by Ross Bentley
COMMUNICATION
Communication may just be the most important factor in a successful driver-engineer relationship. I don’t know of any engineer who can read a driver’s mind, and vice versa. You must understand your preferred learning style, and the engineer yours, as this is the basis of good communications. You need to talk about how you communicate best. And more important, you need to listen. By doing that enough, it will begin to seem as though you and your engineer can read each other’s mind.
The problem with some engineers is that they only hear what they want to hear. And they only want to hear what the car is doing, and that is not enough. The best ones listen to you, the driver. At the same time, you need to educate your engineer in how to listen to you and how to communicate with you. Again, I doubt whether he can read your mind. So you may have to tell him how to communicate with you.
If you want to tell him what the car is doing, because you are an auditory processor, then tell him. If you are a visual processor, then draw or write out what the car is doing. And if you are a kinesthetic processor, show him what the car is doing, even if that means driving the track in a street car or using a model to demonstrate the attitude of the car.
One sure way of destroying your ability to work with your engineer is to be unclear about what you expect of him and he of you. In other words, unclear as to the roles and responsibilities, whether that be yours and his. If you expect to get out of the car, give your feedback on the car, and then get out of the way, then tell him. If you instead want to hang around, to help with team morale, or to be available for more debriefing, let him know. More potentially great relationships have been ruined by misunderstandings about what was expected of the driver than just about anything else. And again, the opposite is true. Make sure you know what your driver expects of you.
One sure way of destroying your working relationship with your engineer is to get out of the car and say, “It sucks,” and walk off! That’s not a productive way of improving the car. Tell your engineer what the car is doing, not what you think of it. Also, work out with your engineer what type of information he wants. Some want you to only explain what the car is doing, leaving the work of figuring out what to change to improve it to the engineer. Other engineers like it when a driver makes suggestions about what changes could improve the car. But another way of straining your working relationship with your engineer is to tell the engineer how to do his job. If you want to do that, why have an engineer?
You may have already figured out that the key to all of this is just plain old-fashioned conversation. The more you talk and listen to your driver, the better your understanding of each other will be.
PERSONALITY TRAITS
If you think back to the chapter about personality traits, and specifically on what your behavioral profile looks like, you may begin to see where problems could occur.
For example, let’s say you have a high level of dominance, are very outgoing, not so patient, and could care less about details. At the same time, being dominant is not so important to your engineer, he is more introverted and patient, and details are everything to him. Can you see where a potential clash could occur? The engineer wants the car to be dead-on perfect by the time qualifying comes around, but feels that extracting the details from you is like pulling teeth. You’d rather be out chatting with friends, competitors, or just about anyone else who will listen. But your dominating style wants to be in control of the decisions about the car setup, the team, what hotel the crew is staying in, where dinner is going to be tonight, and so on.
And that is just your behavior and your engineer’s behavior. Now, mix in the rest of the race team.
How big a problem is this? As big as you let it become. Can you change your personality traits? Yes, you can, through mental programming. And that is something you may have to do.
But within a team environment, the most important factor is not necessarily making changes to people’s traits, it is being aware and understanding them. If, for example, you know your engineer’s patience level, and your engineer knows yours, it makes it much easier to work together and actually complement each other.
You could have each member of your team profiled by using one of the professional firms or software packages, such as PDP or Meyers-Briggs. However, that is probably not necessary. If you simply have each member of your team do a self-evaluation, using a chart similar to the one in Chapter 27, it will provide you with what you need. Make sure that each person doing the self-evaluation fully understands what each of the traits really mean. In each category—dominance, extroversion, patience, and conformity—have each team member rate themselves, placing a mark on the scale that represents where they see themselves.
After everyone has completed the chart, sit down and talk through each person’s profile. The objective is twofold. One, after some input from other people, a person may learn to adjust where they are on the scale slightly. And two, it is as important, or even more, for everyone to know what each other’s profile looks like.
The key to the success of this is in the doing of the exercise. It creates an awareness and understanding for everyone involved of why individuals behave the way they do and how to manage each other in the most effective way with this information in mind.
TEAM ENERGY
I’m sure you have had the experience of one person joining a group of people, and the energy from the person bringing everyone either up or down. It’s amazing the impact just one person can have on a group of people. More important, it’s amazing what impact just one person can have on the performance of your driver. That one person may or may not be you.
If there is a person around your driver who could have a negative impact on your driver’s energy, and therefore his performance, that person needs to be separated from the driver. Of course, this becomes very delicate when that person is a family member or close friend. If it is a crew member, it may be in the best interests of the team to remove him from the team.
In practically any close working relationship, one person will mirror the other to some extent. This certainly occurs when engineering a driver. If you show any level of frustration with your driver’s performance, he will as well. If you are confident in his ability to perform, he will be too.
WORKING WITH A TEAM
Build your team. By that I mean being the team leader, motivating the entire team, and being the one they rally behind. I call this the “Schumacher effect,” since Michael may be the best at this key trait and skill.
What we will discuss specifically is how to work with a teammate. At some point in your career you will most likely have one or more other drivers on the same team with you. Let’s look at the issues you will need to deal with should this be the case.
The first question is should work together, sharing information with your teammate? If so, how should you go about doing that? Some drivers consider a teammate as the very first driver that must be beaten, and therefore don’t give the teammate any information. Other drivers feel that they can benefit by being open with their teammate and share everything they have. Some teams insist on their drivers sharing, while others discourage it.
If the decision whether to share information with a teammate is yours and not the team’s, then I believe it is something of a moral decision, and one that only you can make. You have to feel comfortable with it. If you decide to do everything you can to mess up your teammate in an attempt to gain the advantage, that’s something that you need to feel good about. On the other hand, if you give everything away to your teammate and he ends up beating you, how are you going to feel?
An approach you can take is this: Be willing to share any information with your teammate that the teammate asks for, and expect and ask for the same in return. Then, make sure you ask for more from your teammate than your teammate does from you. In fact, dig as deep as you can into learning from your teammate. Learn by asking to share data, from asking questions about driving techniques, and from listening t
o everything said in team debriefs. Look to gain an advantage, but in a completely fair manner, and let the best (prepared) driver win.
SPEED SECRET
Turn every teammate situation into an advantage.
A quick word on team loyalty: There are opposing forces you need to balance. Being loyal, and building a reputation for being an honest and trustworthy person, will greatly increase your chances of a career in racing. If you treat people and teams like their only purpose in life is as stepping stones on your way to the top, you won’t have much of a team supporting you for long. On the other hand, you should always keep in mind that there may be a better opportunity or person to help you reach your goals. Some drivers are too loyal, and their careers suffer because they failed to take advantage of someone or some team that is better. They have often become too friendly or emotionally attached to the people on the team.
As I said, these are obviously opposing forces or thoughts you need to balance. Too far in either direction and your career will not blossom as it should.
The ideal situation, and the perfect balance, is if you’ve built such a mutually respectful relationship with your existing team that even they will push you to leave for a better opportunity. If you’ve done your team-building job, they will hate to see you leave, but will wish you good luck as they encourage you to take the next step.
SPEED SECRET
Build your team relationship to the point where they will encourage you to find the best opportunity for yourself and even help you find it.
SELECTING A TEAM
Some would say that being in the position to select a team is a good problem to have, but it can be a problem.
Start by considering a team’s reputation. Of course, that covers many areas, such as results, ease of working relationship, their financial dealings, and their trustworthiness.
Results are pretty easy to determine, although you should also consider how and where they got the results. Some teams will have gained a great reputation of being able to win championships in one level of the sport, but when they move to another series, they struggle. Success at one level does not guarantee it at another level. However, there are some teams that seem to be able to win at every level and in every series in which they compete. These are teams you want to run with.
When considering reputation, also look at whether the team is on its way up or on its way down. Most teams, even Ferrari, Williams, McLaren, Penske, Ganassi, Hendrick, and Roush, have their ups and downs. It’s cyclical. Sometimes it’s caused by changing personnel, or just finding the right combination of people. Sometimes it’s due to technical reasons. Other times it’s a matter of how strong the team’s motivation is. The point is there are teams on their way up the cycle and others are on their way down. Guess where you want to join?
Of course, this is not an easy thing to determine. It’s not something you can just ask the team owner, although doing so may give you some insight. Looking at past results, current results, and talking to other people in the sport (especially series personnel) may help you determine this important factor.
Some of the other considerations, such as the team’s financial strength and ability to manage your money, and the team’s ability to work with you are even more difficult to ascertain. You need to do some homework. You should talk to knowledgeable people and particularly drivers who have run with them in the past. Ask a lot of questions, of others and of the team itself. If you’re the one spending the money, don’t be afraid to dig deep. It’s likely to be a fair amount of money, so take your time and do things right up front. If you don’t, you’ll regret it later.
Determine the team’s motivation. Is it to win championships, help young drivers, make money, give the owner an ego boost, or what? None of these reasons are necessarily exclusive, as it’s likely there will be some overlap, but there is usually one main reason or motivation for the team to be doing what it’s doing. I’m not even suggesting that one reason is any better than another, but it should match or fit your objectives.
For example, if the team’s existence is really a way to boost the owner’s ego by getting the owner’s name in the media a lot, that may not fit your objectives if your goal is to maximize the coverage you get as a result of your performance. It would likely not be a good a fit.
Is the team in this for the money? Let’s hope so, at least to some point. If the team is not in it to be profitable, there’s a better chance that it will struggle financially at some point during the season and your results will suffer because of it. If the team owner tells you he is not in it for the money, and it doesn’t matter if he makes money, be concerned. Even if the team owner has all the money in the world, it matters. There’s a reason he has that much money; he’s not stupid about the way he spends it. If the race team begins costing him too much money, he will cut back. If you’ve been relying on his support and it goes away, you suffer.
I’m not saying that there are not teams who are willing to support your program. To some, making money is not the priority; the real motivation may be helping drivers. There are team owners who have driver development as a motivation. If you can find one, good for you. But be careful. Don’t automatically think you have a team owner with this motivation when you really don’t. Again, that’s why you need to do your homework and dig for the real motivation behind the team. Then, see if it’s a good fit for you and your program.
Once you know what the team’s motivation is, your next step is to find out how motivated they are to reach your goals. If your goal is to win the championship or die, and the team is okay with just participating in the series, that’s not a good match. Can you step up their motivation? Can you motivate their motivation? Can you help them become winners? While that can and has happened (look at what Michael Schumacher did first with Benetton and then with Ferrari), it’s rare in the junior formula ranks. If the team isn’t a winner, just realize it will be a challenge to turn them into one. Again, I’m not saying you can’t do it. I’m just saying it is not easy and you need to factor that into your decision of which team you select.
The big question becomes: What is the team willing to do to help you win?
Also consider how you fit the team. How much importance does the team put on having fun? How ethical are they? Will they push the rules to win? How business-like are they? How committed are they? And how do these attributes mesh with yours? There is no right or wrong answer to any of these questions. It only matters that it’s a good fit.
How well staffed is the team, and how qualified are they? I’ve seen teams in the junior formula ranks who have more people than some IRL teams, who don’t win because of their abilities. I’ve also seen the opposite: one-man teams who kick butt. Others seem to have the perfect number of qualified people and yet they still don’t win. These are not teams. As in any sport, sometimes the best people just don’t combine well to make a great team.
What is the team’s level of resources? By that I mean do they have the financial strength to quickly cover some unexpected problem, or are they going to have to cut into your budget, perhaps sacrificing something that may affect the results? If the team is on the financial ragged edge between surviving or not, do you want to take that chance? I once coached a driver whose last couple of races of the season were border-line dangerous (the team had to cut so many corners on car prep because of the lack of money). The team had not been prepared for any unexpected costs during the season. The one thing you can expect in racing is that there will be unexpected costs. Consider whether the team has the financial strength to deal with them.
Will you have a teammate with the team in question? That may or may not be a good thing, but it’s something you need to consider. Teammates can be a distraction to the team, or they can help you be better. If the team does have multiple drivers, are there any written or unwritten “rules” as to who gets preferential treatment? Even if there are no written or agreed-upon driver preferences at the beginning of a season, there will alw
ays, and I mean always, end up being one driver who gets better treatment than the others. Of course, this has more to do with human nature than anything else. If one driver shows more commitment to the team, consistently gets better results, or treats the people on the team better than the other, that driver will eventually get better treatment by the team, whether the team members realize they are doing this or not. Again, it’s human nature.
If you’re considering joining a team where you will have a teammate, can you “take control” of the team? Can you be seen as the leader? Can you get the preferential treatment? If not, you may be better off finding another team. This is a bigger deal than it appears, so think about it. If you want to come in second, don’t worry about being your team leader. If you want to win, you must be the team leader. Unless you’re in the stage of your career where learning from a more experienced teammate may be helpful, if you’re not sure you can be the leader within a team, look elsewhere.
Teammates should be an advantage—people who push you to higher levels of performance, who you learn from, and who provide a benchmark—but often become a disadvantage if you don’t learn to work with them. Shutterstock
This leads right into a sensitive issue that must be considered if the team owner or a family member drives for the team. This could be considered a conflict of interest, although it is not always the case. If the team owner drives, or has a family member driving for the team, no matter how fairly you are treated you will at some point question your treatment. It’s human nature to look for something to blame when things are not going the way you want, and if there is a family member in the team, you’re bound to perceive some unfairness. Our experience is that most team owners in this situation are more than fair. In fact, they often give the edge to the customer (you), but there is always perception and reality.
