You Want To Do What?

We chat with Alex Payne about life as a sports broadcaster. The avid rugby fans among our listeners will know the name well, Alex has been presenting Rugby Union coverage for a number of years, landing a job at Sky Sports just a week out of university making the tea and coffee, gradually progressing up the ranks to his dream job of Broadcaster. Being a broadcaster and working at the weekends left Alex with a lot of free time during the week which he at first filled with playing golf, but in his own words he "wasn't get any better" (We know how he feels!) and needed something more to occupy his spare time, so he started to get involved in other businesses and develop a number of interests on the side. His latest business is in the tech sector, The Room is all about mutually beneficial exchanges between brands and people. We also chat about what its like to work with the brilliant James Haskell and Mike Tindall on a regular basis hosting their podcast "The Good The Bad The Rugby" If you haven't already, give it a listen, some brilliant interviews with super interesting guests. A real pleasure to chat with Alex. 

We chat with Alice about life as a Producer and Presenter. Alice works for the History Hit streaming service, creating amazing historical documentaries, podcasts and more. Alice's role at History Hit involves, producing, presenting, writing researching and most recently branching out onto social media platforms such as TIK TOK. We chat about the need to go above and beyond to get your foot in the door at any job you want, its not good enough to just have a degree anymore, to land the most exciting and challenging jobs you have to show a passion and desire, in Alice's case she has created her own Historical magazine as well as a show at the Edinburgh fringe festival. A Career in History does not have to be academic, there are so many opportunities to create Historical content in other formats through the likes of social media platforms and of course Youtube, which will in turn create other roles, such as researches, social media managers, presenters, producers, etc. We also chat about the positives and negatives of working in a small to medium sized business, opposed to working in a huge corporate, which is such an important decision, some people like the safety a large corporate can offer, but others enjoy the fast paced, variety of working for a small/medium sized business. A Great chat with a really passionate History buff.

We chat with Jahannah about life as an Actress and Content Creator. Jahannah always wanted to be an actress and ended up attending acting school and started to pursue a career in the industry, but as many actors/actresses will attest to its an incredibly competitive industry and very hard to stand out, so Jahannah started to film some Comedy sketches and put them online to showcase her work, and after uploading a sketch to facebook which went viral she started to create more and more videos and started to collaborate with other creators, such as Daniel O'Reilly better known as Dapper Laughs, Arron Crascall and of course most notably her partner in crime Sophie Craig. We chat about the huge opportunities online creation has yielded such as meeting and interviewing huge stars like Will Smith and The Rock, to creating and producing your own work, as well as being able to get paid to do what you love. Although the job does have its negatives such as dealing with the inevitable trolls, and those pesky social media algorithms but most of the time the positives out weigh the negatives. A real pleasure to chat with the brilliant Jahannah. 

We chat with Rob Pacey about life as a Strength and conditioning Coach. Rob tells us all about his journey from professional footballer to Strength and conditioning coach to podcaster and consultant. We chat about the development of the science and data implementation into professional sport, especially in the football world. We also discuss the importance of building a professional network no matter the industry you choose to go into, whether thats through social media, podcasts or more traditional means of networking. Rob gives us some really interesting insights into actually getting into the professional sports industry, such as providing value and going that extra mile at university by doing your own research or giving your time at a local sports club. 

We chat with Steph about life as an E-commerce baker. Steph tells us all about how and why she set up the business, what started out as a passion project quickly turned into a thriving E-commerce business and is going from strength to strength, having created cookies and cakes for all sorts of celebrities and businesses. Steph approached the world of baking with a designers eye, starting out by thinking about how she could make the coolest designs then figuring out how to bake them after. A great chat with a supper passionate entrepreneur who has taken her skill set and passion and turned it into a thriving E-commerce business through the power of social media.  

We chat with Greg Sikora, director and head of acoustic systems engineering at Harman, about his career as an acoustic engineer within the company’s car audio division.
 
Greg has always had a passion for music and audio; from a young age he learnt the piano and loves all genres of music. Having spent nine years at university getting his Master’s degree in Audio Engineering and a Master’s degree in Sound Recording, Greg began his career as a sound engineer before moving into the automotive industry.
 
He’s been working with Harman for six years now, and is responsible for how the company’s in-car audio brands – Harman Kardon, Bang & Olufsen, Bowers & Wilkins and JBL – sound within models from a wide range of car manufacturers, including Audi, BMW and Volvo. Greg gets to see all sorts of vehicles at prototype stage, working closely with the manufacturer’s engineering team, and sometimes even travelling to their facilities to work on projects.
 
The career comes with long hours and if you are working in the music or production industries as a freelancer it can be uncertain at times.
 
As Greg now works as a manger he shares some advice on what he looks for in potential job candidates: number one is passion, after a degree of course. Really enjoyed this chat with Greg, super passionate about his work and his love for acoustics.

We chat with Alexander Sims about life as a Racing Driver in Formula E. From Starting out in karting to processing all the way to Formula E, Alexander talks about the amazing opportunities to travel the world competing at the very top level of motor sport, as well as the difficulties to getting into the sport, the main one being able to secure huge amounts of sponsorship as you move through the gap between karting and being signed by a team. We also chat about the development of electric vehicles and how they are changing motorsport, leading to new technologies being rapidly developed. A rare insight into the life of a racing driver, from the positives and negatives, to what it takes to get into the sport. A pleasure to chat with Alexander.    

We chat with Kiersten about life as an Astrophysicist, studying all sorts of objects in the night sky such as Stars, Galaxies, Exoplanets and even trying to decode mysteries such as finding out what Dark Matter is. Kiersten is in her first year of a PHD studying Galactic Archeology (I'm sure you will agree thats a pretty cool title) she is also super passionate about science communication, and shares her knowledge and love for space and science on social media which has gained her quite a following as well as amazing opportunities such as being part of a scientific panel with the one and only Brian Cox, one of Kiersten's Hero's. A real pleasure to chat with Kiersten who clearly adores her career and shares some great advice and knowledge about getting into science and helping to answer some of humanity's biggest questions about our universe. 

We chat with Doctor Rhys Morgan who is the Director of the royal Academy of Engineering. This is episode is a brilliant overview of the Engineering sector and what types of careers are out there as well as how to get into them. (The sound quality is not the best on this one unfortunately, Hopefully when we get back to normal we won't have to worry about internet signals! and we can get some in person recordings Done)

We chat with Hannah about life as a Fashion photographer. Hannah never planned on becoming a photographer, she studied Printed textile design at university, and in her final year Hannahs work was chosen to exhibited at a trade show called New London Designers, which led to a job offer from an American employer out in New York to work as a textile designer. Hannah jumped at the chance to live and work in the big apple. After buying her first DSLR in New York Hannah started to become interested in the world of photography. Hannah then managed to get onto the photography team at work alongside her main job, allowing her to learn about lenses, ISO, Aperture etc. After coming home from New York Hannah had a tough decision to make, Continue with Printed textiles or pursue a career in the world of photography. I think you can probably guess which path she chose! We had a Brilliant time discussing all sorts of aspects of the Fashion Industry, World of photography and Social media with Hannah, A real pleasure to have her on the show.