When it comes to the 9 to 5, these people spend their working days driving, designing, selling or building some of the most important cars on the road.
We chat to leading professionals with some of the best jobs in the motor industry to gain an insight into what gets them out of bed in the morning, and what it took for them to begin their automotive career paths.
Find your place in the car industry: Autocar's Drivers of Change
Marek Reichman, chief creative officer at Aston Martin
“Did I imagine I’d end up designing cars for James Bond? It won’t surprise you to learn that wasn’t part of even my wildest dreams,” laughs Marek Reichman, chief creative officer of Aston Martin and, in his own words, holder of “one of the best jobs in the world”.
Born in Sheffield in 1966 and the son of a blacksmith, Reichman believes his path through the motor industry has been driven above all else by passion. “I’ve heard career advisors say that you should never turn a hobby into a career,” he says. “What absolute bollocks."
“If you go to work with passion, you can fulfil your dreams. You can create change. Without wishing to get too highbrow about it, a job becomes a vocation. You can go to work every day – and, let’s be clear, it is work, and it can be hard and tiring – challenged and excited.”
For Reichman, the catalyst came from his brother, Julian, who was seven years older and also studied design: “Even as a teenager, he believed that everyone should be taught to draw on the same terms as they are taught to read and write. So I drew and drew – whatever class I was in. It didn’t matter if I was in maths or French, I’d draw in my school books.
“When I started at Aston Martin, I went back to my school to give a talk and my old maths teacher was still there. I reminded him about the board rubbers he used to sling at my head for not paying attention and told the kids to find something they love and pursue it with a passion.”
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Waste
Potentially a good article rendered unreadable by an ugly web page with adverts breaking into the text (with an empty, wide border down the left), with another "moving one" overlapping, and, in one case, separating the subject's name from the body of text about them, which shows a complete lack of repsect.
Sorry Phil
Sorry Phil but I can't agree. Maybe that's because I tried numerous times but could not bring myself to read the article, it just does not matter or appeal to me. I applaud Autocar for trying to offer a mixture of content, but this article and it's title did not enthuse me. Glad you enjoyed it.
Really nice article, a very
Really nice article, a very good read.