Love What You Do!

Name:  Tom Middlebro'

Hometown:  Guelph, Ontario

Contest:  Offset Printing

The equation for a successful career is one part perspiration, one part passion.  There couldn't be a better description for Tom Middelbro', Canada’s representative in Offset Printing at the 2011 World Skills Competition.

A graduate of the Graphic Design Production – Digital program at Mohawk College, Tom, has learned lots about pre-press and how to make designs that will be practical for the application where they will be used.  Now that he has finished school he has one goal in mind:  win Gold at the World Skills Competition in 2011.

“As a kid watching the Olympics on TV, or any sort of world competition for that matter, I always wished that someday I could represent the country that I love, as well as make something of myself on the world stage,” says Tom.  “Not many people get to do that, and I think it is an amazing opportunity that I will never forget.”

Tom credits the Ontario Technological Skills Competition with helping him prepare for his career.  “It was a great chance for me to continue doing what I had found that I loved doing, which was printing. When I entered this competition and was given the chance to further develop my skills on the press I was very excited.  When I won the Canadian Skills Competition and qualified for Team Canada, I was ecstatic because I was given the chance to become one of the best press operators in the country, and possibly the world. If it wasn't for that first competition, I would likely have never touched a printing press again, and for the chance that competition gave me, I am grateful.”

As for career choice, Tom feels that a perfect storm is brewing.  “The print industry is going through a huge change at the moment. Companies are switching from offset printing methods to digital printing, but this is the perfect opportunity for me to get into the printing world and learn the new technologies.” 

His advice for other students a career in the skilled trades and technologies is quite simple.  GO FOR IT!

“We need skilled tradespeople. I remember being in high school and not thinking of the skilled trades as a career option, but once I got to see how amazingly skilled these people are, combined with the demand for people of this calibre, I realized how fun and important these trades are.”