Formula 1 is not just the best sport in the world but the best industry in the world no other place can you challenge yourself every week to the absolute limit of what you're capable of Michael he knew how to extract every millisecond out of himself Lewis the most naturally talented driver that I had worked with including Michael the most disastrous race that we had qualified first and second and beat out The points within nine LA to Lewis you said I threw away the wind didn't you cor James I have thrown away the wind today what
was the consequences of that a few of us thought we're done um this is this is not looking good for us what makes a championship winning team push the boundaries don't be afraid of the boundaries the growth opportunities I have that was slowing down in Mercedes I can go into a completely different level that's what Williams is dig deep Foundations down and start rebuilding it such that you leave your fingerprint on the sport for many many years to come well James thank you very much for joining us what is high performance do you think it's
a good question I mean it's for me certainly I I can only put it within the the remit that I've been working in for for 2025 years or so but it is against peers that are as intelligent uh and as strong as you are overcoming them and Become fundamentally uh the top of your game in that region so it's pushing everyone further than they ever thought they could be pushed it's exploring boundaries that You' never thought you could go past and defining and redefining and actually becoming the lead in terms of this is now the
the mark by which everyone else will assess whether they're doing a good or bad job by so how competitive are you oh massively there very difficult to Even put in words how competitive it is definitely let's not play Monopoly oh really or or any or anything else anything else for that matter I think so where did that first begin can you remember I would say it's always been there to a certain extent there's just some items that will trigger me to want to be the best in it there's other items that didn't for example in
the in the early school years I didn't want to be necessarily best in the class in fact I Felt that that would that would put a a Target on me and I was more interested in other aspects of things um and I wouldn't say that in the early days I was outstandingly good at everything I was actually just good at everything rather than outstandingly good or excellent so there's always better than me in every category but if you if we got to a new task I'd be reasonable that is probably the best way of putting
it um and I think it happened very much Actually University was probably where properly triggered but I thought I know Now's the Time to really be um the best of what you do and it was especially um when I made the decision that this is where I wanted to be and I realized very swiftly that this isn't about average anymore this isn't about being good this is the single best person will make it so that's where you need to be so that sounds like a very conscious decision just to be good rather than great at
School were you always aware that you had the capacity to go up the gears then I I think the best way describing it is my teachers definitely did cuz my report card said incredibly intelligent but could do much better if he just applied himself unfortunate I don't think school was particularly challenging it's just I would find other things that would distract me that I found more exciting and more interesting um well at the time football for example I'd play um it was A whole group of us but we'd play football four times a day to
give an idea to it it wouldn't be unusual to walk away with an hour and a half of football under your belt a day or more um or cycling at the time so cycle to school and back for many many years which fitness was absolutely fantastic but I found a challenging myself I started timing it and I thought right how do we take time out of it so you can see the competitive Spirit but it was Against myself and I couldn't do it without some Metric to say this is where you were let's move it
on from there but I didn't realize at the time I mean at 16 you barely dress yourself properly let alone know what you're going to form into later on in life I didn't know where that was going to construct to but definitely I didn't get that from schooling it made no difference to me whether the I went to an international school so you're rated out of seven made No difference to me whether you got a five six or a seven it just didn't trigger any response to me whatsoever at all and I can flip the
question then on its head you made a conscious decision not to be extremely good when you were at school but then you have to make the conscious decision to be extremely good when you're at University because the penny has dropped that if you want to be in Formula 1 it is a sport that rewards the elite so a lot of people think I Want to be the best right what behaviors followed on from the moment when you made that decision that this is going to be the life you pursue the the best one is probably
it's a compulsive Behavior which is not necessarily always R attributed with the good things but it's compulsive you are focused on a singular goal necessarily it doesn't mean that there's one goal behind it there's many many achievements behind that but um you are constantly doubting whether you are The best in the world and as a result of that that me best of the world sounds extraordinary we're at University studying but you're you're constantly doubting am I doing enough to to be the best person that comes through the door of an F1 team in the next
year and so as a result of that you push yourself harder and harder and harder you stop doing just the coursework you're doing but I started also as soon as I had an hour or two three I was down at snon at The racetrack um and then started working with other entities then started writing some software in the background that did something quite clever in terms of Motorsport at the same time you start doing not one thing focused but as many things to your um like basically consider it like a tree you're adding just branches
to your tree to make sure that it's just not one tall Branch but a whole tree that people look at and go okay this is quite special just to dive In quickly you were corrected there by your own humility telling you not to say best in the world right yeah I get the sense that actually with the job that you do now that has to be the aim right I I don't think my humility will ever let me that I'm against peers just straight away in the business nine other peers of which um many of
them are multiple world champions in their position I'm not we've turned up and and we've scored a few points we've done Okay but that's the Benchmark The Benchmark is when others look at me and go yeah you're multiple world champion and you've pulled a team to the fund you can be compared to but still not the best in the world of what you do there's always another level but that's where you want to be without doubt that's why I joined here that's why I joined here because we have the opportunity to you could do this
and join an organization where you're just moving a Few little dials around just feudal just fine-tuning or you can get here with the right investment which is what we have dig deep foundations down and start rebuilding it such that you leave your fingerprint on the sport for many many years to come and that opportunity comes once in a lifetime and it it's an opportunity to do something that I believe I know how to do this let's go and prove that to the world fundamentally and keep challenging Yourself every day but back to the original point
the I think you were talking about high performance the humility is what keeps you back and making sure you know that you have to keep pushing yourself until it hurts every day because that's what you need to do to be the best in the world but as well as humility James I see that in your story there's an awful lot of self-awareness as well and before we move on to your subsequent career into Formula 1 I'm interested in that moment when you were at UA University and make the decision that you're on a career path
that can see the next 30 Years spooling out in front of you and you decide to change lanes yeah it it was so I think first of all that's W to University um uh I did all going back a little bit further all of my schooling was in Geneva and it's a little bit different in International School in Geneva you you fundamentally from the Age of five until 18 you're in the same same school it's three different buildings on the site but you never move more than 10 meters so um bit of a culture shot
when I came to the UK and found out people travel miles between each school um but you're very disconnected from the UK and I wasn't actually sure whether I wanted to complete my University education in Switzerland or in the UK decided the UK in the end and actually UA was nothing More complicated than um my sister was there at the time and I thought H why not it'll be fine um which which in hindsight as it's a fantastic University there's nothing wrong with that but probably I could have orientated myself more in a different direction
had I been more um Savvy again it goes back to I really wasn't focused enough on on the right Journey at the time for me but I respected of that went to UEA um and studied a combination of Computer Science and Mathematics and it was nothing more than I was good at those two things I had no idea what I wanted to do in life but what I did know is let's do something I'm good at because you can get through and there pretty much once you've done those two things you're back in the 90s
computer science was always going to be this large area of growth so you have some skills behind you mathematics is just this big area that can apply to near enough everything Within the scientific World it didn't take long it took about a year and a bit of doing that when I thought there's just zero chance I can do this for um the next 30 40 50 years no chance it's um it's just not interesting to me at all um it's a means to an end rather than something I wanted to participate in and at the
time I was looking well what jobs can you do and and there's sort of there's Finance there's KPMG there's um Deo there's there's a bunch Of these but none of them none of them created any excitement to me I'm not someone that enjoys sitting behind the desk at all um and it was you know going back way before then one and some of the Fondest Memories I have and and we're sitting in front of these cars now you you won't see it cuz the cameras pointed the other way but I remember watching these cars on
TV sat on a sofa um at a home in Geneva and um at the time you didn't think this could be a career no Chance you're sort of looking at it you don't even realize that there's a couple hundred people behind the scenes as it was back then now a thousand people but I started doing more and more research into it and started finding out actually there is careers you can make out of being involved in something that is um taking a couple hundred people and every weekend challenging you to understand are you good enough
on the day and that that just overnight Triggered with me and went this is it this is what I want to do sat there wrote uh I remember it very distinctly and I've got goosebumps now talking about it but just wrote um I'm pretty sure it's 11 letters that time I think there was 11 teams but um wrote 11 letters got really good paper um it was it was a good letter as well um there was a CV in there but the CV was basic because all I had to that point was um education then
a couple of jobs that I Was doing in the summer always just to earn money um but but nothing in this remit um what did the letter say the letter was fundamentally this it is um I think Formula 1 is not just the best sport in the world but the best industry in the world because no other place can you I'm paraphrasing it wasn't exactly with this way but no other place can you challenge yourself every week to the absolute limit of what you're capable of um I can only see my career taking place Within
that and I want your help and guidance in order to help me achieve that goal I know I may not have everything at the moment but help me at least understand what I need to do to get there so it was um not a direct I want a job because I didn't think that would work but it was I will change my life to come to you help me help me drive that and there were two responses back that were favorable it's it's unfortunate someone Asked me the other day do I still have those letters
because they what happened is going through it there was all of them were rejection letters all every single one was thanks very much printed on beautiful lettered um paper really thick paper and I put every single one on the ball uh with blue tack which if I remember correctly may have cost me on the exit out of that room because the blue tack actually pulled paint off but irrespective they were there and that Became my every morning when you wake up that's why I want to be you want to be there change everything and let's
get on to it the letters were constructive um but there was two really constructive ones British American Racing and Williams were constructive both of them at the time the rest were very short and concise we don't have any wh for you at this time thank you very much but no thank you um but those two were constructive and British American Wasing Went further actually to give me a contact within there that I spoke to um and he said look here here's here's the reality behind it we don't need mathematicians and we don't really take graduates
on the company's 250 people so how you got into Formula 1 I wasn't sure back then you were sort of mid-30s and you're in Formula 1 but what they did say is here's the here's the issue we need engineering um it's great having what you have as background but you need Engineering uh as a string to your bow um so what I immediately started doing um they didn't request experience but I took it up on myself to go actually what I'm going to do now is bolster by experience every weekend that I'm free and just
make sure that I'm doing um racing fundamentally and so started in really Junior sort of GT categories um then did a little bit of formal afford and then it started building from there at the same time so just um there was no There was no free minute anymore and if there was it means I'm doing a bad job of filling it with building my experience and one thing that came on board um just around this time towards the time where I was graduating was Cranfield was starting up a new course which is um engineering fundamentally
in CR field for um post-degree um education is in engineering anyway is one of the most respected it's a brilliant Place applied to it there was over I think at The time 2,500 applications for 20 spots I thought I haven't really got much of a chance at this when there and interviewed um and got in and was successful to go in but to get there um prior to that basically wasn't just doing the M SP I was now studying engineering fundamentally whilst finishing off the mathematics computer science degree CU I wanted to make sure I
had sufficient to get through the tests for the course are you're 20 years Old at this stage you're going up against 2 and a half thousand other candidates into a world where you're interested but don't necessarily have a background what did you do to prepare yourself to get one of those 20 spots the the main thing was just making sure that um any minute was free was free in the day train yourself in what you think they're going to want out of you so they want they want engineers and and it's an engineering course to
be really clear so You're at a master's level in engineering I was the only person on the course without an engineering degree simple as that so I had to have enough foundations that I could at least blackag the interview sufficiently that that I can get through this because some of the aspects of it um when you're in the context complex mathematics of aerodynamics and structures it's very very difficult um so those were the main areas I started to put a lot of focus Into and again bolstered it by working with teams the problem with working
with teams is you gain the real the real tangible World experience but teams don't even really understand when they're buying a car in these the complexity behind all of it all I did though is is um there was a bunch of books um that I read normally read until I'm really good at working till very late at the night so um do the normal university bits but I didn't find that Awfully challenging and it's not because I'm terribly clever it just felt natural when things feel natural they're not difficult but I'd spend pretty much from
6:00 p.m. till um sometimes 2 3 a.m. which is where I felt just really good in myself and I could work through and you're young you don't need that much sleep as it turns out um studying basically engineering at the same time um very focused on what I thought Cranfield would be looking for and it was sufficient to get me through I think um their thought process at the time uh also would have helped me which is we want some level of diverse thinking of the course we don't just want um 20 Engineers actually they
were quite interested when I asked them how did I get this they said ay you showed enough capacity to learn and grow very quickly by the way the challenge on your your shoulders as you got six months to get To that level so good luck um but also you come from a different background both your initial um education not being uk- based but um the mathematics and computer science background we actually think you could form something quite interesting so that's why we took a risk on you why does it give you Goosebumps now when you
reflect because um the the main thing is that you you completely changed your life you have this path that's in front of you That that's laid out but you Define where it is and I literally took a right 90° turn to it conscious decision that that's the route I'm going down and never doubted it never debated it never mve back and there were hard times I was in a tremendous amount of debt I paid for a lot of this University education worked in pubs and other places to try and make money the the GT Racing
side formula 4 they didn't pay any money at all that was just experienced growth so I worked um actually for for many years for free in Motorsport in order to build up what I had to in terms of experience but I was prepared to put it all online and Risk Everything to have the opportunity to get into the sport and that was a young man who when it came to Formula 1 knew so little you're now someone who knows so much multiple drivers championships multiple Constructors championships numerous teams you're now A Team principal the most
senior job you can have in the sport so let's move the conversation on to Formula 1 with all the experience you've got if I ask you what makes a championship winning team what's the answer I'd always go back to um people and culture they're the two things that drive all of it machines help they make things more efficient computers help they make things more efficient but once you have a Workforce that is 100% Aligned with the direction of travel you're moving in that are not fighting each other but fighting everyone else that are aligned with
each other it's one team pulling together the camaraderie almost pulling when you're you're in the trenches and you're really suffering pull you up and want to do harder you want to do everything for those around you you don't want to be seen as the weakness in the team so everyone is creating this strength That's bolstering everyone forward in the right direction and a culture of one that is um push the boundaries don't be afraid of the boundaries don't be afraid to redefine what has happened in the sport previously because that is the beauty of where
we are as a journey we are these small tiny in the grand scheme of engineering teams where we can push the boundaries of engineering and we should do every day of the week and that's not something think you can find Nearly anywhere else in engineering engineering is typically fiveyear lead lead times make sure you're doing something that's robust and reliable we are these Dynamic groups um this is actually Toto's words but I really like this this phrase the Navy Seals of engineering but I I haven't found my own version of it yet so I'll I'll
plagiarize his for the time being absolutely that's what we are we are the best of the best the elite within the Sport and you have no bounds fundamentally the cost cap is not really a bound It's actually an opportunity and so the real key behind it is people and culture once you have those two everything else flies you you mentioned about being in the trenches and we will talk about Toto we'll talk about aligning teams we'll talk about creating culture you mentioned really early on there about a winning team is being in the trenches dealing
with the Hard stuff if I take you back to November December 2008 when you were at what was about to no longer be Honda what did you learn in that period and how much were you in the trenches there where you were effectively working for a team that we thought were about to leave the sport and and you had a Workforce there not knowing whether they were going to get paid one week to to next Um the first thing it taught me is that um there's a fragility that perhaps you don't often consider that actually
wasn't that bad this is going to sound very negative and I don't mean it to but I'll give you how it really was having a job in formula1 in 2001 2002 2003 when I first joined within months about 30 40 people remembering the company's only 250 people gone lost their job in 2002 same thing about 50 60 peopleone yeah yeah That was Formula One back then and all you did is really simple rule of thumb make sure you're not in the bottom half of the team you're going to be okay and to ask one of
your answer one of your questions why did I keep pushing myself I was the other way around I wanted to be in the top 1% zero chance of losing my job um always doubted am I good enough always always through all of that um because you're against peers that are incredible at what they're doing but That drive is still with me today I want to make sure that I'm um earning my place this isn't a right I have to earn it and I have to earn it every single day and that will stay with me
forever and that creates the humanity it creates all the other lovely cultural aspects out of it um so what was a culture like then in Formula 1 in a period where you knew people were going to get booted out and you had to be in the top half of that business to not be one of them it Was um as you would expect it to be um it wasn't a nice culture to be in fundamentally because if you couldn't raise yourself you'd pull others down that's the simple way of doing it uh which is why
I was talking about being the top one% now you don't worry about that anymore you're you're so detached from it that you're not part of this politics for otherwise how did you get there um no other way than saying it than just hard work it was uh I lived in Brackley at the time which is where the team's based and pretty much might have I had a sleeping bag at work for For What it Took I just I was there the the real way I did it that's probably an exaggeration of it actually it's not
that I slept at work particularly but I I didn't have anything else in my life I didn't have family I didn't have um Partners nothing it was it was about work but one of the clear things I remember and it would be my advice to Anyone else there out there as well when there was a difficult problem I would always put my hand up first and say I'll take that straight away anything that people just thought I don't really want anything to do with it and it could be difficult it could be a lot of
work my hand would got first and say I'll take that on and just kept taking it on and taking it on and taking it on because those that that take on those work and and fundamentally do a good job with it You then build your team up around it Etc but you become a reliable Force within the team you increase your your knowledge your learning and all the other associations with it as well um and that that was sort of how I went about it and my advice to anyone would be don't shy away from
the difficult bits quite the opposite push into them um can I tell you about to a comment you made about when you were in the classroom at school where you said that I didn't want a Target on my back so I deliberately chose to be good rather than great and now it sounds like you've made that mentality shift to say I'm not bothered that there's a Target on my back I will put my hand up what was that shift like what did it involve I think school as well it has to be recognized that I
don't think I was the cleverest person in the room I think there were other people there that were far more intelligent than I was I I have A balance I hope a little bit between what I call EQ and IQ but at school um it was also bullying would be the wrong word it wasn't bullying buling but you were isolated when you very clever at school and I didn't want that at work it's very different when you're in an environment where you're surrounded by peers that want exactly the same as you do which is you
want to be the best in the world you're not isolated you're rewarded so it's a cultural change that Went with it where I thought but you did say that there was also a culture where the drag you down that if they couldn't do it so it's almost like the adult version of bullying is it not it is but the difference here is you can pull yourself so far above the Power Pit by by describing what I just said there's a bunch of job I'll get them done simple as that that doesn't matter what your peers
do fundamentally now um you're above all of that um and that's that Approach doesn't work at school it doesn't you don't have that direct contact with Teachers dayto Day if that makes any sense um I mean it's an interesting analogy I've never really thought about it in this much depth but it's a good conversation to be having but for me at the time it was um also based on the fact that the job I initially had was this very kind at the time I got a job sort of created for me but it's not what
I wanted to be I knew where I wanted to be which is at the time was Race Engineering and then growing and so what I was doing was when I was pulling on jobs they were helping me in that direction of travel to things um so now you had breadth across multiple parts of the organization that perhaps others wouldn't at the time and again as much as you could be pulled down in certain areas and by the way the pulling down it's not people don't do it to bring the Team down they'll only do it
if they think that some are very close to them they can just pip ahead of but if it's someone clearly whose goals and aspirations are to make us better make the team better actually you won't you won't pull backwards I would say and like that description you said about almost sleeping in the office and being quite monastic in in in your lifestyle what were the consequences of that the biggest one is you have no life Outside of it as long as you treat this as your hobby your passion your life you don't have any of
those other things anymore this is it um and that you form relationships that are keeping you going because you everyone needs something there's a support network it becomes okay but it it definitely for example um I had a long-term relationship that that was destroyed um for various reasons and and rightly so I I didn't see her at all in that period Of Time family I didn't see perhaps save for once a year and Christmas for a few days that was it um I have nieces and nephews that are fantastic I haven't seen them go up
you've got to accept this becomes your sole desire on what you want you really have to give up everything for it or at least that's the the conclusion I came to to go away do you don't have to of course but for me it was this is the compromise I'm going to make and do you Regret that no no no not at all it was conscious decisions I was making and they've led me to where I am today but it's it's putting it out there that if you are prepared to sacrifice everything you can have
greatness uh you can have growth you can have the direction of travel but there's no such thing as all of it it doesn't work that way let's talk then about the changing culture at what was for those that aren't well versed in Formula One British American Racing did pretty well as a team and then Honda did okay Brawn one season amazing I have fun memories of that time absolutely uh and then it became Mercedes to wolf arrived and then by 2014 you won the constructors and the drivers World Championship I'm really fascinated by this period
of change and turnaround the arrival of Toto the change to a winning team the change in culture there's a lot to pick out there but I would I'd almost Love just when I talk about that period what comes into your head that really signifies the change it happened before 2014 um at the end of 2012 I remember this vividly we we didn't score a point in eight races and at the time um that that was I mean I think by far our worst year uh at the end of that year certainly I think we won
One race that year which was Shanghai um and you're questioning am I Am I in the right place I haven't come here to just get a car going around the track I've come here to make a difference the senior leadership team at the time so there's no one individual in an F1 team I still maintain that today doesn't matter whether it's Toto or me there's no one individual it's a it's a group of individuals it's why I go back to the people and culture element of things but the Senor leers team at the time um
within the era of 2012 2013 of Mercedes we were becoming stronger and stronger as a unit um and the cultural change happened before Toto came there and the cultural change was this have no fear of failure we've done enough failure I'm comfortable with it now have no fear of failure um we need to change what we're doing what we're doing is not good enough it's not the standard in Formula One The Catalyst was totto it's really important to say it's not that he had no part in it at all far from it It's that the
direction of travel already started prior to him joining 13 but he mirrors the views that we did and that's why it jailed incredibly quickly overnight um because we we had now the impetus at all levels with the organization of enough is enough we're changing we want to be the best what do we have to do and what was the consequence I mean that's quite a seismic shift to not have a fav of failure in a sport that is defined Almost by winners and losers what was the consequences of that first and foremost is you will
as you get a group of individuals and enough of us that stood up and and had no concerns about talking about a failure I mean if you want the most public example I came on the radio at some stage in front of 60 million people and said I've got this wrong but here's what we're going to do um so that gives you the confidence that in the old formula one that will get you Fired you're done you make a you make a mistake there was a a perception that you're done you're fired as a result
of it um and so you have to go against years literally years worth of culture that's built up that way but because there was a strong leadership team and we knew that as long as we stuck together on on what we were thinking as a result of this we'd move forward and others would actually join us in the initial part of It you'd had what you would accept people would go why are we talking about this doesn't make sense we have to make change but by change they mean the people are failing and then very
quickly actually um in 13 especially so 13 it's where all of that got applied because the car 13 was brilliant on one lap fastest car on one lap no doubt about it um but we're probably the only car I think to have qualified first and second and be out the points within nine Laps in Barcelona that's what it was that was the car we we made a lot of mistakes that year on a number of tires and setup Direction um and uh I remember it very vividly um because this issue wasn't just in Barcelona but
I remember the board were there in Barcelona and I made um some claims that we understood far more what we had before we had the most disastrous race that we had um but not postulated in the way of we're great it was here's where we've gone wrong and Here's the things we are trying to correct it and here's what we expect the outcomes to be so proper experimental driven and data driven systems um actually to the credit of the board um we failed badly but we showed them how we're then rebuilding from that failure they
embraced it rather than pushed it away so there was a cultural change thatly strong enough um there was a time that a few of us thought we're done um this is this is not looking good For us and actually the culture change was enough already to take place that we had good momentum that were're able to change and 2013 turned into one of our best years at the end of it and 13 was the foundations that led towards 145 everyone wases 14 brilliant Championship but if you look at the end of 13 especially around Budapest
we went round from a car that was the fastest and qualifying to the one that could be beat A Red Bull in the race and that only came about because we kept resetting ourselves going through learning processes and make sure we changed everything and we changed a lot on that car so how how did you go about making this culture change and I think the point you make about coming on the radio and admitting failure is a really powerful one like I used to love it when I was watching a race and I heard it's
James cuz I Like what follows next is some honesty about actually what's going on here there was very little hiding behind things which you hear a lot of I mean I remember that moment you know to Lewis you said I threw away the wind didn't you correct and to hear you say well we changed the culture it sounds so easy could you give us a couple of tangible things that happened that drove that so the here's here's a little bit of the secret Source first and foremost you Need to have a clear idea of what
culture you want in your head but it doesn't matter what culture you want in your head to a certain extent that's not how the culture is created the culture is actually created from your Workforce it's created bottom up but you can have an idea you should have an idea a very clear idea of what culture you want you should have some um items that help on that Journey behaviors values items like that and then you need a leadership team That enact every single one of those behaviors and culture not bits of it every single one
of it behave in the way that you want your Workforce to be as well it's not words and it's not um do as I say not do as I do it is behave and the way what were the P um within Mercedes it was starting with a failure one it is absolutely Ely first of all data driven everything every single decision has to be data driven it's not horis STS it's not I think it's not I Haven't looked at the data it is Data driven approach to it experiment driven I think this what happened here's
the data here's what the outcome was learning loop on the back of it make sure that you understand exactly what went wrong what went right and learn from it because all too often people go through that and then the learning Loop's forgotten you just have a result that's actually the most important bit of that whole process the next bit is Fear of failure that's failure and the learning Loop is the important bit you get out of it make sure you Embrace that failure reward that failure show it to everyone and go here's what I got
wrong can you learn anything else from it and the next bit and this is the hardest bit because humans aren't very good at it is once you had that failure where else are we going to fail in a similar way from that learning so not wait for it to happen but how else can You apply that learning to 10 or 12 or 20 other areas where we can stop failure from happening and we can already start learning from it and the reason why humans are really bad at that is when you have success you often
don't think about the downsides involved with it and there was many times in Mercedes where we won by a second not 10 seconds and you go that's done that's a win completely wrong why was it 9 seconds closer for The other competitors than it was other races I mean we were dominant so we might as well be honest about it and those questions actually led to a lot more unlocking of potential but it's hard for a human to do it's really painful when you fail really hurts doesn't it I think there's I've read this in
a book so whether it's true or not but it's about 10 times more powerful having a failure than it is having success so you need you need to Be really looking at your success to really break it down whereas the failure hurts so much that you want to get to the bottom of it and that's I mean that's the secret Source everything there is there enact the behaviors you want make sure as I say don't say them enact them and then encourage your Workforce that this is how you want them to be this is how
we can become better and you'll find that in time it comes through bottom up and it depends on the Size of the organization how long it takes eight people probably quite quick a th000 people quite slow so give us some insight into how you park your ego to do that because you're right it is painful to fail or sometimes we entrench our views or we defend our position and I love the learning Loop of going back and admitting failure is something to be embraced rather than feared what lessons did you learn James about parking your
ego to able to do that I I'll say this Here on on camera and on vodcast I'm not the cleverest person uh in this company I wasn't the cleverest person in Mercedes I have no doubt about that there are many many other intelligent Engineers way above me um I think what I'm able to do though is to bring balance between how to communicate information how to digest it how to give clear Direction that's the strength I have and enough intelligence to be able to understand the very intelligent People in the room in terms of what's
good and what's bad out of it some I will always find someone better than me in every regard there there's I can always find a reset for me and and that's that's how I live my life it's not that I want to be beaten by these individuals I want to then improve myself to become closer to them as much as I possibly can um but this isn't about me as a one individual it's not about the fear of what people think of Me either because that's secondary to I just want us to be better and
as soon as you think this isn't about you this is about the wider good of in this case Williams you you become not insignificant but you're just a part of the puzzle on the journey there's something very unique though about Formula 1 which is the team sport and the individual so actually you know when you're at Mercedes and you're suddenly focusing on failures using them as a Learning Loop pushing forwards playing the long-term game knowing that eventually things will get good that's actually great for the team who are there and are going to get their
salary and they're going to be okay it's not so good if you're the driver and you're like well I'm only on a one or twoyear contract I can't I can't hang around and it wasn't any old driver you were working with in Mercedes as well you know before leis Hamilton it was Michael Schumacker right y so I'm interested in how you give those messages to these driven often quite ego driven self-centered individualistic Sportsmen that are playing the team game but the drivers's results is what really matters to them you've you've probably hit the nail on
the thing that makes me one of the most excited by Formula 1 because I struggle to find another sport similar to this where it's a team sport but it starts with beating your Teammate you don't be your teammate you're in question and here's how it's built up and you'll see that's a lot with the messaging I've used here with regards to Logan for example the key behind it is that that's just one fight but actually each individual contributes towards the success of the team simple as that Lewis when he joined us was and still is
to day I me the most uh within my Mercedes career the most naturally talented driver that I had worked with Including Michael just so much natural Talent um The Journey we took him on was it isn't we'll win championships together his mentality at the time when he joined was was a brilliant one I can see why he successful but it's I'm going to win every race at all costs doesn't matter what the cost is I'm going to win that race and done and if you speak to him today it's migrated to he accepts that the
second place is in third places of how you win the championship and Building and working with a team on the days where you can't win the race will give you far more reward than pushing everyone away in order to win that single race out of it how did you get him there though because that was 20 years of learning that he brought to the team which was about him winning races absolutely that it wasn't the Journey of one individual or even Toto or myself or at the time shove I would also say Nikki lder was
a strong part of it as well a Strong minded individual that had won multiple world champions and I learned to tremendous amount from him starts with being open and honest with the drivers just simple as that all too often we don't actually go to the real truth behind the matter and we skirt around it they are after all in many regards the best in the world of what they do so it becomes difficult to have a direct conversation and you'll see the way I am publicly the way I am here and The way I am
would be off camera is exactly the same it's open honest transparent and it starts there you have that open honest conversation about it which includes when their behaviors are ones that are hurting the team and Hur Hur in themselves not helping can you give us an example of that the the the biggest thing that um we got enter with the drivers 2014 for example was that both of them knew both Nico and Lewis knew that it was one of those two Winning the year they knew by the way before we turned the first wheel in
the the first race and so um it took quite a while um but my role in this was I constructed a document that created some very very clear how we are going to work with each other how we're going to fight each other some what the time was called Rules of Engagement um changed later to another ter that was less military um but racing intent but Irrespective um it was some really clear boundaries on this is how we're going to behave and this is how we're going to perform and there was a lot to do
and it started with this and it starts with an ethos I believe in today but the whole first page was about being a sportsman and to explain it you can win a world championship but if you've done so in a way that is not fair and sportsmanlike you will have regrets for the rest of your life y you have a championship to Your name but it'll be suid it'll be muddied it won't be pure we at the time there we want to win things by doing things just better than everyone else not because we've found
other mechanisms we just want to be better than everyone else and that applies to the drivers as it does to the engineers within the team as it does to designers and it was very much bringing them that journey and and making sure they're aware that you can become the Best Sportsman in the world which will cre to Legacy Beyond many many years or you can win a race by doing something that has perhaps forced or hurt or damaged your teammate which one do you want to go down and it's a very simple Choice when you
present it to a sportsman ultimately they want the one that creates Legacy in many years to come Michael incredible man but still marred by 1997 in many regards it stands out in everyone's mind um and we created A the mindset that that's not how I want to be remembered I want to be remembered that we were a dominant Force working together and between the two of you within these rules the fastest driver across 20 races will win not the fastest driver on a weekend not the one that's done something that's maybe benefited them in the
short term the fastest driver on 20 races and we'll construct it and make sure it's built that way and we'll give you each equal Opportunity and they bought into it um and that created a good environment it doesn't mean that in time we didn't have a breakdown I mean everyone remember 2016 Barcelona you're talking about when Lewis and Nico crashed into to each other yeah absolutely still still sticks in my mind today because you're taking two Elite Sportsmen that were constrained within their boxes and just got frustrated um but actually what you do at the
time is you don't back off you Double down and go this is how it's going to be can you tell us what you learn from these great drivers whether it is niik rosberger won a World title Le Hamilton multiple world champion Michael schumacker one of the legends of the sport they're all enigmas in their own unique way they don't share too much because I think they sometimes particularly when they're still competing they worry that it maybe removes either some of the magic around Them or gives some power to their competitors you've been as close as
you can ever get to multiple world champions what separates them they're all different as every human in this room is different they're all different to each other um there's literally very few characteristics you would have thought this is what makes a world champion it's these characteristics it's not so if I take you through them one by one Michael um He he taught how to how to work really hard Michael wasn't the most skillful in the car I've what he said that was Lewis but he knew how to extract every millisecond out of himself and every
millisecond out of the team he was a leader that absolutely he would say I'm going to go this way the team would follow him there so much so that both sides of the garage wanted him to do well so much so that one of my regrets in my career is we didn't get a win for Him that that still hurts me today he he deserved a win and how did he take people on that Journey with him um a couple of things so first and foremost um you had a genuine interest in who you were
and your life I went motorbiking on track with him as in race bikes on track with him in po card and we had the time of our lives we both still laugh about it um for many years after that um he knew at the time my partner's birthday flowers arrive at home and embarrassed Me because I didn't do that much he would take a genuine interest in who you are who your family is what drives you every single person in the team and that's hard to do and it's not because he's doing it because he
wants to gain Advantage he does it because he really cares that's that's Michael the Michael you had front facing in front of the media is a very different Michael to what was behind the scenes um and uh that's how he did it fundamentally so he Would bring everyone on the journey and Lead everyone on the journey he would extract every he would squeeze himself every millisecond he had he would work as late as he needed to every hour he needed to um that was how he operated and N learned a tremendous amount from him um
it formed the Nico that then became a world champion ultimately which is squeeze everything out of you can at the cost of everything else um so much so you end up having to leave after Corre winning that world title exactly that he the sacrifice I talked to you about before that was painful to me where you let go of family and friends and loved ones he did for that year and he decided and all the respect to him for it that actually that's not the life he wanted um Lewis just had these just as I
said it's this urles of natural Talent um and with him he's he's got these Tendencies and traits where when you go out in sp1 he's like an octopus All over the wheel he'll change every setting on the wheel near enough um and explore it but it's what makes him incredible and if I give you an example of it there was a time where on simulation in Brazil it said hold sixth gear up the hill um sorry going to seventh gear uh up the hill and um within two laps Nico was was doing exactly as we
asked him to do within two laps Louis this doesn't feel right back down to six and was finding a tenth There and it took until the end of the session before Nico saw the data and saw that he's this Optimizer that he'll use data as a starting ground but he's got a feel beyond anything else for it and he has no issue exploring the boundaries and that originally manifested itself in you'd often see him go off at turn one he'd find the absolute limit of breaking and it would just push him wide at turn one
then they bought the lap and one of our biggest frustrations with him was That out of 20 laps he did one like come on you could do more than that and actually if you look at the maturity leis had between 13 to now you'll see he completes every lapse he's now found a way of of still gaining the experience of the m to the lap out of it but it was this perfectionist that wanted and breaking was his strength his Forte maximize everything under breaking and then I know the limits the car and then I
can build from there and get into the Rhythm of things um but his is because he's explored all these boundaries he knows in just a few laps in fp1 and he learns the track incredibly quickly what the boundaries of the car is what the limits are already within his tools that he has available in the steering wheel which are quite fast for what it's worth and understands therefore how to get the car into the right positioning for as the grip comes up very very impressive where others are still just spending Seven or eight laps learning
the track he's explored quite a bit of the boundaries um now that came with some downsides often often he would change the car so quick on that you'd Lose Yourself certainly as Engineers it's difficult when your data's all moving the tracks moving the grip's moving the driver's moved everything on the steering wheel you don't know where you are and then he comes in and we've changed Mech Bell and error balance you Think okay we're starting from scratch here basically and that's some of the reasons why at times you'll see Lewis drops backwards and often when
he jumps forwards again is he's gone to a setup that's known and now he's back on the money but he's able to do that and many drivers aren't he's able to explore of and except they have a whole session perhaps in the wrong place on setup but he's learning from it and that's Lewis all over so you have this time at Mercedes eight drivers Championship seven Constructors all the other way around um definitely eight Constructors eight Constructors seven contentious yeah okay yeah eight Constructors titles eight drivers titles right you can't say I can't say the
no I mean it is what it is in the history books um correct but that was the time at Mercedes yeah and then you make the decision to walk away from one of the Best on the grid to join at the time one of the worst on the grid please talk us through that decision- making process for for many years um I'd I'd built up first of all a team behind me so one of things I've been focused on at Mercedes is I I knew my longterm wasn't going to be doing strategy for the rest
of my life loved it to bits it's brilliant job but um for many years built up a really strong team behind the scenes and in fact from from Around 21 onwards the hard work was done by them I was simply uh making a final decision but the hard work was done by them or enacting um more aspects of my job including team orders other aspects of motorport advising Toto all that sort of thing um the reason being was that um Toto was kind enough with his time to give me um as much of his experience
as he could he knew where he was forming me towards that doesn't mean I had a job within Mercedes to be a team principal There but he provided me his time and his knowledge and experience and provided me more and more responsibilities back to what I originally described to you before where if there's an opportunity I'll grab it and I'll take it I'll put it in at the cost of time and sleep and all the other things so that started happening so simulator drivers then Young Drivers then race drivers fell underneath me then started working
with our formul e Outfit started working with our GT3 outfit started working with elements of Finance elements of um s on the cost cap and other bits and Bobs just kept pulling it in of course you can't just keep doing so what I did is not absolve the responsibilities but build a team that just did all the strategy bits for me and so I could focus on that growth the direction of the path being clear once you've based yourself out of engineering and you're focused a lot More about how the company runs you have a
better idea of how to step into this role not that I ever thought this role would appear but if it did appear I wanted to have the maximum amount of exposure so that I'd be ready to jump into it simple as that um Toto is incredible at what he does no no doubt about it and has many many more years as the best one of the best team principles in the pit Lane and so it got to a point where I had to make A decision for my life not not for Mercedes life and um
that decision came when I very swiftly realized that actually I think the growth opportunities I have the growth learning I have I I enjoy learning tremendously and that was slowing down in Mercedes I can go into a completely different level by going elsewhere and so had honest conversations with Toto across that year period it it wasn't a big surprise to him in the winter and it's why also he Was accepting of the fact that he he let me move on he wanted me to move on as well as a result of of it um did
he give you a particular piece of advice in going into the role that that he could share with us I I think he said don't be um was his advice uh which I'm trying to do um no uh other than that um he he knows that I've been forming for this for quite a while so there was little he could provide me above it but even today and not just him I would say Fred and uhar before he left and a few others were were guiding voices z um where I I can happily call them
even though they're adversaries and um not ask for advice but they'll give me guidance and different things can we explore day one at Williams then please because you arrive at a team where they're at a lowb you know they work hard as hard as every other team all week long and then get no results at the weekend underfunded for year after year Some of the stuff here would have been obsolete when you arrived compared to what you were working with at Mercedes so what do you do on day one how do you communicate the start
of a new period here the start of of it is actually find out what our strengths and weaknesses are every organization will have strengths and weaknesses and there are elements here that are stronger than the Mercedes one of them is Passion which is what drives this team um this team still Has a a family feel behind it which I like but it's the reason why we have a car out the door is not because um we have digital systems telling us how to do 20,000 parts and how to put them together it's because individuals would
do what it took across a period of 3 weeks um including sleeping here as required to get the car out the door that's what Williams is it's what it embodies it's embodied for 20 years or so but the starting point is you find Out what what makes organization strong what makes organization week um don't assume find out find out from the people that have been here doing the hard work for many years um so a lot of the initial journey and it still is today for that matter as well is I'm trying to go to
every single level of the organization and talk to them the second thing is you show your vision for where you want to go and the vision I've shared here is is a very clear one it Started with this I don't care about 23 I don't care about 24 and I really don't care about 25 sounds strange doesn't it but that's not what it's of interest to me I'm interested in 25 is a bit of a borderline one but 23 and 24 I don't care about we can finish last break everything this is an opportunity you'll
never have in your lifetime break everything you have uh C from me you have a um a free pass to if we can do it better let's do it better let's talk About it don't carry on with the same way we've been doing it for 20 years and we'll go backwards as a result of that but break everything learn and use the experience so for example how we approached racing was we highlighted before the season starts these races and there would say that you could highlight from a distance as well these races we're going to
be good at all the other ones I want to do learning on those weekends it is about learning try Something you haven't tried before um it doesn't matter if it's a setup Direction it's a driving style it's How We Do data it's building performance Engineers it's um how we use the factory learn on those weekends make sure you set out what we're going to learn learn on these weekends you're never get this opportunity again same within the era Department let's let's focus on actually doing things from ground routs properly do flow Dynamics not worry about
what Other people are doing understand our car do flow Dynamics do proper designer experiment learn from experiment feedback to everyone from experiment you'll see how I've used the actions they apply here and um to the credit of the organization there was Little Resistance to that we have a problem at the moment which is always the same problem which is there's a little bit of a taste of success and when there's a taste of success you want To hold on to what you've got but putting the sort of that into context we have as many points
less than a top team would score on One race weekend so it's success by the measure of where we were but it's not success I don't want that from this team I don't want that for the future of this team we want more than that and to get more than that where we are at the moment is on the wrong slope we have to change everything still and it's the hardest thing to do change if You look at many organizations changing what you're doing is incredibly difficult um it's why a number of companies that were
some of the most successful in the world Blockbuster went bankrupt nearly overnight because you don't change and the same happened to us you sense fear from some people here I don't think it's fear there's sort of two beliefs essentially in there one is I've done it this way for a long period of time and so that's not necessarily Fear it's Comfort what but it's comfort in this works while are we changing it um and often it's difficult to know what works and what doesn't work I mean if I said to you use your left hand
to right wi when you're right-handed because it's change that's not good change and often it's different difficult to differentiate what's good change and what's bad change so you're not just literally changing everything we're not going to make people sit on boxes which Which aren't anymore actually um uh we're we're going to to properly change structures to be um for the good sometimes people are afraid of the challenge that's going to be in front of them sometimes people are afraid of fa failure so I go back to the first of those what you do is you
first will create exactly the right culture I don't wor I'm not worried if anyone fails as long as we are changing things for the good but what you've done yesterday is Now not good enough and what you're going to do today will not be good enough tomorrow how do you know there if someone isn't failing because they're not good enough or they're not working hard enough and how do you know they're failing because they're pushing the envelope it's a good question first and foremost you you start by having it won't be one individual myself or
even a select individuals which is a management committee you have a leadership team That know what Excellence looks like that's the key behind it all what Excellence looks like and how to drive people towards that fundamentally and when you start getting the vision of what Excellence looks like sufficiently down the organization even if the individual doesn't recognize it you'll find a level that does recognize this is what Excellence is and we're not anywhere near close to it anymore and you redefine the boundaries where you Are even if you don't know what Excellence looks like here's
where we are today here's where I want you to be all the way over there how do we get there and it's not by doing this it is by large momentous jumps on where you're going so to your question even if you don't really know whether what you're doing is pushing the boundaries or not change the the game push the bound into something completely different and you will fail by doing that and and Fundamentally you could say yeah but you could be failing already because you're right up against the boundary I can assure you all
of us will look back and what we're doing here in three years time ago was nowhere near the boundary it's much further away than that so it's about defining what Excellence looks like defining what the Gap looks like and defining a pathway that allows people to get there in a safe way without fearing the failure that comes Out of it as the result when we interviewed Toto he he told us about on his first day at Mercedes he gave a speech to all the staff and he distinctly recounts a an engineer saying him I'll believe
it when I see it we've heard these fine words before and he recognized the need as you've said James to role model to demonstrate that I'm going to do this can you give us an example of where you've given a tangible example of you Being prepared to break the rules um not so much break the rules but in the period of time I am here um the update that was due for Canada it's a large update for this team it look everything looks on Target and then suddenly everything fell way behind and we were going
through an empowerment empowerment of our team to say you tell us whether we can make it or not and the answer that came back is we can't make it which I reflected On um then we had a lot of damage in the race just before on the floors and now we're in a bit of a tricky situation that there is no existing flaws and there's no future flaws so I went downstairs with Fred our Co um went downstairs brought around about 50 people together and said the following we will get this update to Canada there's
no ifs SPS and babies we will get this update to Canada and I will be here every evening with you Until we get this update to Canada it's not that I'm useful I'd be crap at laminating flaw um but I wanted them to see that um it's the journey that I believe in so much that I will put all of my time into it not other things all of it into this the next element of is is what I explained is we will not have many opportunities of points this year I know that but one
of them is absolutely Canada I am confident to be able to score points in Canada and thank God we Did otherwise I'd look foolish um to the extent where we took a new panel unit as well with Alex and Canada literally all legs in one basket not a great way of doing Formula 1 racing by the way but um you've got to sometimes back what you believe in to that extent and I walked around um and met a lot of people um across the next few evenings in fact I didn't have to stay late Beyond
Friday because it was done the day and a half early surprised everyone but it was done Early um but actually some of the the best memories I have for this year is walking around and seeing some of the night shift down in um in the comps area and the floors being built and just seeing them build up over time and the kit building up over time um and that's where you put you put your actions where your your words are um and I uh I enjoyed every minute of that actually for what it's worth it's
not something you can do habitually day to-day but I Wanted to demonstrate to the organization that this isn't about one one of us and I'm no different to the rest of them I want us to have success and to have success means we've got to do things that are tough and difficult um so that was the start of it the same words actually got told to me here when I'm I'm here as well which is there were a number of people there something called change saturation um which happens when you've had large amounts of Sways
of change from different individuals and this organization is probably the epitome of it in Formula One it has it's had large amounts of management change over the last 10 years and they become fatigued by it so when you change like yeah we're just changing for the sake of changing again um I had a bit of that at the beginning and actually I'm thankful for it because it means the individuals felt already that they could talk to me openly and Honestly so i' already started to create a bit of that there and and thank them for
it and said that's fine let's action speak rather than anything else and as you would expect momentum builds momentum so as soon as we had a little bit of momentum on actually the wind tunnel starting to produce some really good things and the update starting to produce some really good things and we're getting things out the door and we're scoring points you build in that Momentum with everyone else and you can start to see the direction of travel with then the hardest thing is that direction is still very light compared to the direction of travel
we need to be we have a tremendous road in front of us we've just started on it and it's making sure we build momentum not slow down or accept that what we're doing at the moment is okay because it's not we're far away from where we need to be and that change needs to double down not Half going forward brilliant it's time for our quick fire questions the first one of which is what are the three non-negotiable behaviors that you and the people around you must buy into honesty it's um incredibly important to me respect
yep to to your peers around you to make sure that you you give them the time of day you listen to them and you understand what they're doing um and actually the third one I would embody Which is Passion here because the passion is what drives her and absolutely keep it it's tremendous here I hope we never lose it what advice would you give to a teenage James just starting out probably work harder at school in hindsight you would have been could have had a better easier time it would have made your life easier later
on no I think the the main advice I would give is believe in in yourself believe in What you're capable of and um dreams can become reality if you're prepared to sacrifice enough to get there what's your biggest strength what's your greatest week weakness biggest strength is I think I have the ability to um listen to a wide a wide varied selection of individuals and communicate with a wide selection of individuals as well so in other words I I'm able to understand from from very quickly some quite difficult subjects not to the level of Depth
that many individuals would but enough to be able to talk about it and I'm able to communicate and direct individuals all of my decisions aren't going to be 100% bang on but often with an organization someone that's strong enough to make a decision is what you're looking for because that often is better than just going around in circles I appreciate that's what we do for a living but uh you get the idea biggest weakness is Um I all too easily will get dragged into the details because I love the details um and actually there's not
enough time in the day so you've got to focus on the big picture items in order to move forward and the details you have to entrust and Empower individuals to get on with it sure what's the single best piece of advice you've ever received from why um it's uh it's from a very good CEO uh who's a good friend of mine um who said trust your instinct um Don't delay the difficult decisions get on with them because all you do is regret not doing them six months earlier and finally your one Golden Rule that you'd
like to leave the viewers and the listeners with for living a high performance life I know I spoke about before about giving up a lot in the life but there is also a balance to it you need your health your health is if you want the biggest and best investment you can make in life it's into your health Because it will give you returns Beyond any others so eating properly being fit and healthy just means you perform better at work and the hour that you take to do that will reward you more than the hour
you would spend otherwise the the second piece of advice is um there is going to be a point where actually just taking a break and walking around will give you far more return than doing an extra 10 minutes of sitting there Scrat scratching your head Fundamentally you'd be surprised how the human brain works but the best ideas I've had aren't sat at a desk for 10 hours it's in the shower going for a run at 4:00 a.m. my brain just wakes up at 4: a.m. have really good ideas I have a pen and paper and
I write them down um by the bed maybe that's says something to you about not very intelligent but somehow my sleeping brain's quite good uh so it makes up for it but give your brain the breaks it needs to have the Real epiphanies because they don't happen when you just punish it for 10 hours in a row listen thank you so much for sitting and sharing so much with us we look forward to 2026 there you go thanks very much hope you're patient thank you thanks mate
