Head of Strategy

At McLaren Racing, we’re not just here to try to take the chequered flag. We’re here to excite our fans, inspire our people and deliver for our partners. And we’re also committed to evolving our sport, our industry, and our technology, too

We have an incredible history in endurance racing, securing a legendary 1995 win at Le Mans at the first attempt, and are the only team to have won the prestigious Triple Crown: winning the Monaco GP, the Indy500 and the 24hr Le Mans in the same year.

From 2027, we’ll once again be the only team in the history of motorsports to be competing in the top three racing series, and we’re excited to be building our team.

Purpose of the Role:  

• The Strategy group’s primary objective is to deliver the maximum points on track and to ensure the team is both compliant with and takes full advantage of the sporting (and associated) regulations as well as contributing to the continual, marginal improvement of the team’s performance.  

• The areas of responsibility for the group include qualifying and race strategies, pitstop analysis and competitor intelligence.  

• The purpose of this role is to contribute to the above areas as required with a focus on central strategy decision-making and execution.  

 
Role Dimensions:   

• Working during race weekends is required (100%) and unsocial and extended hours may be involved.  

• Travel to race and test events is required on an ad-hoc basis. There is the possibility that the position may develop into full time race attendance in the future.  

Principal Accountabilities:    
Central Strategy  

Responsible for contributing to maximising the strategy and sporting elements for the team to deliver the maximum number of points on track.  

Other responsibilities include:  

• Oversight of Race Team (Trackside) Strategy Engineers during events. 

• Working closely with the Race Team Chief Race Engineer to ensure that strategy decisions are consistent with maximising the overall performance of the Team. 

• Leading the analysis, meetings and reporting with respect to qualifying and race strategies (both over race weekends and outside).  

• Leading the development of strategy tools (either programming and developing internally or working with the software team to guide development).  

• Leading the analysis of and tracking competitor performance live during sessions.  

 
Strategy Analysis & Operations  

Responsible for contributing to strategy analysis and operational improvements, as required including:

• Leading ad-hoc analyses or operational investigations/reviews on strategy and sporting matters.  

• Suggesting topics/areas of improvement and investigation.  

• Contribution to general improvements in processes, analysis and operations.  

 
Competitor Analysis  

Responsibilities include: 

• Leading analysis related to competitor performance.  

• Regular reporting on the competitor performance measures.  

• Developing analysis techniques to be more useful and accurate.  

 
Other Responsibilities  

Although not part of the core role, there are other responsibilities that are part of the role, these may include:  

• Contribution to pitstop analysis and improvement.  

• Contribution to the improvement of the Race Support Room.  

Knowledge, Skills and Experience:    

• Experience in race strategy, sporting matters, pitstop analysis and/or competitor intelligence in a top tier motorsport championship (F1, FE, WEC etc) is essential.  

• A degree in engineering, mathematics or the sciences, or alternatively some demonstration of depth of technical knowledge.  

• Experience in coding/software engineering is highly desirable.  

Personal Attributes:    

• Ability to take decisions quickly, often under high pressure, with strict time constraints and incomplete information and to be able to work calmly and diligently under such conditions.  

• Desire to help develop the members of the team, improving their skills, experience and expertise.  

• Desire for continuous improvement in our performance, including analysis, operations and execution.  

• Good at prioritisation of resource across a number of different areas with many, disparate stakeholders.  

• An intelligent, data-driven approach to solving new and challenging problems, with strong problem-solving skills and the ability to conduct new types of analysis in an unbiased manner.  

• Good communication and presentation skills to work effectively as part of a close-knit team, with shared responsibilities, working under challenging conditions. 

What McLaren can offer?

We constantly strive to be better tomorrow than we are today. Our ambition is to be the most pioneering and exhilarating racing team in the world, and our collective task is to set the standards for high performance in sport. We show up every day with energy and enthusiasm, ready to play our part.

We encourage and support diversity, equity and inclusion. We will actively promote a culture that values difference and eliminates discrimination in our workplace.

McLaren Racing is based at the iconic McLaren Technology Centre (MTC) near Woking. Our state of the art, sustainable campus offers many facilities including a gym, restaurant and indoor and outdoor break-out areas, as well as direct access to park and common land. The MTC is connected to Woking mainline station via regular shuttle buses, from which London Waterloo is a 30 minute train ride.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including private healthcare, car schemes, life insurance and generous pension contributions.