Was Franz Tost the worst human resources director in the world? The worst supervisor? Some recent statements from the customer of Toro Rosso/AlphaTauri, now retired after a long and rich career in F1, leave us to believe so.
Earlier this year, Franz Tost thus launched that he no longer trusted his engineers. “Repeatedly recently in Abu Dhabi, he assured that burnout was for the weak ”; He had repeated a few months ago that if mechanics and engineers complained about an extreme workload in F1, they should go elsewhere …
My management style is completely simple “ he defended himself.
I sit down with people, we discuss a topic, we make a decision. What I don’t like is deciding on something and then changing it, going in another direction. At first, we sometimes had small problems, but people then got used to me and we had a fantastic cooperation. “
How to explain then his controversial statement about his engineers and his lack of trust? Shouldn’t Franz Tost make his mea culpa?
The engineers I was talking to, they understood it. I have to tell you the story. Last year, our car was not competitive. I then said that we had to do something because I can’t accept that we are driving at the back of the grid. I want to be at least in the first part of the grid. “We work very hard and we have options. We know exactly what we have to do,” they told me.”
I visited them at the aerodynamics department. They gave me figures and told me, “The car will be fantastic. Very good performances, very good numbers, as well as in the wind tunnel, and blah blah”. “
Then we arrived in Bahrain and I didn’t need to wait for the race. I knew already after the test that we were nowhere. I got angry and asked them what was going on: “Oh, you know, an evolution is coming.” I said, “I don’t care about the evolution. This car needs to perform.” Then, during your press conference, I was questioned about this and I replied: “I no longer trust them.” “
If I no longer trust people, then they are out. That’s what happened. We changed them and brought in new people, so that we now have, I hope, a good team in the aerodynamics department. I must say that all the evolutions they have brought this year have worked properly. “
18 years in F1 … looking back on a memorable career
Franz Tost will have had the merit, if not the delicacy,
