Tech and venture capitalists are quick to recognize the value of a “10x” employee — the ones that are 10 times as productive as their peers. In both tech and venture capital, they disproportionately contribute to the success of their products or deals. The same dynamic exists with federal employees, and every presidential transition drives some 10x federal employees out — into the hallways of contractors, into sectors related to their work, into the arms of nonprofits. You can see it in their text messages to friends, the LinkedIn updates and the offhand gossip you hear in these months.
A transition is an inflection point, like an exit event or a new funding round in a tech company, a time to reconsider the tacit and explicit deal that keeps them in the job. Is the work and the return worth staying or is it time to pursue another deal? The difference: Tech companies ensure their 10x employees are locked in before the exit event. Before these inflection points, no one in federal agencies makes sure the 10Xers are still there.
As the federal government transitions to a new administration, the influence of the tech and venture capital communities on the government functioning has never been higher. Elon Musk is leading DOGE. The early nominations and appointments of David Sacks in the White House, Jacob Helberg at State, and Scott Kupor as the new director of the Office of Personnel Management show that this administration is tapping these communities for leadership positions. One practice they can bring with them is the hunt for and preservation of the federal government’s 10x employees.
Losing a 10x employee can scuttle a product launch, deter an investment team, or break a startup. Or do the opposite — make the product launch a long-standing meme, bring competition among investment teams, or create the next unicorn.
Tech and venture capital firms are constantly searching for the engineer, the developer, the designer and the deal maker who can make this kind of difference to the success of their organizations. By poaching talent from competitors, recruiting out of high school, college and doctorate programs, and cultivating their existing networks, leaders from these communities lure these exceptional employees to their organizations.
Federal agencies have 10x performers too. We seldom pay attention to finding, recruiting and cultivating their talents and putting them in an atmosphere where they can deliver 10 times the benefit of their peers to the agency or program mission. Right now, there is pressure to cut back, fire, let go, and trim the federal workforce. Beware who you let go lest you lose the 10x federal employee who is making their agency missions possible.
There are 10Xers in government? Yes
Review the Presidential Rank Awards, the Samuel Heyman Awards (Sammies), LinkedIn’s Humans of Public Service and the recent Washington Post’s “Who Is Government?” series led by Michael Lewis. Recent books like “Hack Your Bureaucracy, Recoding America,” and numerous articles, conferences and blog posts bring to life the federal employees who, with determination, savvy, expertise and energy make a difference in their federal programs (not all of these are delivering 10 times the value of their peers; some are merely 5X or 2X — still a strong return).
Their contributions make a meaningful impact across the country. They are the branch managers sustaining marine fisheries for future generations. They are the National Institute of Standards and Technology scientists watching over how we count, weigh, measure and tell time so that we speak a common language in everything we do. They are the infrastructure teams of engineers, grants managers, contracting officers and program specialists building the bridges, airports, water treatment facilities and cell towers needed to create our future. And so much more.
Federal rules prevent playing favorites with employees in hiring and promotion. They emphasize treating people fairly and consistently. This doesn’t mean you can’t identify the employees delivering extraordinary results.
How to spot a 10x federal employee when you see one
Despite the above efforts to publicize their work, the 10x federal employees are not easy to find. They tend not to be the loudest voices, the most senior leaders, or those who are about to climb to the next position. They are buried in the programs critical to the agency’s missions. You will have to dig to find them. You have to be curious, ask questions, seek them out.
Search for them in the technical disciplines and programs doing the real work of the agencies — the wildlife biologist in the Fish and Wildlife Service, the geologist in the Bureau of Land Management and the information officer in a disaster response team.
You can even find them in the functions that facilitate getting the work done, such as contracting, human resources and IT. These are the people who reduce the burden on the line employees and lessen the friction that can get in the way of the real work, such as passing background checks, hiring contractors, or responding to a Government Accountability Office data call.
They exhibit compassionate impatience (sometimes): They do not have time to “admire the problem” — to endlessly describe what’s wrong and the reasons why. They are impatient to get on with solving the problem while understanding the restrictions that can delay their work.
They demonstrate a tenacious pursuit of outcomes: They keep a constant focus on delivering the service, the product, the value of their work to the agency and do not let others, even agency leaders, derail getting to the delivery.
They combine deep expertise with passionate curiosity: They geek out on the work and will explore endlessly with those who share their curiosity, even when they disagree.
They appear insensitive to the barriers that daunt the strongest of us: They aggressively question received wisdom, contracting habits and even regulations that get in their way. Maybe they even need some of the barriers to find elegant workarounds.
They solve wicked challenges with compelling solutions: They delight in going after what they see as a wrong to be righted, a poor service that needs to be delivered and a disenchanted partner who can save lives.
How to hold onto 10x federal employees
Give them the next dragon to slay: From cybersecurity to AI bias, from poor service design to lack of customer experience culture, from economic development to national security technologies, every agency has big problems to solve. Your 10x federal employees thrive on beating the big problems.
Reduce the crap-worth ratio: This is the difference between worthless activities and those that provide real benefits. 10x federal employees are acutely sensitive to the amount of what they consider worthless or maintenance activity they need to engage in to get to the work they do that creates value for their programs. If the ratio tilts toward the crap, they’re gone. Constant security patches, data calls from the General Counsel, the inspector general, GAO, Congress, and Freedom of Information Act experts all count in their ratio.
Authentically engage in their work (or find someone who can): 10x employees can sniff out inauthentic interest or someone going through the motions when asking questions about their work. However, they revel in authentic engagement and debate. Learn what they are doing and maybe find how you might help or find someone who can.
Encourage entrepreneurial drive: Too few federal employees are recognized for the initiative they take to get the job done efficiently and effectively. We need more, not less of this. We need to find ways to locate and praise this.
Finally, provide them some “top cover,” some protection from those who would burden them with bureaucratic tasks, defund or reassign their resources.
How are 10x federal employees different from private sector 10x employees?
Many of the characteristics of 10x employees are the same between the public and private sectors (see above). Achievement is a significant motivator in both cases. The fun of overcoming obstacles and doing something great is a motivator. However, other motivations come into play. The value transaction for tech and venture capital 10x employees includes reaping financial and prestige rewards for what they do. Federal 10x employees want to be paid enough and taken care of in retirement. However, the value transaction for 10x federal employees includes the meaning they get by saving or improving lives, reducing harm and protecting us from bad actors. If their agency cannot deliver that, they will raise their heads and see who can.
If you disparage all federal employees and the work they do and you believe this is more than just polemics and posturing, you won’t care about finding or keeping 10x employees. However, if you are really here to make government work better, they are worth finding, treasuring, rewarding them with work that means something.
Of course, all this is based on the assumption that federal work is worthy work — worth the investment, worth holding onto the 10x employees due to the importance of the mission of the federal government agencies, worth the same energy you expend to keep the best client development lead at Palantir or the best propulsion engineer at SpaceX. Our quality of life — food, air, water, medicine, housing, national security, our connections with each other — may depend on what we think of that assumption.
Peter Bonner is a public, nonprofit, and private sector innovator, working at the crossroads between these sectors in the areas of human capital, workforce development, leadership effectiveness, and operational excellence. He is a Senior Fellow at the Federation of American Scientists.
New appointees: Don’t lose your 10x federal employees
Tech companies ensure their 10x employees are locked in before the exit event. No one in federal agencies makes sure the 10Xers are still there.
Tech and venture capitalists are quick to recognize the value of a “10x” employee — the ones that are 10 times as productive as their peers. In both tech and venture capital, they disproportionately contribute to the success of their products or deals. The same dynamic exists with federal employees, and every presidential transition drives some 10x federal employees out — into the hallways of contractors, into sectors related to their work, into the arms of nonprofits. You can see it in their text messages to friends, the LinkedIn updates and the offhand gossip you hear in these months.
A transition is an inflection point, like an exit event or a new funding round in a tech company, a time to reconsider the tacit and explicit deal that keeps them in the job. Is the work and the return worth staying or is it time to pursue another deal? The difference: Tech companies ensure their 10x employees are locked in before the exit event. Before these inflection points, no one in federal agencies makes sure the 10Xers are still there.
As the federal government transitions to a new administration, the influence of the tech and venture capital communities on the government functioning has never been higher. Elon Musk is leading DOGE. The early nominations and appointments of David Sacks in the White House, Jacob Helberg at State, and Scott Kupor as the new director of the Office of Personnel Management show that this administration is tapping these communities for leadership positions. One practice they can bring with them is the hunt for and preservation of the federal government’s 10x employees.
Losing a 10x employee can scuttle a product launch, deter an investment team, or break a startup. Or do the opposite — make the product launch a long-standing meme, bring competition among investment teams, or create the next unicorn.
How are agencies creating future-ready cloud platforms that meet data accessibility and security requirements? Find out in our latest Executive Briefing, sponsored by Nutanix.
Tech and venture capital firms are constantly searching for the engineer, the developer, the designer and the deal maker who can make this kind of difference to the success of their organizations. By poaching talent from competitors, recruiting out of high school, college and doctorate programs, and cultivating their existing networks, leaders from these communities lure these exceptional employees to their organizations.
Federal agencies have 10x performers too. We seldom pay attention to finding, recruiting and cultivating their talents and putting them in an atmosphere where they can deliver 10 times the benefit of their peers to the agency or program mission. Right now, there is pressure to cut back, fire, let go, and trim the federal workforce. Beware who you let go lest you lose the 10x federal employee who is making their agency missions possible.
There are 10Xers in government? Yes
Review the Presidential Rank Awards, the Samuel Heyman Awards (Sammies), LinkedIn’s Humans of Public Service and the recent Washington Post’s “Who Is Government?” series led by Michael Lewis. Recent books like “Hack Your Bureaucracy, Recoding America,” and numerous articles, conferences and blog posts bring to life the federal employees who, with determination, savvy, expertise and energy make a difference in their federal programs (not all of these are delivering 10 times the value of their peers; some are merely 5X or 2X — still a strong return).
Their contributions make a meaningful impact across the country. They are the branch managers sustaining marine fisheries for future generations. They are the National Institute of Standards and Technology scientists watching over how we count, weigh, measure and tell time so that we speak a common language in everything we do. They are the infrastructure teams of engineers, grants managers, contracting officers and program specialists building the bridges, airports, water treatment facilities and cell towers needed to create our future. And so much more.
Federal rules prevent playing favorites with employees in hiring and promotion. They emphasize treating people fairly and consistently. This doesn’t mean you can’t identify the employees delivering extraordinary results.
How to spot a 10x federal employee when you see one
Despite the above efforts to publicize their work, the 10x federal employees are not easy to find. They tend not to be the loudest voices, the most senior leaders, or those who are about to climb to the next position. They are buried in the programs critical to the agency’s missions. You will have to dig to find them. You have to be curious, ask questions, seek them out.
Search for them in the technical disciplines and programs doing the real work of the agencies — the wildlife biologist in the Fish and Wildlife Service, the geologist in the Bureau of Land Management and the information officer in a disaster response team.
You can even find them in the functions that facilitate getting the work done, such as contracting, human resources and IT. These are the people who reduce the burden on the line employees and lessen the friction that can get in the way of the real work, such as passing background checks, hiring contractors, or responding to a Government Accountability Office data call.
Read more: Commentary
Here are some clues to finding your 10x players:
How to hold onto 10x federal employees
Finally, provide them some “top cover,” some protection from those who would burden them with bureaucratic tasks, defund or reassign their resources.
How are 10x federal employees different from private sector 10x employees?
Many of the characteristics of 10x employees are the same between the public and private sectors (see above). Achievement is a significant motivator in both cases. The fun of overcoming obstacles and doing something great is a motivator. However, other motivations come into play. The value transaction for tech and venture capital 10x employees includes reaping financial and prestige rewards for what they do. Federal 10x employees want to be paid enough and taken care of in retirement. However, the value transaction for 10x federal employees includes the meaning they get by saving or improving lives, reducing harm and protecting us from bad actors. If their agency cannot deliver that, they will raise their heads and see who can.
If you disparage all federal employees and the work they do and you believe this is more than just polemics and posturing, you won’t care about finding or keeping 10x employees. However, if you are really here to make government work better, they are worth finding, treasuring, rewarding them with work that means something.
Of course, all this is based on the assumption that federal work is worthy work — worth the investment, worth holding onto the 10x employees due to the importance of the mission of the federal government agencies, worth the same energy you expend to keep the best client development lead at Palantir or the best propulsion engineer at SpaceX. Our quality of life — food, air, water, medicine, housing, national security, our connections with each other — may depend on what we think of that assumption.
Peter Bonner is a public, nonprofit, and private sector innovator, working at the crossroads between these sectors in the areas of human capital, workforce development, leadership effectiveness, and operational excellence. He is a Senior Fellow at the Federation of American Scientists.
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