The perils of over-indexing on a single factor.

I was a baseball pitcher in high school. As many of you know, I was skinny and awkward, weighing 100 pounds soaking wet. My fastball wasn’t very fast, but I could put it almost anywhere I wanted. My curveball was unhittable.

Then speed guns arrived.

Coaches became fascinated with velocity. Everyone wanted the hardest thrower. I couldn’t light up the radar gun, so despite winning more than 90% of my starts, I spent my time on the junior varsity team.

Between my junior and senior years, I hit a growth spurt. My fastball gained several miles per hour, and I became just as captivated by velocity as everyone else. I started trying to throw every pitch harder.

I made the varsity team and finished 4-0 with a 0.25 ERA. But midway through the season, I lost my curveball. I didn’t realize I was trying to throw it too hard. Instead of snapping sharply, it flattened out (“hanging,” as they call it). I began throwing a slider, which put much greater stress on my shoulder.

The following year, as a freshman at West Point, I injured my shoulder. I over-indexed on velocity, lost my best pitch, and accelerated the end of my baseball days.

I learned the danger of optimizing one variable at the expense of the whole system.

Servant leaders who fixate on “servant” forget to lead. DEI advocates overindexing on identity come across as bigots. Militaries that overindex on lethality lose wars. CEOs who overindex on short-term results destroy the foundations of prosperity.

Aristotle noted that virtue is the mean between extremes. A balanced approach to pitching would have had me increase my fastball velocity without overthrowing my curveball. I followed the crowd and lost what made me good.

Service-centric leaders can serve their people and organizations without becoming subservient and burned out. You can build diverse teams of people who buy into your standards and feel they belong. You can have militaries that focus on outcomes rather than means. You can pursue strong financial performance while investing in the capabilities that make future success possible.