YouSaid · the spoken record

Zak Brown

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59
first
2025-11-19
most recent
2025-11-19
sittings or episodes
1
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podcast

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  1. “You and I'm going to want to have that the entire way. And then when you do get old, which I'm not there yet, but I'm getting old, then you want to be mentored by the youth because the youth are growing up with technology that us old guys are like, what? So I think you can get mentored by people that are more experienced, that are older and people that are more experienced and are younger because of how fast this world is moving.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “Mentors. I was fortunate at a young age because I was racing cars to hang out with CEOs when I was 21 years old. The gap in experience between being a 21-year-old who's just full of adrenaline and a picking age 40, 50, 60, 70 year old, I think about how much, you know, I'm 53 now and I look up to Roger Penske, who's 85-ish. And I think, look at how much I've experienced. He's got 30 years more of what I'm experiencing. And I can't even imagine what I'm going to see in the next 30 years. But if I go talk to Roger Pensky, he can share some of that with me. So I think mentors are critical and all along the way, because there's always someone smarter than you. And there's always someone who has more experience.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Something I've not perfected at all, but I've gotten better at it with some maturity. You know, golf course, cigar in hand, my high school friends, baseball, and ice hockey. Get out and play. I played some tennis this morning. So getting out and playing sport and driving my historic racing cars”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “Ooh, it's almost kind of hard to Answer that because that's kind of an in the moment, I think stupidity is doing something that has consequences far worse than the reward. So if you get your risk Versus reward balance out of place, then I think that becomes stupidity.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “Ooh, I've had a lot of mentors, and I still have a lot of mentors. I think if I had to pick one, it would be Paul Walsh, my chairman. I've known him for 20 years, so he was a client of mine. He's a friend. He's a mentor. He's a boss. And that's actually what I've probably learned most from him. He's unflappable. He's the one.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “What does that mean? It's become less emotional. I'm a high passion, high emotion guy, which I think comes hopefully comes through in my book dating with school. And I've learned to mature, be a little bit more thoughtful, a little bit more deliberate. I'm naturally an instinct guy. And that's great, but sometimes you got to slow down a little bit. So, you know, Andrea is ready, ready, Amy, aim, aim, fire. And I can be, you know, definitely fire ready aim and pick an order. And it's worked for me pretty good. But... If instincts right 90% of the time, but slowing down takes that 10% you got wrong and you can cut that in half because you still got to rely on it, then that's what I've learned over the years. And also I've always had mentors.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “We read it out of order, and I've read it so many times. I'm interested to hear what people who read it start, you know, because when you're editing it, we read chapter 20, and I forgot what 19 was. And so it's kind of hard for me now. I can't see the forest through the trees. So I hope people find it entertaining. There's definitely some funny stories in there. And I hope people have some, you know. Takeaway from it, and they can go, you know what? That's something I think I saw Zach learn from, I can apply it in my own world.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “Good question. I never thought I was going to be a book guy, but I got approached and I thought, well, it's just pretty cool. It's a business leadership book. It kind of goes back to my childhood and how. Aspects to it, but it's not like here's my story. It's kind of here's my story and here's how I applied it to business. So I really really”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Yeah, yeah, definitely. I'm happy. Just not happy for long periods of time. Doesn't mean I'm unhappy. I'm just kind of like, I'm happy. That's right. But like I'm thrilled we won last night. It was amazing. But like we got a job to do at the next race from Brazil. We've got four races to go.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “Where we want to win in Brazil. So that's something I've had to personally work on over the years. I've had comments from my staff, whether it was my old company or here, of like, is he ever happy? He's always kind of busting our chops. I'm just trying to”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “Making a ton of money, Grand Prix racing, living in Monaco. Pretty cool. So I think all of that. And then it's a sport where it's not just on the field of play. It's the whole environment. It's the social gatherings. It's the evenings out. It's the technology. So I also think everybody drives. Well, maybe not everybody. Most people drive. So I think there's a relatable aspect to it where women, men, boys, girls all kind of have had a steering wheel in their hand at some point. And I think there's some relevance there.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “I think engagement. You know, we went from being an exclusive team to an inclusive team. Come on in, and the sport went from being an exclusive sport to an inclusive sport. I think that's what Netflix did, is it brought you into behind the scenes. And I think what's happened is people realize how fascinating our sport is, not just on the field of play, the politics, the big money, it's global, it's easy to get to know 10 racing drivers and 10 team bosses where if you look at other sports, you've got 400 or 500 people in football. So it's harder to kind of get to know everybody. A lot of drama in our sport. It's a pretty glamorous sport. Racing drivers are pretty cool, guys. So you can see why the younger audience, you can see why Landonoris is the most popular with young female fans, right? You got a 25-year-old racing driver.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “On all three of those aspects. And then, of course, we've built on it. You have the Brad Pitt movie, all these things have accelerated our new fan base.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “They've been fantastic. I don't think any of us saw that coming. It's brought in north of. So if you look at what Formula One needed when Liberty acquired it, it needed North America from a geographic standpoint. It needed a more diverse and female fan base and a younger fan base. Tick, tick, tick, tick. You know, we went from one race in America to three to a new huge TV deal with Apple. 75% of our new fans are women and a younger audience age 18 to 34. So it totally moved the needle in the three areas that when you went and talked to corporate sponsors big for us and Formula One's not big there. The fan base isn't young enough. It's not diverse enough. Netflix helped us lead the way on ringing the bell.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “Well, directly you get prize money from Formula One. So that increases as you are more successful. And then, of course, fans love winners. So you get more fans. That's where you have your great communications department who handed over your commercial department to monetize that excitement in your brand. And then you get more sponsor partners. So what we need to do is be a team. And we fell out of this that's always a threat to win, right? We've won 13 races this year. I can't say we are or aren't going to win 13 races next year. We might win none. We might win 15. We might win somewhere in the middle. But we need to be one of those teams that is always in the top four because the top four teams, last year four teams won. This year three teams have won. So we always need to be a threat to win where we fell back.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “We were not in good shape before we brought in our investment. But coming back to winning because our shareholder was spending a lot of money on the automotive group, they had a decision to make live within our means, which was a slow death because you've Gotta kind of play to win or play to win, they took the decision let's bring in some external investment so we can give the racing team all the resources they need to get back to the front. That's what we did. We got back to the front and then they went that was in a great five-year run we'd like our team back and they bought out the minority shareholders Simon came in and partnered them and now it's it's happy days”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Yes, Formula One teams are hot. The sport has never been hotter. Sport has never been hotter. I mean, it was. Years ago, we were this all public $560 million value. And it's been reported that we are around 3.5 billion in value. And while I can't give you the exact number, that's not a million miles off that value growth in five years is amazing. And now you have an 11th team who's had to pay almost $500 million just to get an entry. spend a billion or two until they become profitable. So now the low watermark, I think for a Formula One team is $2 billion and a high watermark. Five, six, four, and”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “Yep, awesome relationship. Mum Telecat, which is Bahrain, have owned. Want us to win first? Obviously have a great healthy business, which we do. Things have never been more successful, which is exciting at McLaren on and off the track. But we also know in sport it's not if we take a step back. It's when.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “You wouldn't be our first choice. Yes, of course you could. There are some drivers that Don't care about Anything other than driving. And while I appreciate that from a driving point of view, that's not what this job is. This job is. Driving, sponsors, fans promoting the sport. So, yes, you would get a ride because coming back to We care more than all the teams? I know we care a lot more than a lot of the teams because there are some drivers that wouldn't drive here at McLaren, regardless of talent, because they don't fit the McLaren brand and culture and our values, which is sponsors, our brand, the way we carry ourselves, our engagement with fans. So, yeah, you'll get a ride, but you want to get a ride with McLaren.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “We went to papaya, all our fans when I started were going, bring back the papaya. All right, we'll bring back the papaya. And I remember one of the old school teammates around here was like, we're only doing that because that's what the fans want. And I'm like, That kind of a trick question. So, our livery today, our iconic papaya, we brought back to McLaren because we listened to our fans. That's what our fans wanted. So we're doing activations and engagement with our fans all the time. Little small things. At the end of a Grand Prix, if we have had a good result, fans come into the pit wall. I'll take a chunk of merchandise and I'll start flinging it out to the fans. So I think the fans know how important they are to us because without our fans, there's no McLaren.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “We did a great event in Trafalgar Square, free, open to the fans, 40,000 people through two days. We just did a huge fan event. All of this on our dime and our partner's dimes, time and investment in Austin to get us closer to the fans. Only 1% of our fans will ever go to a race. So the amount of effort we put in to bringing Formula One to the 99% that'll never go to a race. Our drivers, you'll never see them not stop and sign an autograph and take a photo for a fan. We do, we went back to probably the greatest example, our iconic papaya colors, which you'll kind of see right there. We were a dark team. I described this as Darth Vader, which Darth Vader is cool, but dark gray exclusive.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “Without fans, there's no McLaren. Just simple, straightforward. We're in the sport and entertainment business. You had some people in the sport. It was like, we shouldn't be in the entertainment business. And I was just, I don't understand. Like if you buy a ticket to go sit down and watch a fireworks, a movie, a football match, or a motor race, that's entertainment.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “They're different guys. Lando is extroverted. Oscar's more introverted. You know, Lando kind of likes to get out and golf and done some DJing and I think likes to kind of release his energy. Oscar's much more inward-looking, studies a lot, thinks a lot. And so you'll find on a summer break Oscar kind of A little bit more in his hotel room or going the beach and Lando, you'll find a bit more with his friends and going golfing and going carting. So they kind of have different ways of, you know, focusing recharging their batteries, which again, I think makes them a very complimentary driver pairing, much like Andrea and I.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “Yes, from like a simulator, but not from a physical fitness, because they'll be on their own routine. So they're not best friends and they're not going out on Friday night, Saturday night, but they have a huge amount of respect for each other. And, you know, when you can feel two people coming into the room and you can feel the tension, never once. Not once have I seen these guys. Each other, which drivers can do, feel any tension in the room. Like they just want to race, and of course they want to beat each other, but it's very healthy competition.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “Oh, I think it's always been there. And, yeah, I mean, we've got four races to go. They're separated by one point. The last time there was a driver pairing competing for the championship, then it didn't end in tears was 1984. Happened to be our two drivers, and Nikki Laudo won the championship by half a point. They were very competitive, but friendly. Every other inner team rivalry has ended in tears. But I think that's not who we are as a team. And it's not who our two drivers are. They want to beat each other, but fairly and squarely.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “Then off the track, you've got two drivers that your sponsors and your fans love and want to see. So the downside of having two great drivers is they can take points off each other and the rivalry can get nasty. It has to drive.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. “The advantages are one from a constructors championship point of view, which we've now won two years on the trot. If you have two great drivers, you're going to increase your odds, the constructors championship. If you've got two great drivers, you're going to increase your odds at having a driver world champion, even though they can take points off each other, which is a downside if you'd like. Two or three, you're going to have better two drivers because they keep pushing each other. You know, when you get pushed, you just find a little bit more. So when you've got two great drivers, they just keep elevating, then you've got two sets of great feedback for the teams to develop the car.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  28. “Yes and no. I think it's something that you're looking for when you're bringing someone in of how grounded is this person, but sometimes you get it right, sometimes you get it wrong, but it's definitely something that you're looking for in that early day analysis of do I want this driver in my team”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  29. “So they're just a complete package of what you see as what you get and money and fame and success have not gone to their head whatsoever. It's gone to their car collection.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  30. “First and foremost, they're unbelievably naturally talented, right? You see this in all sports. It's that anticipated rookie coming in who's just had a stellar career through high school, college. They just run faster. They throw better. They read the game better, whatever it is. Lando and Oscar are two of the six best drivers in the world on a grid of 20. Then you get into the qualities of them as a human being, highly intelligent, which you need to be as a former one driver. This isn't just get in a car. You need to technically understand what's going on. So they're high IQ people. They're great in a team environment. They're honest. They don't have an edge to them. You know, a lot of that we look at families and upbringings.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  31. “Aerodynamic map. I mean, that's a bit untrue. I can look at an aerodynamic, but how it's constructed, the method, forget it. But I can tell who someone said this is going to happen in two weeks. And it did or it didn't happen. Or they made this prediction and it didn't. Or wait a minute, that's different from what you said two weeks ago. So I think that's my area of contribution technically. I can sniff who's good at their job or not. I can't do their job for them though.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  32. “It's fascinating. They're different people. They think differently. They get mad scientists. They're absolutely brilliant. Where I think I can contribute is I've got a good sniffer. I can see who's working well together. I can see who's delivering on their promises. I can tell by the second question how confident they are because they haven't backtracked when I put a little pressure on them. So I wouldn't know how to look at a.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  33. “I run the business, the commercial, the brand, the board, and I give Andrea the space, the tools, the direction that he needs to be successful. And then I get out of his way. And so my view is that the racing team doesn't work for me. My view is I work for the racing team. My job, I'm one person out of 1,400. My job is to keep them all fed and hungry and motivated. It's not to do their job. I can't. There's some jobs in here. The commercial department's an area that I'm obviously very comfortable in. But it's all about getting the right people and the right energy in the factory.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  34. “But these podcasts being with sponsors reporting to boards, getting the rest of the, that's a full-time job, as is running the performance of a racing team. So our relationship is you take what used to be one role and these teams are so big now, it's two roles. And so I run the business. I mean, ultimately, everything's I'm responsible for.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  35. “We have two different personalities. We have two different skill sets. We have two different areas that we like to work and a common passion for racing and winning. So our work in there's so much work to do in a Formula One team that the CEO and the team principal used to be one and the same. And there are a few teams, but that's kind of going by. If you look at the role of today's team principal, it's the performance of the race car. I can't be doing these with you while right now he's in an aerodynamic meeting.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  36. “100%. So we knew hot debrief and then a cold debrief. And Have thick skin. We're all on the same team. We're all just trying to drive forward. We're trying to chase perfection, but we know we're never going to find perfection. So you're constantly kind of almost unhappy because you can always be doing better. So it's about getting people that understand the intent of a hot debrief is not the point fingers, isn't the place blame. It's to having an open and frank conversation so we can all improve. I'm good with mistakes. All I ask is you don't make the same one twice because you'll learn from mistakes, right? You think about R&D companies that didn't work. Try this. That didn't actually learn by a bunch of failures. But once you failed, don't make that same mistake twice.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  37. “I've only seen it once, but I was angry. It was passion turned into emotion. And I said something I regretted. I then later apologized to hundreds of millions of people on TV because that's the right thing to do. But that's a good example. And, you know, you say that to the wrong person at the wrong time. You create some damage. I was in an emotion. My passion had turned to emotion.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  38. “And it was between my two championship drivers and a driver named Nico Holkenberg. The moment it looked like Nico wiped out my guys. Sky TV comes on to me two seconds after it's happened as part of the interview. Hey, what do you think? And I was like, that was some amateur driving. And when I went and looked at the replay. I don't think Nico was at fault. I think it was a racing incident. So that was one of those where, you know, unfortunately I was doing TV, so I had to say something. But I should have been more measured and said, you know what, until I see the replay.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  39. “You then make emotional decisions, and that's a bad place to be. So I think it would be unrealistic to say don't beat emotional because you can't control your emotions, but you can control how you react to your emotions. And, you know, so what do I mean by that? If something happens on a Sunday night in a race and you're massively passionate about winning, but something goes wrong, you're kind of emotional. If you react to that, maybe you think it was the driver's fault or your pick crew or strategy and you say something, you can't fix it, sleep on it, don't say something that you might regret because you can't unsay it. You can do some damage. I did that the other day, to be honest. What happened? We had an accident in turn one in Austin.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  40. “Very fine line between the two, as my chairman says to me, Zach, there's a fine line between bravery and stupidity. And so to me, passion is what obviously propels us. We're passionate. But the minute that trips into emotion, You can't control.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  41. “So I calibrate when do I need to make a decision? And I think one of the areas that I've seen in sport, specifically in racing, where people get it wrong, is they make decisions when it's an emotional, highly charged environment. And actually, you don't need to make a decision yet. So I'm a, you know, hey, if I got to make a decision now, it's a pit stop. Gotta make a decision. But if it's something that happened on the race on Sunday, and I can't fix it, but I do want to talk about it address it makes don't do it on Sunday night. You know, everyone's tired, they're not, do it on Monday or Tuesday. So I make the decisions when I have to make the decisions. And sometimes those are literally split second. Sometimes or a week, I like to get as much feedback and data and whether that data is pure data or data from just people talking to me.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  42. “I'm consulting, I'm listening, I'm trusting my team. I've got the best technology around me. So I think being a Formula One driver is kind of like being a CEO.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  43. “So I kind of put it back to when I raced. If you think as a racing driver, it's all about making split second decisions. So you need to know how to be a quarterback and a leader. Risk versus reward. Am I going to make that pass if I miss it? Am I going to crash? Or am I going to just go off the track? Can I recover from it? So risk versus reward, is it worth it? Am I going to make a pass for the lead or if it's for 15th? Why am I taking risk? You need to have great people around you. You need to have immense trust. You need to be a great communicator to your engineers. You need to be a great listener from your engineers. Sometimes you can think and have a long time to make a decision. Other times it's pure instinct, it's like the start of a grand prix. And if I think of it as a CEO, sometimes I got to make quick decisions.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  44. “Culture at risk and a great culture again. And you're not hearing any noise. Max is happy. You're not hearing people leave. And they're winning again. Same exact race car that had some developments on it. But I think that's the power of culture and sports team. So what we need to do for 26 is keep doing what we're doing. And for me, that's stability.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  45. “To make set up, right? Well, okay, so Well, all we can keep doing is doing what we're doing. We've got great technical tools, a great team, and my focus as CEO is stability. So take Red Bull, our won the last four championships. Unbelievable team. They hit a bunch of kind of culture turmoil, which has been well documented the last year. And you see the team start to slide backwards. Now they brought in a new team boss that looks like they're very aligned and settled. They're back to winning races. Same driver, same budget, same car”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  46. “This year wasn't a big change. So, you know, we won the championship last year, and this car was a rollover, but we took some big innovation risks. We didn't have to because the rules didn't change too much. 2026 is a clean sheet of paper. Biggest regulation change in the history of Formula One. So that has us bite in our nails.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  47. “Good question. I mean, as I tell people in Formula One, the worst team is really good. 2% separate the best from the worst. If you think about all the industries out there, 2% is our margin of error, which explains why we work so hard for the smallest incremental gain of milliseconds. It's an aerodynamic game. It's a tire wear game, which also comes from aerodynamics. So it's primarily an aerodynamic game, but that then facilitates your mechanical grip, your tire wear, and then of course you have things like strategy. And you got to have the best of everything. You can't have.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  48. “No, it's not a stupid question. It's one I'm asked all the time. And here's how I would say first of all, you need to have both. But I would say there are six drivers that can win the world championship out of 20, but they have to be in two of the best cars. So two of the 10 cars can win the... Drivers World Championship, but only six of the 20. So you got to have one of the best two cars in the business, or it doesn't matter who's driving.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  49. “Shutting the door, what's in there? It's beyond a state of the art gym, physios, psychiatrists, wellness room, diet, restrooms. I don't mean as in toilet restrooms, as in areas to meditate. So it kind of covers all aspects of physical and mental and health well-being. And that's because we're a sports organization and people operate at their best when they're in the best physical and mental state of mind.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  50. “Everything from as you can imagine, you know, company wide CEO, you know, town halls down to I'll do breakfast, 20 people at a time. We'll do our new starters. So we're going to make sure we get the culture set with people that have joined. I do it with middle managers. I do it around women in motorsport. I do it around people that have just joined us from coming out of school. So I break it down by departments or skill sets or tenure and really get dialed into the organization. We also invest a lot in our facilities and our people. We've got a state-of-the-art, not gym, but a human performance center canteen. So people know that we care about.”

    2025-11-19 · In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen · Zak Brown: Rebuilding McLaren, Leading Formula 1 and the Power of Winning Culture · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source