To the outside world, it seems as though Toto Wolff has left no stone unturned in his attempt to get Mercedes back to the top of F1. However, BusinessF1 claims that it is Wolff who is actually the main reason why Mercedes cannot make progress.
Wolff has made all kinds of efforts to make his team as strong as it was two or three years ago. In fact, he recently went to the lengths of signing Red Bull’s ex-COO Jayne Poole as a team advisor for the Silver Arrows.
Mercedes have hired Red Bull’s former COO Jayne Poole as a senior advisor. She will work closely with Wolff & be involved in evaluating current infrastructure at Mercedes & offer advice on any potential changes that can be made – especially under the cost cap. #F1 pic.twitter.com/MfXC6jYQXA
— The F1 Journal (@thef1journal_) March 3, 2023
Poole has already started her work at Mercedes. As per her suggestion, Toto Wolff recently approved a $100,000,000 project to completely renovate their headquarters in Brackley. According to them, having a revamped campus will improve the morale of the workers.
Toto Wolff is not active enough
After completing the approval of the renovation project, Wolff has come under immense criticism. The issue is that Jayne Poole was a redundancy at Red Bull. She was surplus to their requirements. Yet, Mercedes picked her up. Meanwhile, other teams are busy poaching active engineers from Red Bull who were actually important to the team’s success in recent years.
An article about Wolff, published in BusinessF1, talks about the same issue. The article makes it clear that trying to sweep up the cast-offs from Red Bull cannot be a way for Mercedes to succeed. The fact that Red Bull did not retain Poole to save money, shows that she wasn’t vital to the team.
However, Wolff believes otherwise. He commented, “Her role at Red Bull was, in my opinion, a very large part of the success of the team.” He claimed that he had wanted to sign Poole for a long time, and finally got that opportunity when Red Bull let her go.
Toto Wolff is quite pleased with Mercedes’ recent signing of former Red Bull COO, Jayne Poole.#Wolff #Mercedes #RedBull #F1 #Formula1 pic.twitter.com/JJtlROfsXC
— PlanetF1 (@Planet_F1) May 22, 2023
Business F1 also criticizes Wolff for asking Poole to draw up a ‘forensic profile’ of the best engineers in the paddock. This sends a very negative message to the hundreds of young engineers who are already working for Mercedes.
Wolff is not dedicated enough?
A lot has been spoken about Wolff’s dedication to Mercedes since Niki Lauda’s death. Another article by the same magazine claimed that Wolff spends a lot less time at the Mercedes factory compared to how much time his rival Christian Horner spends at Red Bull’s base in Milton-Keynes.
The magazine also claimed that the top heads at Mercedes are not happy with how Wolff is leading the team. They are pushing Wolff to move from Monaco to Brackley so that he spends more time at the team headquarters, where he is needed.
If the reports of instability in the hierarchy of the team turn out to be true, it is clear that Mercedes have a lot to sort out before they can dream of being champions again.
