
Top 15 Skills to Put on a Resume (Examples for All Jobs)
You want to know which exact skills to put on a resume to impress the recruiter? Give this article a read to find the know-how with a list of skills for your resume.
The 21st-century workplace. A battlefield or a team sport? How do A players and B players view each other? Over 1000 employees share their opinions on different worker types.
A players are high performers. The workplace superstars.
They push performance from good to great, climb the highest mountains and earn fortunes.
They’re the geese that lay golden eggs, the boss’s pets, and bring out the green-eyed monster in their colleagues.
They make the best deals, but not best friends at work. And they love to make a fuss. Because they know they can.
There are also B players. And stereotypes would have it that “B” stands for the background, where they belong.
Do you like the picture of a black-and-white workplace where “us” and "them” are from different leagues? Your answer might depend on whether you’re an A or B player yourself.
But let’s pause the A/B battle and get back to reality.
Let’s analyze some recent data to set the stage.
To dive into the reality of workers, with all its shades, complexities, and nuances, we surveyed over 1000 employees and examined:
Key findings:
But that’s not all. Keep reading to discover what else we uncovered in our ultimate A/B test.
Let’s go back to the year 2003.
That’s when Thomas DeLong, a professor at Harvard Business School, defined B players as the middle 80% of a company’s workforce who are neither the superstars (the A’s) nor the weakest links (the C’s). Since then, there have been further studies on the topic. But, for the most part, the share of B players remains the same. So most career experts agree with DeLong to this day.
In our study, we wanted to confront this data with how people viewed themselves and which type of employee they identified with. What’s worth noting, the terms “A player” and “B player” did not appear in the survey. Thanks to various research methodology tricks, while collecting the data, we avoided bias. After all, it might be tempting for the participants to join the “A–team.” No matter whether it reflects their actual type.
But—
Before we reveal the results, let’s describe the two main types of employees.
★★★
Time to get back to our study.
It seems that something might have changed since 2003. At least with how workers see themselves.
Let’s dig deeper. The biggest share of respondents identifying as A players were Independents (54%), people with work experience of over 11 years (51%), and workers in companies employing 201–500 people (47%).
Conversely, participants with an annual income of $50,000–74,999 (58%), Republicans (57%), Master’s/Doctorate degree holders (55%), and blue-collar workers (54%) showed the strongest tendency to classify themselves as B players.
Survey takers without a college degree (18%) and those working hybrid (18%) work gave the highest percentage of “Neither A player nor B player” answers.
What determines if a person is an A or B player? Let’s find out.
Interestingly, there also were noteworthy disparities in answers given within demographic groups. Here’s the full breakdown of the data:
Age: 25 or younger—90% vs. 26–40—76%
Industry: software/IT—90% vs. education—71%
Work experience: 11 years or more—88% vs. 1–2 years—69%
Company size: 501+ employees—95% vs. 1–10 employees—68%
Annual income: $75,000 or more—89% vs. $25,000 or less—64%
Education: Master’s/Doctorate degree—86% vs. no college degree—64%
Political affiliation: Republicans—83% vs. Independents—69%
Age: 25 or younger—87% vs. 41 or older—79%
Industry: software/IT—86% vs. business & finance—74%
Work experience: 6-10 years—88% vs. 1–2 years—69%
Company size: 501+ employees—89% vs. 1–10 employees—65%
Annual income: $50,000 or more—85% vs. $25,000 or less—64%
Education: Master’s/Doctorate degree—86% vs. no college degree—54%
Political affiliation: Republicans—85% vs. Independents—71%
Age: 25 or younger—88% vs. 41 or older—75%
Industry: software/IT—86% vs. education—63%
Company size: 501+ employees—91% vs. 1–10 employees—50%
Annual income: $75,000 or more—84% vs. $25,000 or less—62%
Education: Bachelor’s/Associate degree—82% vs. no college degree—50%
Political affiliation: Republicans—83% vs. Independents—62%
Industry: software/IT—85% vs. business & finance | education—69%
Company size: 501+ employees—95% vs. 1–10 employees—53%
Annual income: $50,000 or more—80% vs. $25,000 or less—57%
Education: Master’s/Doctorate degree—83% vs. no college degree—52%
Political affiliation: Republicans—78% vs. Independents—62%
Age: 25 or younger—82% vs. 41 or older—72%
Industry: software/IT—84% vs. business & finance—68%
Work experience: 6–10 years—85% vs. 1–2 years—67%
Company size: 501+ employees—82% vs. 1–10 employees—54%
Annual income: $75,000 or more—85% vs. $25,000 or less—61%
Education: Master’s/Doctorate degree—79% vs. no college degree—49%
Political affiliation: Republicans—79% vs. Independents—70%
As you can see, views vary depending on many factors.
Something to consider. Being a B player isn’t set in stone.
Moving on, we also asked questions to examine how the survey takers' careers were progressing. In each case, we compared the answers of those who identify as A or B players. Here’s what we found out.
In the last 12 months:
Additionally—
The next piece of data may be surprising in light of the above findings.
Why is that? If pay rises and promotions don’t have enough power to retain an employee, what does? The findings in the following sections of this article will provide the answers. Stay tuned.
Let’s dive deeper. Respondents also shared if they felt proud of their professional achievements. Their answers were as follows:
Surprisingly enough, A players – the workplace superstars – were less proud of themselves than B players—33% vs. 41%, conversely.
Another myth busted. High performers don’t have to be big-headed, arrogant, and crazy about hyper-productivity.
Now let’s examine the role of motivation and praise at work.
In the next section of the survey, we focused on what inspires participants at work. They chose up to two factors they considered most important.
What motivates you to work?
Work enjoyment, financial reasons, and personal ambition were the top motivational factors, as you see.
Although only 11% of respondents chose getting recognition for their work as a crucial contributor, the role of receiving praise is hard to overstate.
We all want to be appreciated – in the workplace and beyond. Recognition makes employees more motivated, productive, and eager to cooperate. It also gives them a sense of accomplishment and encourages consistent high-level performance.
Next, we asked participants about workplace recognition.
How often do you receive praise from your colleagues?
How often do you receive praise from your manager?
Do you feel that you receive enough praise from your manager?
Surprisingly, B players claimed to be praised approximately twice as often as A players, both by their colleagues (18% vs. 9%) and their managers (20% vs. 9%). But our high-maintenance A players were noticeably less satisfied with the amount of praise they received than B players (16% vs. 30%).
Moreover, almost 8 in 10 (79%) participants felt taken for granted by their manager.
Kind words cost nothing but have tangible benefits. The more valued the employees, the more positive the atmosphere in the company. Everybody wins as it contributes to the overall success of the organization.
Let’s have a look at workplace strengths and weaknesses now.
When asked, “What do you consider your greatest workplace strengths?” participants chose up to three options. Their answers were the following:
On the other hand, when reflecting on their greatest workplace weaknesses, respondents named:
Interestingly, A players and B players chose the same top 3 strengths, but the share of individual answers differed. Also, they shared two of the top 3 weaknesses.
A player's top 3 workplace strengths:
B players' top 3 workplace strengths:
Conversely—
A players' top 3 workplace weaknesses:
B players' top 3 workplace weaknesses:
So there’s some overlap, but also notable differences.
Let’s move on to the evergreen topic of job satisfaction.
Time to find out if there were noticeable differences in how A and B players felt about various aspects of their professional life.
How satisfied are you with your job?
How satisfied are you with your salary?
How satisfied are you with your relationships with colleagues?
How satisfied are you with your opportunities for promotion in your workplace?
As you see, the differences weren’t striking.
A players were slightly more satisfied with their salary. In contrast, B players showed a significantly higher level of overall job satisfaction and greater satisfaction with their relationships with colleagues and opportunities for promotion.
But overall, according to The Conference Board Job Satisfaction 2023, American workers are more content than ever.
So—
Maybe it’s more a matter of the workplace atmosphere than what type of employee we are.
Participants also answered a few questions about their mental health and work-life balance.
Digging deeper—
How far would they go for their careers?
For a successful career, I would sacrifice…
Surprisingly, participants identifying as A and B players were almost unanimous. The differences in answers given by these two groups were minor.
Time to move on to another value-oriented issue: dilemmas most employees share.
Participants were asked: “What would you prioritize if you had to choose one option?”. Here’s what they prioritize.
[money: A players – 50% vs. B players – 41%]
[stable employment: A players – 48% vs. B players – 40%]
[job satisfaction: A players – 65% vs. B players – 80%]
[regular praise: A players – 38% vs. B players – 31%]
[colleagues: A players – 50% vs. B players – 44%]
vs.
Working for a higher salary for an employer with values that don’t match my own—39%
[values over salary: A players – 56% vs. B players – 68%]
[team: A players – 47% vs. B players – 63%]
Again, the conclusions aren’t as obvious as you might expect. Priorities go beyond the A/B binary.
Let’s summarize our findings on A players and B players.
Now, the ultimate question—whose contribution to the workplace is considered more important? Let’s find out how respondents answered.
That’s almost a three-way tie. No clear conclusions here.
What our study does show is that perception of A players and B players could be heavily influenced by stereotypes, our limited knowledge of the given topic, and, finally, the fact that being one or the other is not an inborn characteristic.
After all, the modern workplace is a team sport. And superstars need supporters as badly as supporters need superstars.
Working together, we can get further, grow stronger, and achieve more. The key to success is to know our strengths and weaknesses and celebrate opportunities for cooperation with others.
The findings presented were obtained by surveying 1074 respondents online via a bespoke polling tool. They were asked questions about different types of employees. These included yes/no questions, scale-based questions relating to levels of agreement with a statement, questions that permitted the selection of multiple options from a list of potential answers, and a question that permitted open responses. All respondents included in the study passed an attention-check question.
The data we are presenting relies on self-reports from respondents. Everyone who took our survey read and responded to each question without any research administration or interference. We acknowledge there are many potential issues with self-reported data, like selective memory, telescoping, attribution, or exaggeration.
Want to share the findings of our research? Go ahead. Feel free to use our images and information wherever you wish. Just link back to this page, please—it will let other readers get deeper into the topic. Additionally, remember to use this content exclusively for non-commercial purposes.
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