I’m at that stage of parenting where I’m teaching my oldest teenager how to drive. As a result, I’ve added more gray to my already salt-streaked waves these past few months.

During one recent driving lesson—after basketball practice, no less—my son asked a question that stopped me in my tracks:

“Will I ever use my left foot when I’m driving?”

That simple, genuine question reminded me that most cars today no longer have a clutch. Just a gas pedal and a brake—of which my son’s size-14 shoe clearly prefers to press on the gas.

And it brought me back to an analogy I’ve carried for years, shaped through helping to lead an organization that grew 15x and supporting more than 50 organizations as they replicated their models across the country.

When an organization enters high-growth mode, I’ve noticed that successful teams almost always have a healthy mix of three leadership types:
Gas pedals. Brakes. And clutches.

This photo was taken in San Francisco on one of the city’s iconic cable cars with my oldest son, who was two at the time. It was his first ride — and easily my twentieth.

What he doesn’t know is that, had it not been for a fateful meeting on a cable car many years earlier, he might not have been here at all. And no, this isn’t some “meet-cute” story about meeting my partner on a cable car (that happened thanks to basketball, not a vehicle that climbs steep hills using cables).