It's really quite easy. Excellence makes people take notice. Remember that doing great work doesn't just impress one customer. It impresses all of the people that satisfied customer decides to tell. I'm not suggesting that businesses discard classical positioning theory.
Excellence actually embraces it.
Positioning just takes on a new role in the equation. Companies that abide by the excellence principle focus on doing great work. Then, they use every available medium to exhibit their successes. This, in effect, is how they position themselves. In simple terms, this means using communications to help people remember what you do.