The Question: Quiet disengagement from top performers — have you seen this too?

(This question is based on a post I recently came across.)

I’ve been noticing this pattern where strong hires slowly shift from “I’ve got an idea” to “what’s the priority?” Still shipping. Still solid in reviews. But that proactive energy? Gone. Not burnout. Not underperformance. Just quiet drift from ownership to task completion. Have you seen this in your teams? What worked to catch it early (or bring people back)? Wondering if this is just inevitable at scale or something worth fighting.

My Answer:

It’s wise to pause and reflect, the shift from “I’ve got an idea” to “what’s the priority?” is worth investigating, especially when you see it across multiple strong hires.

I always start by clarifying the goal, and in this case your goal is crystal clear: you want a team that owns their work, goes above and beyond, and proactively drives outcomes.

Yet, it’s common to see hires initially meeting that goal, only to shift over time. The work still gets done, but focus moves away from ideas and ownership toward simply following priorities. Since this change happens after someone has been at the company for a while, it often points to something in how the work is getting done that drives this shift.

Consider your team’s mindset constraints and feasible region

I’ve found that the way work unfolds is strongly influenced by mindset constraints — the rules, assumptions, and habits that shape how people behave at work. These constraints form a feasible region: the set of behaviors and outcomes that are possible within the current environment. Based on what you’ve shared, completing work and following priorities are within your team’s feasible region, while proactive ownership is not.

For example, you team might operate under unspoken rules like:

• “Shipping on-time is the most important thing.”
  
• “New ideas get put on the back burner if they will impact shipping.”

With constraints like these defining what’s possible day-to-day, it is easy to see that completing work is feasible but there is little room for proactive ownership.

Shifting your team’s constraints to make ownership feasible

I suspect the work environment itself is making ownership hard to sustain, even for your strongest hires. To make ownership feasible in the long-term, it’s important to identify how the work environment can support that behavior.

For example replacing “New ideas get put on the back burner if they will impact shipping.” with new mindset constraints like:

• “New Ideas move the company forward, shipping deadlines are scheduled so that there is time to invest in them."

This shift expands the feasible region to include both meeting shipping deadlines and pursuing new initiatives, making proactive ownership possible rather than impossible.

Questions to explore and guide change

Here are some questions to help explore where the current work environment is coming up short and help you brainstorm ways to keep your team oriented to ownership:

• What mechanisms currently exist to encourage initiative? Are people recognized when they take ownership and bring forward ideas?
  
• How are new ideas and initiatives given room to grow and be worked on? Are they actively prioritized alongside other deliverables?
  
• When someone shared an idea before, did the way it was received or implemented encourage them to do it again? Did they get credit or visibility for their contribution?
  
• What are recent examples of initiatives taken from idea to completion? How are those achievements celebrated?

Putting it all together and your next steps

The challenges you’re seeing stem from the mindset constraints shaping how your team works. To help your top performers stay engaged and proactive, something about how work gets done needs to change.

Reflecting on these questions can help you uncover the mindset constraints that shape day-to-day behavior, and identify changes that would make proactive ownership feasible long-term.

If you’d like, I can guide you through with this work, carefully mapping out the mindset constraints holding your team back and identifying practical ways to restore the proactive energy and ownership you want to see. Interested? Reach out. I’d love to hear from you.