Ben Bradlee served as The Washington Post‘s executive editor from 1968 to 1991 and is best known for leading and protecting the newspaper’s coverage of the Watergate break-in and subsequent cover-up.

As Bradlee explained, “Our best today; better tomorrow” was the standard that his grade school teacher set for all of her students.

He selected a version of that quotation to serve as the motto for The Washington Post: “Put out the best, most honest newspaper you can today and put out a better one tomorrow.”

It would also be an excellent standard for all other organizations, whatever their size and nature may be.

And it would also be an excellent standard for each of us.

It is exciting to think about what could be accomplished if we did our best each day and — over time — were able to accomplish even more — and better — than the day before.