C players: productive people whose values don't align. He calls them 'the cancer' because they're hard to fire despite dragging down high performers.
Chapters
What is the number one reason why A players leave? The number one reason is because we don't let go of C players. So, listen, let's. Let's clarify what a C player is. There's a whole description of A, B, C and D that I have on my YouTube channel. You can go down there and check it out. C players are the cancer. The C stands for cancer. These are people who are oftentimes highly productive and very low in terms of value alignment. So these are the people who are at work, who are working enough and, like, they're carrying enough of the load to where it makes it really hard to let them go. Because if you had someone who was not producing well and had very poor value alignment.