Leader of the pack

Imagine being promoted to one of the most sought-after jobs in the world at the age of 43. Then start loading up the challenges: the two most successful exponents of the same role are still in the management structure; your company has dominated its field for the past decade; and you have to negotiate your way through a minefield of enforced cost reductions without losing competitiveness.

Meet Stefano Domenicali, who took over in January as team principal of Scuderia Ferrari, better known as the Ferrari Formula One team.

Ferrari are unlike any other team in the sporting world. For a start, there is the impossible task of improving on perfection after the staggering success of the past 10 years, with 13 world championships, both drivers’ and constructors’. Then there is the social responsibility. Ferrari carries a nation’s hopes. When the team are racing, more than 12m Italians watch on television and every newspaper has its daggers ready to plunge into the team if they fail.

Motor racing is followed passionately in Italy, and while there are many football teams, there is only one Ferrari. It is part of the fabric of life and a vital part of history. When the bridges over the River Po were destroyed in the second world war, it was the need to hold the legendary Mille Miglia (1,000 mile) road race that got them rebuilt quickly. Both literally and symbolically, motor racing reunited Italy.

Ferrari is part of that history and retains an importance today. The late Fiat patriarch Gianni Agnelli, who bought 90 per cent of Ferrari in the 1970s, said that a successful Ferrari team was vital to the image of Italy because it meant that “Made in Italy” could be a badge of pride.

Domenicali is affable but razor sharp. He knows the responsibilities and risks of his role but is calm and assured, which comes from having been a key member of the group that made Ferrari so successful. In his previous role as sporting director, he was able to learn from two great leaders: Ferrari board member Jean Todt, team principal from 1993 to 2007, and Ross Brawn, head of the technical department from 1996 to 2006.

Domenicali saw how Ferrari maintained its success thanks to talented individuals who were highly motivated to improve and to never rest on their laurels.

“I have been lucky to live close to both [Todt and Brawn],” he says. “I try to keep my personality because it would be wrong to change it, but I understood how to manage this very difficult work in F1. For example, the way Ross takes into consideration all the different people, but at the end of the day one person has to take a decision. And from Jean I learnt the importance of taking care of all the details and never giving up.”

Ferrari as a racing team had fallen into disrepair after the death of Enzo Ferrari in 1988, and even before that they had slipped behind British-based outfits such as Williams, McLaren and Benetton.

Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo, who managed the F1 team in the mid-1970s, hired the best international talent to regenerate the team. Along with Todt and Brawn he recruited South African designer Rory Byrne and German driver Michael Schumacher. But the “expat” regime at Ferrari had a succession plan in place that would eventually let Italians take over the team again.

“I think that [the succession plan] was a good move for the motivation of the people working in Ferrari,” Domenicali says. “The most important thing is to keep everyone at a high level. Also, it is important that the top management has created an evolving, dynamic stability, in order to change people at the right moment, without changing the philosophy.

“In 1996, when Ross and Rory and Michael came with us, we had a big change because we were lacking a lot of things inside. Then, step by step, that group of people brought a lot of know-how and brought us to a very good level.”

The “Italian-ness” of the team is always there, he says. “What is important is that the passport is not a limiting factor. If you are able to create Ferrari with Italian people, of course it is fantastic for Italy, for our brand. But Ferrari is more than that – it crosses borders.”

Domenicali has only ever worked for one company. The son of a prominent banker from Emilia Romana, the region where Ferrari is based, he joined in 1991 after graduating from Bologna University. He started out on the road car side of the company but then moved across to the finance department at the race team.

His core business during the past 10 years has been team management. F1 is a complex sport and the rules are often vague and open to interpretation. As sporting director from 2002, it was his job to know the rules and to ensure the best outcome for Ferrari.

Under the leadership of Todt and Schumacher, Ferarri were a team that never gave an inch to their rivals and sometimes crossed the line of what is and is not acceptable in the pursuit of victory. They were not much liked for it, either within F1 or among the general public.

Without distancing himself from that regime, Domenicali is his own man with his own values. Ferrari under him is more open and engaged with its competitors, while maintaining the highest standards of engineering and racecraft.

“I have a clear vision,” he says. “This job is team work. At the end of the day, it is Ferrari that is winning. I don’t need to have any ego about that. For me, the team spirit has to be the thing that wins.”

By any standards, Domenicali has a tough task on his hands. If he cannot match the success rate of his predecessor, his reign may be considered a failure. The competition in F1 is always intense, but Ferrari face an onslaught from the Mercedes-backed McLaren team and from a well-financed and well-organised BMW outfit.

“I feel that responsibility,” he says. “But we don’t have to overreact. Of course, when you set such a high standard it is very difficult to keep up the same results for many, many years. We are in a sport and, in the real world, life is up and down, and you try to control it. This is the cycle of life. When you have this kind of challenge you know that, after so many years of success, to keep on thinking you can do the same for years is unrealistic. And I am a realistic guy. On the other hand,” he adds, “the way we want to face this challenge is to think that it is possible.

“To have this job at my age is incredible. I take it as an honour that I was able to achieve it. But I understand that it will all disappear very quickly if we don’t achieve results.”

Domenicali has arrived in the top job at a time when the sport is embarking on substantial cost-cutting, with talk of spending caps and slashing budgets in half. Reducing a £200m-a-year budget without giving anything away to the opposition will be tricky.

“The attention on cost is vital for the future,” he says. “On the other hand, we don’t have to overreact because F1 has always been the leader in technology, and for us technology and the development of it is the key element of F1. The transfer between F1 and the road car side is essential.”

Achieving agreement between the teams has been difficult, with deep suspicion and clashing egos dividing the team principals. Domenicali represents a new wave, a chance for reconciliation and progress.

“We had periods in F1 where the ego of some people was too strong,” he says. “This is something that will change over the next few years.”