In fact, they are trying to outdo him. On their workforce, just about everybody makes the all-star team. I'm not kidding. I've met a few Fairfax employees in my time, and nearly all of them seem to be decent people. But if four-fifths of the workforce is at the top of the chart, then there's something funny about the chart.
Exceptional ability is, by nature, exceptional.
It can't be the baseline. The irony is that Fairfax went to its new performance appraisals last summer in an effort to move beyond its traditional practice of giving salary increases to every worker every year, regardless of merit. The idea was that those who deserve raises would get them, and those who didn't would receive a pretty clear message. In a way, that happened. One unidentified employee got nothing.