By Mark Sedgley, Director of Sales and Business Development

Excellence as defined by Webster is the fact or state of excelling; superiority; eminence. Unfortunately for me, a dismayed Red Sox fan, this is the definition of Yankee baseball.

What is it about those “Darn* Yankees?” I know, I know, they have the largest payroll in baseball — that must be it. Or maybe it’s because they are from the largest city in America?

And their fans are better, right? Would you believe me if I told you that the Yankees started out as the no-name stepchild to the New York Giants? They were a transplant team from Baltimore, kicked out of the National League so they could be a pawn for their cross-town rivals. Hard to imagine but true.

The Yankees aren’t excellent because their payroll is large (see: Dan Snyder’s 2-6 Redskins. Nor are they the best because of their venue (see: the New York Mets’ Citi Field).

They are excellent because that is what they expect. No more, no less. Excellence is a state of mind. It starts from the top down and, when done right, is pervasive. When Col. Rupert bought the Yankees, he brought an expectation of excellence and he was willing to put his money where his mouth was. This expectation has carried on through the team’s storied history.

The funny thing about excellence is it becomes a habit. (Failure does too, but no one aspires to failure.) So what is the trick to obtaining excellence? If you follow the Yankees’ model, it’s by starting small and investing in what’s important: your people.

There has been enough business literature written over the years to substantiate an investment in people. I’m not going to belabor that point. However, it is important to understand that unless you expect excellence from your colleagues and others, you won’t get it.

In a lot of ways, expecting excellence is a statement of confidence in your own abilities. How can you expect excellence if you don’t believe you can deliver it? Teams, individuals, employees … all of them want to give their best. They want to be excellent. They need, however, to be asked for it. This happens in a number of ways:

1. Set small success goals: Don’t shoot for the stars right from the get go. You will set yourself and your team up for failure. Creating a foundation of successes allows you to take it to the next step.
2. Stretching those goals: Build success — don’t sit on it. Sounds simple, right? The Atlanta Braves won 12 straight Division Titles and they only won the big game once. However, when this was brought up to management, they consistently pointed to their accomplishments and the division titles. Wrong approach. This will never breed excellence. Push further than you ever thought you could. It creates a culture.
3. Give people an opportunity to be excellent: Be deliberate about putting people in success situations. Marry up their strengths with a task that feeds to the goals and watch them flourish. This approach can be infectious in an organization.
4. Compassionate confrontation: I once asked someone “What does constructive criticism mean to you?” His reply “Criticism worth taking.” People want feedback. They want to get better. Compassionate confrontation or constructive criticism is a great opportunity to do just that. Put criticism in the context of obtaining the over all goals and focus on the opportunity moving forward.

All of these steps help foster an environment of excellence. However, at the end of the day, if you don’t expect excellence and you simply play lip service to it, then you will be just like the Philadelphia Phillies — pretty good, but not the World Champion New York Yankees.

P.S. Go Sox

Photo via Chang W. Lee/The New York Times