Perhaps most important, set a high and clear standard for performance. If you want to have a world-class company, you must make sure that the people on your staff — be they young or old — are world-class.

It’s not just about being a nice guy, we need to set the standards higher.

I wanted to change the rules of engagement, asking for more— from fewer. I was insisting that we had to have only the best people...If you wanted excellence, at a minimum, the ambience had to reflect excellence.

Excellence comes from an internal standard that asks, “How can I deliver beyond what’s expected?

Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.

Any time you sincerely want to make a change, the first thing you must do is to raise your standards.

Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.

Standards must be achievable (though achieving them will always require extra effort), and the leaders must provide the means to get there. The focus should always be on getting better and better. We must always reach for the better way.

Become the best in the world at what you do. Keep redefining what you do until this is true.

Striving for excellence means never being satisfied—always doing things to keep improving, even if it means changing everything we do. It means we never feel that we have arrived. We don't believe our press clippings. We don't get complacent and pat ourselves on the backs. We talk about what we could have done better. We believe that we can achieve extraordinary results when we strive for excellence in all we do.

Building a World Class Company is a commitment to the integration of passion, purpose, and practice.

Champions don’t create the standards of excellence. The standards of excellence create champions.

Challenge the status quo and redefine what it means to be an athlete.

If not excellence, what? If not excellence now, when?