Mercedes technical director James Allison has revealed the steps taken after the “disorientating” and ‘confidence-shaking’ feeling of being deposed as F1 champions that resulted in a “destructive” and “fragmented” attitude inside the team.
Mercedes announced in April a major reshuffle of its technical department which saw Allison return to a role he had previously occupied for four years before taking on the position of chief technical officer to oversee a range of projects.
Mike Elliott, who had taken over the TD role from Allison in April 2021, became CTO.
The move was deemed necessary to help Mercedes return to winning ways after taking the wrong direction with development following the introduction of new aerodynamic regulations at the start of 2022.
At the start of the past season, Elliott chose to persist with the ‘zero-sidepod’ philosophy from the previous year. It soon became apparent it was the wrong route, however, effectively leading to the job swap.
Although changes were made to try to address the issues with the W14, Mercedes ended the season without a victory for the first time since 2011.
What Allison discovered upon his full-time return was a different team internally to the one he had left behind two years earlier.
“When a team has been, as we were, on a very high plateau for quite a large number of years, and then takes a dip, for whatever reason, it’s very disorientating,” he said, speaking to the Performance People podcast.
“It’s very unpleasant to suddenly feel that what you had previously felt about yourselves as a group, the foundations of that have been loosened by the reality of the stopwatch and being beaten by other teams.
“It shakes the confidence of an organisation and it also puts a lot of very short-term pressures on a company that’s been used to thinking further ahead.”
Allison has revealed those short-term pressures related to a ‘poor car and poor results’, and although galvanising in many respects, there was also a severe knock-on effect internally.
“The action can tend to be that all the disciplines in the company, the aerodynamics, the vehicle dynamics, the drawing office, all the necessary specialisms that work together to create a good car, that each of them can sort of scatter on the four, five, six winds to their individual corners to do what they can do, or contribute in the way that they think is best, driven by this very loud call that the car needs to improve,” added Allison.
“If you’re not careful, then those groups can stop talking to one another because they’re all head down trying to fix what they see as their part in making the world a better place.
“Probably the most destructive pattern that we as a group got into over that difficult period from when our crown first slipped, was that we fragmented more than we should have done.
“Not because anyone fell out with anyone, far from it. In fact, the spirit in this place, considering the pressure it’s been under, has been incredibly resilient, but everyone’s natural desire to contribute to a recovery was a little fragmented.”
Although just an individual in a company of over 1,300 people, since returning as TD and playing a full-time role in addressing the issues of the car, Allison has attempted to pull the team together again and get everyone rowing in the same direction.
“I would say that if I’ve had any effect that’s been positive, it’s to try to draw that back together, to try to get the main engineers who are leading the main divisions in the company to talk to one another more, to try to take off their shoulders some of the immediate pressure and just dampen down the shout that is coming from the car, and just to focus on coordinating our work,” said Allison.
“If we do that, the world will improve, and the call from the car will quieten on its own.
“So I would say that’s mostly what I’ve been up to since coming back to the technical director role, and that’s got nothing to do with nuts, bolts, springs, dampers, wings, floors, it’s just human stuff.
“Nevertheless, that human stuff becomes more and more important the further you are up the food chain, and the more fortunate you are with the role that you’re given in the company.”
The fruits of Allison’s labours, and the wider team around him, will be witnessed when a completely revamped car, the W15, is launched next year.
As to how it will fare, and whether Mercedes will return to winning races and titles again, Allison said: “I hope that we have put in place enough of a programme of work that we have put ourselves in with a shout to be back to winning ways.
“Does that mean winning a race? Does that mean winning a championship? In my head, it’s only ever about championships. That’s what Formula 1 is. It’s a constructors’ and a drivers’ championship.
“So I hope we will have done enough to give ourselves a shout of being in the championship fight in both championships.”
Issuing a word of caution, he concluded: “If you look at the long march of F1 history, then the stats are against us.
“Teams do not bounce back from slipping from their previous peak in the length of time that we have set ourselves.
“But we have, nevertheless, set a pretty ambitious programme. We have quite a lot of strength in depth, and we’ve made quite a lot of progress with next year’s car. Whether it proves sufficient or not only time will tell.”
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