All in Naval industry
Déborah is tended to like a top athlete by her employer, Naval Group. Why? Because she's a gold medalist. She didn’t win her medal at the Beijing Winter Olympics earlier this month but rather after three days of competition at WorldskillsFrance in the "welding" category in early January. However, just like the winter sports athletes, she’ll also go to China to compete in the Worldskills international finals in Shanghai from 12-17 October 2022…
When Anne was studying at the École Polytechnique it was mandatory for all students to spend a year in the military. A keen traveller, she thought that spending this time on a ship would be a great way to see new places. “And that’s how I found myself aboard ship for eight months after three months at the Naval College. And I loved it!” From then on, apart from a brief incursion into the oil industry, Anne has always worked in the naval sector. Today she is in charge of the new French nuclear attack submarine (SNLE) programme at Naval Group. Not one to blow her own trumpet, she omitted to tell me that in September 2018 she had won the “Jury’s Special Prize”, one of the 12 trophies awarded by the magazine L’Usine nouvelle to women who’ve had a remarkable career in industry…
Hélène was planning to be a nurse. Instead she’s a welder at Naval Group, working on the components for the nuclear boilers of submarines. Two worlds that, on the surface, have very little in common! Except that in both cases you have to be a perfectionist and have a sense of thoroughness and a job well done because people's lives depend on you. How did she come to do this difficult job, practised by very few women, but which she finds thoroughly satisfying…
Alexis (silent -s) designs warships. Always has done. As a child she covered pages with colourful drawings of them. But, unlike any of the other women I’ve portrayed to date, she was a failure at school which is hard to imagine when chatting with this extremely articulate, vivacious, sporty young woman whose mind works as fast as quicksilver…
“I don't like the term 'work/personal life balance' because I don't want to compromise,” says Amelia Gould, systems engineer, former Royal Navy lieutenant, currently chief of staff to the BAE Systems CEO and mother of two! “It's not so much a balance as a conscious choice and I'll concentrate on whatever needs attention at that moment. If there's a work project deadline then that gets my attention and if its one of my children's birthdays or they are ill then that is my priority,” she explains…
Don’t disregard the importance of holiday experiences: they can become the defining moment of one’s life. Such is the case with Stéphanie who discovered sailing whilst on holiday when she was 18 and was hooked! So, obviously, she chose the navy for the mandatory year of military training at French engineering school Polytechnique…
