[majormajor]

> This even fosters an environment where top performers are discouraged by their peers for "making everyone else look bad".

You don't need a union for this. Most large companies that do software (not the FAANGs, but the non-tech-first ones) generally don't know what to do with top performers, because consistency and predictability is more valuable to them. Especially a top performer who's bad at politics so they come off as attacking whole other departments or teams.

A union won't fix it, but probably won't make it worse, in those places.

[chillacy]

Someone who comes off as attacking other departments or teams is probably a toxic individual to work with. Even if they crank out good code quickly, at some point senior engineers are expected to influence others, and attacking others is not conducive to that.

As for rewarding top performers, most places have annual or biannual reviews where people are given bonuses based on individual and company performance. The difference between underperforming and overperforming can be a lot of cash.