The Netflix documentary that is a "fun" MBA
I just binge-watched Season 8 of Netflix’ “Formula 1: Drive to Survive”. I am hooked on the series for 3 reasons: first, I like racing, second, because of how well produced it is but, more importantly, third, the way we can see the individual characters and management styles of the principals.
There’s a lot to be learned from this, and, at the risk of being guilty of retrofitting:
Old-fashioned, hard-ass management doesn’t work.
Being nice, understand complexity and being focused but warm does.
The failure.
After dumping Bruno Famin and Oliver Oakes as principals for the Alpine Team, famous Flavio Briatore is brought in. He is an old-fashioned, ruthless, hard-ass manager who treats his drivers like pawns. The typical movie CEO who comes into a company and begins by saying "my way or the highway” and then fires people after two failed attempts.
The problem is: Does he bring Alpine even one spot up? Nope. Fails miserably. And fails because he fails to realize that Formula 1 is truly a team effort.
One of my high school friends, Steve, who is the telemetry director of a racing team put it succinctly: no one goes home until we all go home. While there is no single management style that seems to work better than others, two aspects emerge from the winning-est teams (McLaren, Mercedes and Ferrari):
- Complex understanding of the objectives. In this case, drivers who compete for the drivers’ championship and the importance of team points for the constructor’s championship, which generates money for the team.
- Making sure everyone understands their place in the team, the importance of that place and the importance of the team.
In short: management is complex. My short take on styles:
The winners
Zak Brown – McLaren – very expressive, wears his emotions on his sleeve. Makes no bones that he is not going to support one driver over another because they are both number 1 drivers and he wants both cars to score points for the constructor’s championship.
However, takes huge pains to avoid showing preferences. Lots of contact with the drivers and the race team.
When both drivers are disqualified after a skid plate is found to be illegal does three things that mark him as an adult: he admits, the rules are the rules and doesn’t try to blame others; he owns the problem and doesn’t blame the mechanics and he profusely apologizes to the drivers.
Finished first in the Constructor's championship 2 years in a row, his drivers placed 1 and 3 in the drivers' championship.
Toto Wolf – Mercedes AMG – While not as expressive, he is not the cliché “cold German”. Toto comes across as very professional, very focused, but also very human. We see a lot of interaction with the drivers, the mechanics and everyone else. As an aside, Toto is the only team principal who is also a major shareholder in the team.
Frederick Vasseur – Ferrari – More on the emotional side, nevertheless, comes across as very professional and you can see his expertise. However, he is also not the cliché “emotional Italian”, remaining professional at all times. He, too, has a lot of contact with the drivers, the mechanics and everyone else.
A special mention to James Vowles of Williams. He was next to last in the ranking at the beginning of the season. Then he convinced Carlos Sainz to take a risk by joining them. When Carlos joins him, Vowles makes an extra effort not only to integrate Carlos into the team, but to reassure his other driver, Alex Albon of his value to the team. When there are obvious failures in racing strategy, in the cars themselves, he not only takes ownership of the problem, he is very open about the failures and communicates well with the drivers. And he is nice. A really nice guy. Result: in one season went from #8 to #5.
Bottom line: Successful team principals:
- Embraced complexity
- Were able to deal with several concurrent objectives
- Owned the problems
- Communicated with their teams frequently, nicely, warmly, making sure that all team members felt valued
- But never faltered when it came time to communicate the end goals, so everyone was conscious of the results expected
Oh. And were nice.
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