When It Comes to PT and Team Building individual exercises, should officers strive to be the best or to get underperformers to try harder?

PT and Team Building activities are great opportunities to create camaraderie; they give you a chance to interact with all of your Soldiers. You should be there and you should be paying attention. You should know how your NCOs are leading Soldiers. You should be keeping your eye on your PT "projects" - you know, the ones who are flagged or near flagged and tell you how hard they are trying...you should know for yourself whether or not that's true. If instead you are out there breaking people off, yelling, running in front of everyone and showing off, you're blowing it. Yes, some Soldiers will be motivated by the "beat the CDR game," and you can do that some of the time, and it's fun, but not all the time. If you are doing that, you are being Joe, so who is doing your job?

I also see a lot of officers skipping PT altogether or showing up at the formation and then heading off to the gym with other officers. Not OK if you have troops. Even if you are a staff officer and have a section. See your officer buddies at lunch.

Not everyone was born to be a PT stud. You should strive for your personal best and in doing so encourage your soldiers to do the same. I was never a sprinter, but in my prime, I averaged a 13:30 on my run. One of my team leaders in Korea when I was newly minted used to like to play duck-duck-goose as part of PT - actually a good training tool - and knew I was slow on the start. Inevitably I'd end up chasing 3/4 of my section before I got to sit down again. A few laughs at your expense here and there motivates soldiers.

Your goal should only be to do the best you can. If you sandbag-it, you can't get mad at your guys for doing the same.  You don't have to be the top, but you shouldn't be the bottom either.  Never quit, and never let your guys quit.