Mercedes' chief operating officer Rob Thomas has revealed a 'chaotic' working environment at Mercedes during the early days of the team's current participation in the sport led to a number of deadlines being missed.
The Brackley-based squad took over from the one season wonder that was Brawn GP in 2010, with Ross Brawn staying on as team principal in the initial years.
Seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher came out of retirement to drive with the team, but was only able to add one more podium to his illustrious CV in three seasons with Mercedes.
Now, Thomas is reflecting on the early days of Mercedes' reintegration into the sport in which they had previously competed in both as an engine manufacturer and team.
“There were detailed plans, but they weren’t really respected,” he told PlanetF1.
“A lot of internal dates were a bit optional, and we’d do our best to hit those deadlines, but generally we didn’t.
“Things got later and later and what you ended up was people working in a chaotic firefighting way, trying to get parts together.
“We wouldn’t get either the result we needed from performance or reliability either. That all leads to going to the first races in a massively sub-optimal condition, not getting the learning you want and leading to people being burnt out.”