Let’s say in your company right now, you have (more or less) 25% of your employees who are like Paolo the Barber, and 25% who are like the Barman.

This leaves around 50% of people we haven’t spoken about and who I call Middlemen and women. For the sake of simplicity in this book, I’ll refer to them simply as Middlemen, as ‘middle people’ doesn’t have the same ring to it!

Middlemen neither share the passion and desire of Paolo the Barber, nor the negative energy of the Barman. They are somewhere in the centre. They neither over perform, nor under perform. Allan would say their performance is good, but ‘good’ in this case has a wide definition.

Good is only good. It is not excellent, it is not brilliant.

Good may give a customer a reason to come back and buy, but it may not. Customers want and expect excellence and brilliance. They want to be dazzled, thrilled and wowed! It’s that level of excellence which will raise you to the top of your niche market, and it is that level of excellence which will make your customers return to you, and become evangelical about you.

Good, in the eyes of your customers, is often not good enough.

The only way for you to achieve this level of excellence is to have virtually every employee thinking and acting like Paolo the Barber. This means employees putting the needs of your customers first, being innovative and creative (because they love their work), being proud of and connected to their work, and understanding the direct connection between the revenues coming from your customers and their salary being paid at the end of the month.

Unless you have everybody in your company elevating the level of service, care, and attention they give your customer, and being