If you go to a second-rate place, and you are first-rate, it is very difficult to do first-rate work because you do not get that critical feedback you need for first-rate work on a daily basis.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
If doing something with second-rate effort satisfies you, find something else to do - where only your best effort will satisfy you personally.
First-rate people hire first-rate people; second-rate people hire third-rate people.
What's terrible is to pretend that second-rate is first-rate. To pretend that you don't need love when you do; or you like your work when you know quite well you're capable of better.
Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.
Regular feedback is one of the hardest things to drive through an organization.
First rate mathematicians choose first rate people, but second rate mathematicians choose third rate people.
There is no room in the world, as you say, for second rate work.
American workers are first rate.
There are two kinds of people, those who do the work and those who take the credit. Try to be in the first group; there is less competition there.
But no work from a first rate mind is ever really second rate.