John Elkann reflects on Mattia Binotto's 'blame culture' and why Fred Vasseur is the right man for Ferrari

In the summary of the sporting season of Scuderia Ferrari, President John Elkann offered his perspective on the eve of the final act of the championship in Abu Dhabi. The power of words can convey explicit thoughts and subliminal messages. Without considering the starting context, it can undoubtedly be stated that the Prancing Horse abruptly halted the upward trend that began after the disastrous 2020 season. However, the change at the helm of GES, following the unmet expectations in the second half of the season after a brilliant start, was an event that had not only organizational implications.

The departure of Mattia Binotto left the racing department with a technical project lacking instructions concerning the dual role of technical director and team principal entrusted to the Italo-Swiss manager.

In this regard, the President of the historic Italian team emphasized that since Stefano Domenicali’s departure, Ferrari has progressively embraced the “blame culture,” an age-old problem eradicated by Jean Todt during his tenure.

The rejection of the roles assigned to Maurizio Arrivabene and Mattia Binotto is as clear as their guilt in not smoothing out frictions within the areas of the racing department. The motivations for choosing Fred Vasseur align with various schools of thought. Some argue that he was the best the market could offer, while others hypothesize providing greater tranquility to the team’s flagship, Charles Leclerc.

“If you trace back,” he says, “we haven’t had that culture since Jean Todt and then Stefano [Domenicali, Jean Todt’s successor] were leading. It just left us. Accountability is that you own your responsibility and somehow a blame culture deflects that. So it’s not about blaming, it’s about being responsible. And that was a major cultural difference that we had. So if we look at 2020, I remember that there was such disappointment. That’s when I realised we had to take this very seriously and it was important to look at what was happening and be aware of it and work. We were not going to be competitive until 2022 – and everyone was very much in denial about this. And then we actually were able to work over these years and be competitive in 2022. So focus definitely is an area where if it is applied, but then you need a culture that is able to use that focus in a way that pushes full responsibility and accountability and ultimately a no-blame culture is a prerequisite of it.” – the Ferrari president explained.

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According to John Elkann, Fred Vasseur was a choice based on two criteria. His many years of experience in motorsport and skills acquired in smaller entities compared to the Prancing Horse. In essence, the French executive has a managerial style focused on streamlining internal processes, having matured professionally in entities incomparable to the Prancing Horse.

“What is important is to have the best possible team, and if you’re able to have the best possible team and have women and men coming from different nationalities and backgrounds that enable that to happen, that is very welcome. Our identity is very clearly defined as Italian and the backbone of our organisation is Italian. But that is not in any way a detriment. On the contrary, it is a base on which you can complement with very strong talents coming from different places. What’s really important is to maintain the pace and momentum of improvement. Every year will be difficult for unknown reasons”

A decision-maker who, however, needs a lean organizational structure to give his best. In this sense, the manager from France demonstrated his pragmatic approach by significantly compressing the development times of the race car. Just think of the significantly earlier debut of the “B” version of the SF-23 in Spain. On the other hand, in some circumstances, the French manager seemed tied to minimal objectives, consistent with the expectations of a second-tier team but decidedly lower than the targets of a team that should at least compete for victory on every track.

However, the season coming to an end is a bonus in terms of credit that insiders and fans have granted to Fred Vasseur, having inherited an organization and a race car conceived according to the rationale of the previous team principal. If the historic Italian team has been appreciated for some aspects related to on-track operations, next year it will be his race car designed by his men chosen by Fred Vasseur based on the processes and methods defined by the French executive.

The turning point in the Ferrari president’s interview, betraying a certain embarrassment, is the non-answer regarding the motivations for the long championship drought that has plagued the dry spell between the triumphs of Jody Scheckter and Michael Schumacher. A version without historical and technological construct masked by the most predictable of clarifications: “There are always many, many reasons.” The hope for the red team and its millions of fans is that the reasons are well clear to the new management because unexpectedly, even 2023 has been a new year zero for the legendary Italian team.