In brief: There is no one right approach: whether to build a high performance culture so employees perform better, or hire high performers who then create that culture, depends on the people already in the organisation, the timeline for improvement and cost. Changing culture takes longer than hiring, but hiring many high performers is expensive and does not guarantee better long-term performance, as the aftermath of McKinsey's 1998 'War for Talent' showed. Research on shared values suggests higher-performing teams can develop from within.
Most businesses feel they can perform better. But to do this is it as simple as creating a high-performance work culture, resulting in higher performing employees? Or conversely, is it an easier path just to hire high performing employees who are ready to tackle any project or challenge that ultimately creates your high-performance culture?
What is High Performance Culture?
High performance culture is related to a high performance workplace where the employees are motivated and productive. Many factors contribute towards this, such as support from the company, having the necessary resources, and feeling aligned with the values of the company. Ultimately, seeing the greater good or outcome of the work they are doing can contribute towards a high-performance culture.
So does a High Performance Culture Lead to Higher Performing Employees... Or the Other Way Around?
Companies without a high performance culture will likely start to wonder whether they should focus on their culture to engage higher performing employees or simply work on hiring high-performance employees and the culture will subsequently improve.
Update (November 2026): The question is as live as it was in 2021. Gallup’s 2026 report found only 21% of Australian employees were engaged at work in 2025 and 50% had experienced stress a lot of the previous day (Gallup, 2026a), while its meta-analysis of 112,312 work units found teams in the top quartile for engagement outperformed the bottom quartile by 18% on productivity and 23% on profitability (Gallup, 2026b). Culture, in other words, still pays, whichever way the causation runs.
There is no one right approach to this question. It’s highly dependent on the type of people already in your organisation, the timeline for needing to improve, and of course cost.
Changing culture can take a lot longer than hiring in a string of high performers. Hiring a string of high performers can be expensive and may not necessarily guarantee longer term overall higher performance.
The lesson of the ‘War for Talent’
In 1997 McKinsey researched 77 large US companies and concluded, in its 1998 article ‘The War for Talent’, that superior talent would be ‘tomorrow’s prime source of competitive advantage’ (Chambers et al., 1998). The approach did not always work out as planned: Enron, a showcase for the ‘talent mindset’, collapsed in 2001, and critics argued that over-valuing star individuals can damage an organisation’s health (Gladwell, 2002; Pfeffer, 2001).
Writing in Harvard Business Review, Satell and Windschitl (2021) argue that high-performing teams start with a culture of shared values, so there is some support for the theory that higher performance can be evolved from within the existing workplace.
Which path suits your workplace?
So, how will you support your workplace toward becoming more productive? By planning and focussing on building a high performance culture or by focussing on hiring in high performing talent expecting overall business performance will subsequently improve.
Linq HR provides fractional employee relations support to Australian employers and operates Workforce Directory, Australia’s HR services marketplace. Ph 1300 234 566.
Further reading:The role of vision, mission and values and The value of cultivating a positive employee experience.
References
Chambers, E.G., Foulon, M., Handfield-Jones, H., Hankin, S.M. and Michaels, E.G. (1998) ‘The war for talent’, McKinsey Quarterly, (3), pp. 44–57.
Gallup (2026a) State of the Global Workplace: 2026 report – Australia. Washington, DC: Gallup. Available at: https://www.gallup.com/workplace/704474/state-global-workplace-australia-country-level-data.aspx (Accessed: 6 November 2026).
Gallup (2026b) The benefits of employee engagement. Washington, DC: Gallup. Available at: https://www.gallup.com/workplace/236927/employee-engagement-drives-growth.aspx (Accessed: 6 November 2026).
Gladwell, M. (2002) ‘The talent myth: are smart people overrated?’, The New Yorker, 22 July. Available at: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2002/07/22/the-talent-myth (Accessed: 6 November 2026).
Pfeffer, J. (2001) ‘Fighting the war for talent is hazardous to your organization’s health’, Organizational Dynamics, 29(4), pp. 248–259. doi:10.1016/s0090-2616(01)00031-6.
Satell, G. and Windschitl, C. (2021) ‘High-performing teams start with a culture of shared values’, Harvard Business Review, 11 May. Available at: https://hbr.org/2021/05/high-performing-teams-start-with-a-culture-of-shared-values (Accessed: 6 November 2026).
