An organizations will not achieve excellence by figuring out where it wants want to go, then having leaders do whatever they have to in order to get the job done, and hope that along the way those leaders acted with good character. That way is backwards. Pursuing excellence should not be confused with accomplishing a job or task. When you do planning, you do it by backwards planning. But you do not achieve excellence by backwards planning.
Excellence starts with leaders of character who engage in the entire process of leadership.
And the first process is being a person of honorable character. Character develops over time. Many think that much of character is formed early in life. However, nobody knows exactly how much or how early character develops. But, it is safe to claim that character does not change quickly.