Standard of Performance

Bill Walsh was a Professional Football Hall of Fame Coach who led the San Francisco 49er's to three Super Bowl Championships during his fourteen years with the team. He set a standard of excellence for himself and his players that ranks him as one of the greatest coaches in the history of the National Football League. Below are Coach Walsh's Standards of Performance. Can you apply these standards to your life and business?

1. Exhibit a ferocious and intelligently applied work ethic directed toward continual improvement.
2.  Demonstrate respect for each person in the organization and the work he or she does.
3.  Be deeply committed to learning and teaching which means increasing our own expertise.
4.  Be fair.
5.  Demonstrate character.
6.  Honor the direct connection between details and improvement.
7.  Relentlessly seek improvement.
8.  Show self-control especially when it counts most—under pressure.
9.  Demonstrate and prize loyalty.
10.  Use positive language and have a positive attitude.
11.  Take pride in my effort as an entity separate from the results of that effort.
12.  Be willing to go the extra distance for the organization.
13.  Deal appropriately with victory and defeat, adulation and humiliation.
14.  Promote internal communication that is both open and substantive (especially under stress).
15.  Seek poise in myself and those I lead.
16.  Put the team’s welfare and priorities ahead of my own.
17.  Maintain an ongoing level of concentration and focus that is abnormally high.
18.  Make sacrifice and commitment the organization’s trademark.
19.  The leader must exhibit the principles, code of conduct, and behavior that he is asking others to emulate.