Mark Yudof knows what he wants from UC employees: "My feeling is that you only win with the ‘A team,’ " he said as he prepared to take office on June 16.

Most people who work for universities are competent and know how to do their jobs, he said, yet more than high performance is needed: "What we need is a total commitment to the mission of the system. And part of that mission is that we are there at the Office of the President level to serve the campuses, to add value, to make sure that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. And so what I think I’m looking for is not only the traditional indicators of quality of performance, but someone who is committed to making that happen and understands it."

Yudof said he is committed to fairness, consultative processes and competitive salaries for people who work hard.

On his first day on the job, Yudof and his wife, Judy, greeted employees at a gathering on the patio of the Office of the President's downtown Oakland headquarters. Hundreds of staff members lined up to welcome the president and shake hands. (Yudof held another reception for UCOP employees who work at the Oakland Kaiser building on June 18.)

"I know there has been not too smooth sailing for the last year or so," he told employees at the reception. "I view that as a blip. We can right the ship and move forward."

At the top of his agenda, he said, is to take the message of what UC does for California directly to the 38 million state residents. Whether they have students attending a UC campus or not, he said, Californians need to know how their lives are made better by the university's advances in science, technology and health. At the same time, he said, the university needs to hold itself accountable to the people of California.

Yudof is a distinguished authority on constitutional law, freedom of expression and education law who has written and edited numerous publications on free speech and gender discrimination, including "Educational Policy and the Law." He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a member of the American Law Institute. He served a two-year term on the U.S. Department of Education's Advisory Board of the National Institute for Literacy and currently is a member of the President's Council on Service and Civic Participation.

Over the next few months, Yudof expects to visit each UC campus to meet with faculty, staff and student leaders.