How Binotto will change Ferrari for the better

Mattia Binotto's promotion to Ferrari team principal as replacement for Maurizio Arrivabene could be interpreted as a kneejerk reaction to yet another failure by the Maranello team to win the Formula 1 world championship.

In an era where stability has paid such dividends for Mercedes, some may question why Ferrari has once again appeared to fiddle rather than focus on the small improvements it needs to turn its promise into championship trophies.

But to understand why the move has been taken, it is important to realise that away from the race victories and championship challenges Ferrari has mounted in recent years, it has found itself severely lacking in several areas - specifically in the way the racing team was being run. In the end, those factors highlighted that change and a new culture was not only desirable but needed.

Sure, the timing of the move isn't ideal, but what's clear is that Ferrari's top chiefs have quickly come to realise that behind the Harry Potter-style glasses of the quiet and unassuming Binotto is someone who not only understands how a racing team works but can also help inspire staff and lift them - rather than act as a crushing force like his predecessor so often did.

If you dig a little deeper into the reasons for Ferrari's turnaround since its disastrous first year with the turbo hybrid engines that prompted the split with Fernando Alonso at the end of 2014, it's Binotto rather than Arrivabene who has been most influential in lifting its form.

He first of all helped turn around its engine situation after taking control of that department in the wake of Luca Marmorini's departure in 2014. His efforts swiftly pulled the red cars towards the front of the grid, and set Ferrari on a path to rival Mercedes for the accolade of having the best power unit on the grid.

That work made it obvious to then-Ferrari president Sergio Marchionne that Binotto was the right man to take over the car side of things too in the wake of James Allison's departure in the summer of 2016 - even if outsiders were sceptical at the time.

After all, despite a lengthy career at Ferrari, Binotto's CV had never included the design of any racing car. And here was the man that the team was hoping would be able to take on the might of Adrian Newey at Red Bull.

The outcome of Binotto's approach was a team better at thinking outside the box, rather than just trying to keep the chiefs happy

But Binotto's move was not about having the technical department led by the best design genius the team could get its hands on. It was about having things run by the man who could get the most out of the brilliant brains Ferrari already had.

Some of the world's best film directors can't act; championship-winning football managers may be unable to score goals, and renowned orchestra conductors may not be experts in playing all instruments. But what they all have in common is the ability to know which people they need around them, how to get them to work together and how to extract the best from them. This is where Binotto fitted in.

The same qualities that had helped Binotto guide Ferrari's engine department back from its terrible 2014 effort were exactly what were needed to improve its chassis too.

A modern F1 team is no longer a case of a car being designed as a one-man show: it's about pooling together hundreds of personnel to simulate, create and test new ideas to make the progress. Decisions are based on hard data and feedback, not the whim of an individual.

Binotto very much wanted a new approach to how Ferrari's technical department was run. Rather than opting for a power grab and direct control over everything that went on, he set about getting support for a new structure.

Gone was the old vertical organisation of the technical boss sitting on top of each department head. In came a more horizontal system - where all staff had a better say in how things were done, and were more able to get involved in the decision-making process.

The outcome of this approach was a team better at thinking outside the box, rather than having a mindset of just trying to keep the tech chief and team principal happy. Ideas were allowed to flourish.

This way of working opened the door for a number of Ferrari innovations in recent years - including its unique sidepods, mirror solutions, a double battery arrangement and even auxiliary oil tank use.

The horizontal structure also meant the different departments worked better as a cohesive unit to help produce the best overall cars. It wasn't the case of one group vying to become 'teacher's pet' to get free reign for their part of the car to take priority: an overall chassis performance target was laid out and everyone had to contribute the best way they could to that goal.

By pushing the press away, Ferrari was unable to control the message. It lost the PR war from the off

The aero department, gearbox department and chassis department were no longer working in isolation and then having everything merged together at the end. From the start of the process, everyone worked together for the global good.

Of course, there were some hiccups along the way. The reliability dramas of late 2017 proved costly for Ferrari's championship ambitions, but Binotto had been mindful of quality control being a weak area and had already started working on a solution before the failures hit.

The end of last year was also blighted by problems with extracting the best from a series of car upgrades as the team failed to capitalise on the overall strong base of the SF71H.

While that stall in technical progress in late 2018 contributed to Ferrari's championship situation, the driver, management and team strategy errors were ultimately much more costly. And those latter aspects were all firmly at the door of Arrivabene.

Plus, the ebb and flow of car development, with teams sometimes getting it wrong as they strive to improve, is part and parcel of life at the front of the grid. Mercedes hasn't been perfect in this regard and has found itself dealing with a 'diva' of a chassis in recent years.

Binotto's organisational talents will be a bonus when it comes to pooling the best from Maranello. He has an intense understanding of the car operations - both inside the factory and at the racetrack. His umbrella approach, of being able to cover all areas while trusting those underneath him, should allow the team's quality to rise up rather than be fearful.

His calm stance can also help ease the siege mentality the team has been under with Arrivabene, whose media lockdown added unnecessary pressures.

By pushing the press away, Ferrari was unable to control the message. It lost the PR war from the off, so when things turned bad, the criticisms piled up - making the team think the world was out to get it.

This served to only increase the pressure to succeed far beyond what it needed to be, and left the team trapped in a negative spiral.

As Ferrari has shown in recent years, having a very quick car is no guarantee of winning the world championship: but it's an essential element if you want to have any chance of success.

Binotto played a key role in giving Ferrari that important first part. Now, the same philosophies and qualities are what he now needs to bring to the table to produce a team that operates better. If he does that, Ferrari's rivals had better watch out.