{"id":44150,"date":"2023-06-20T07:00:17","date_gmt":"2023-06-20T14:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/?p=44150"},"modified":"2024-03-23T08:18:52","modified_gmt":"2024-03-23T15:18:52","slug":"q-what-do-you-think-of-guenther-steiner-and-how-he-manages-the-haas-f1-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/q-what-do-you-think-of-guenther-steiner-and-how-he-manages-the-haas-f1-team\/","title":{"rendered":"Q: What do you think of Guenther Steiner and how he manages the Haas F1 team?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Q<\/strong>: \u201cThis is a different kind of question than you usually answer here, but I\u2019d like to hear your opinion. What do you think of Guenther Steiner and how he manages the Haas F1 team?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

A<\/strong>: Well, I don\u2019t know Guenther Steiner personally, and he might be a wonderful person, so I\u2019ll only comment on the second part of your question – how he manages the Haas F1 team.<\/p>\n

Steiner has become a bit of a star because of how he talks and is presented on Drive to Survive<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I think he\u2019s a toxic.<\/p>\n

He seems to believe that yelling, threatening, and using at least two F-bombs in every sentence is a way to motivate people, especially drivers. What he\u2019s really done is hurt the careers of more than a few drivers, with Mick Schumacher one of them.<\/p>\n

At this stage it\u2019s hard to believe that Mick has the same abilities as his father, but I strongly believe that he was capable of far more when driving for Haas. I really hope he gets an honest shot with Mercedes at some point (although his timing in terms of open seats doesn\u2019t look good).<\/p>\n

Threatening a driver with being replaced in a team, and that they need to be faster while never crashing a car is rarely what\u2019s best for their performance. There are rare exceptions when this doesn\u2019t hurt the situation, but even then it may not be the best.<\/p>\n

Right now, don\u2019t think about a pink elephant. Do not think about a pink elephant. I said, don\u2019t think about a pink elephant! Stop f***ing thinking about a pink elephant!<\/p>\n

What do you think is going through a driver\u2019s mind after being told to not crash? And not just told, but f***ing told in a very loud voice? Right, crash.<\/p>\n

Tell a child to not do something, especially something that impacts a sibling, and it\u2019s not hard to predict what they\u2019re going to do. Tell them to do something else (especially if you\u2019re able to physically give them the resources to do it), and there\u2019s a good possibility that they\u2019ll do it instead of, let\u2019s say, picking on their sister.<\/p>\n

Drivers are just older children!<\/p>\n

Telling them what not<\/em> to do is far less effective than telling them what to<\/em> do,<\/p>\n

There are people in the world that seem to perform well no matter how they\u2019re treated, but there are far more that need some level of comfort, and knowing they\u2019re trusted and believed in. One way of being is no better than the other, just different.<\/p>\n

You may be surprised at just how many top-level pro drivers need that comfort, that trust, that sense of \u201cWe believe in you.\u201d They have egos, emotions, and they have self-doubt. They\u2019re human, and to think otherwise would be silly.<\/p>\n

Guenther Steiner does not bring out the best in his drivers. If I was Gene Haas, I\u2019d replace him immediately. In fact, I\u2019d have replaced him within weeks of having hired him, after seeing the way he interacts with the drivers. I can\u2019t comment on how he manages the other people who report to him, but I can\u2019t help but believe there are some similarities between his team management and driver management styles (management by fear). It also makes me wonder what Mr. Haas\u2019s management style is.<\/p>\n

To be fair, I suspect Steiner would consider my driver management and coaching style to be wrong, too.<\/p>\n

Great managers find a way to bring out the best in everyone around them. Steiner doesn\u2019t do that. And with his starring role on Drive to Survive<\/em>, his appearance as a color commentator on other races, and now his own book, it seems that he\u2019s more interested in what\u2019s best for Steiner than what\u2019s best for his drivers. If it was up to me, he\u2019d be a Haas-been.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Q: \u201cThis is a different kind of question than you usually answer here, but I\u2019d like to hear your opinion. What do you think of Guenther Steiner and how he manages the Haas F1 team?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44151,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ask-ross"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44150"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44150\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44153,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44150\/revisions\/44153"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/speedsecrets.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}