By CASEY NEILL
FORMER jockey Simon Marshall was heading to Dandenong Hospital after his guest speaking spot at last Wednesday’s Greater Dandenong Chamber of Commerce breakfast at Sandown Greyhound Racing Club.
His three-year-old daughter toppled from her pony Gazza and broke her arm at 6.20pm the previous night.
“She loves them to death,” he said.
“It’s just unfortunate mum didn’t catch her at the right time, this time.
“If you work with horses you’re going to break bones.”
Marshall grew up “between horses legs” in Devon Meadows.
His father Len was a jockey who became a trainer and sought his 11-year-old son’s help with track work one morning in pouring rain and five-degree temperatures.
“Just through pure fright and adrenaline, you hang on,” Marshall said.
“At 11 years old, I knew what I wanted to do.”
Marshall told the breakfast about the battle to keep his weight down, which started with his first race day at age 15.
After a makeshift sauna he was allowed dry toast, a boiled egg and half a glass of water until the day’s racing was over.
“I understood I wasn’t there for long,” he said.
“I was just too big.”
He’s now campaigning for the weights to be raised in line with natural human growth.
“We’re happy to lobby for jockeys to eat,” chimed in MC James Sturgess.
Hallam’s Wastech Engineering and Wurth Australia in Dandenong South were the morning’s nominees for the chamber’s Premier Regional Business Awards.
ACTCO-Pickering Metal Industries CEO Jill Walsh said Youth Enterprise Award nominee Alex Woller was in his third year with the company, which supplies the rail, defence and aerospace industries.
“We need highly-skilled tradespeople,” she said.
Ms Walsh said the 20-year-old from Carrum Downs was extremely focused and passionate about what he did and had a natural ability to digest complicated information about fabrication.
“Let’s hope we’re looking at the next CEO of ATCO-Pickering,” she said.
Alex said welding was popular work.
“The younger generation seems to be getting more into it,” he said.
“The possibilities are endless.”
Wurth Australia CEO and Australia and New Zealand managing director Serge Oppedisano has worked with the assembly and fastening materials supplier for 15 years.
“For me, work is like a big playground,” he said.
Before that, he was self-employed in the service station industry – and a Wurth customer.
Mr Oppedisano contacted Wurth, told them he admired the brand and submitted a hand-written resume.
“I told a few fibs on that resume,” he said.
“I started as a sales consultant.”
He rose through the ranks and wouldn’t be anywhere else. He said the workplace was special.
“We have many goose bump moments at work,” he said.
The multinational organisation’s headquarters and origins are in Germany.
The Australian arm started in Dingley in 1982 and now employs about 550 people across the country and is in the top 15 of the 400-plus Wurth companies throughout the world – ahead of the US operation.
New Wastech CEO Brett Jones accepted the nomination, three months into the job.
“In the interview (technical support manager) Paul (Bone) told me he was a Hawthorn supporter so I signed up,” he said.
Mr Jones said the company’s culture also impressed him.
“It’s hard to implement a strategy when the culture’s not right,” he said.
Recent award wins have buoyed the culture, including the Casey Business of the Year and Casey Manufacturer of the Year for 2013 and, in May, the Melbourne South East (MSE) Business Awards Business of the Year Overall Business Excellence award and Medium Enterprise category.
Wastech provides standard and custom-designed engineered products and solutions for the recycling and waste industries.
The business was started 20 years ago as a three-man operation in a small factory in Dandenong, has grown to be an industry leader and employs more than 80 staff.
“The appetite for growth is pretty high,” Mr Jones said.
He told the breakfast the company had won its first job in Saudi Arabia the previous week, following a recommendation from client Veolia.
“They obviously hold us in high regard,” he said.
The Premier Regional Business Awards are now in their 24th year and designed to profile and highlight successful businesses in the region.
Winners will be announced and presented at a gala dinner in March next year.
