Letting Go of Control, Leadership at 200 Miles an Hour

On a racetrack, the most dangerous moment is not full throttle or hard braking. It’s the neutral phase, the transition between the two. Apply pressure at the wrong time and the bike loses balance. Too much throttle and you high-side. Too much brake and you low-side. Leadership works the same way. As teams move faster, ship more often, and increasingly rely on automation and AI, the role of a leader shifts. You are no longer the one creating forward motion directly. Your job becomes managing pressure, when to accelerate, when to slow down, and when to stay neutral long enough for the system to stay stable. This talk uses motorsport as a mental model to explore modern engineering leadership. We’ll look at the balance between directive and enabling leadership, how to maintain quality without becoming a bottleneck, how accountability changes when work is delegated to people and tools, and how to lead teams operating at high speed without burning them out or losing control. This is a practical talk about restraint, timing, and judgment, and why knowing when to let go matters more than knowing how to push.