McLaren Team Principal Andrea Stella has abstained from taking individual credit for the incredible turnaround the side has made in recent weeks.
After dropping a place to fifth in the standings last term, McLaren opened up the current campaign without scoring a point in the opening two rounds, condemning the British squad to its worst start in six years.
Following expectations of a sluggish start having openly admitted to missing development targets on its 2023 car, a recent upgrade package has transformed its prospects for the remainder of the year.
Both McLaren drivers qualified inside the top three at Silverstone, before Lando Norris scooped a maiden home podium with Oscar Piastri coming home fourth on Sunday.
However, Stella, who replaced Alfa Romeo-bound Andreas Seidl over the winter, declares that the entire team should be heralded for the remarkable improvement.
“For me, my focus is just doing the right things,” he said. “Focus on performance, focus on creating a vision for the team and making sure everyone understands what the vision and direction is.
“But the most important thing is that you don’t do these things alone. I have been very, very well supported, and even the collaboration with Zak [Brown – McLaren CEO] has been incredibly close and strategic.
“It would be a mistake to say ‘I, I, I’ or ‘you, you, you’, it is a group work even when it comes to the leadership. A Formula 1 team is too complex to think that somebody alone can turn a situation around.”
The ex-Ferrari race engineer has also opened up on the decision to part ways with former Technical Director James Key earlier this year in order to implement a revised technical structure.
McLaren has elected to adopt a three-pronged team, consisting of Peter Prodromou (Aerodynamics), Neil Houldey (Engineering and Design) and David Sanchez, who will return to Woking as the outfit’s Technical Director for Car Concept and Performance next January.
“You obviously need to recognise who are the people that need to be part of this journey, but also when you mention the technical director, it is not about a person at all,” Stella, 52, explained.
“We wanted to establish a different model from a technical point of view based on distributing the aerodynamic, the concept and performance and the engineering and design function in different areas. This is just a different was of working, it doesn’t have to do with somebody in particular.
“We as a leadership group, we wanted a focus on aerodynamics, a focus on performance and concept, and focus on engineering and design. This required a bit more a distributed model when it comes to the technical organisation. That was the rational.
“When we talk about the leadership the contributed to the change, I want to praise all the people that work with me,” he continued. “Piers Thynne, chief operating officer, Daniel Gallo, chief people officer, and then certainly all these under the coordination and strategic input of Zak. So it’s teamwork.”
Along with the capture of Sanchez from Ferrari, McLaren has also signed long-time Red Bull man Rob Marshall to fulfil the role of Technical Director, Engineering & Design). He will also begin work in January 2024 once his period of gardening leave has concluded.
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