What does it mean to “raise the bar?”

Raising the bar is part of Amazon's Hire and Develop the Best Leadership Principle: hiring and promoting candidates who demonstrate they are the best person to perform that job. It also means hiring a candidate with proficiency, or super powers, in areas that bring more to the job. For example, a program manager may be able to construct SharePoint workflows or have advanced Excel skills, which are not required for the role. With these qualities, they raise the bar on the role and may be better than 50% of the PMs in the organization.