Clan Secrecy Forged in Clermont Soil

“Contradiction between its isolation and its global dynamism. Located in a hard-to-access region (Clermont will likely not be connected to Paris by highway before the end of this decade), far from car manufacturers, major universities, financial institutions, and national and European political assemblies, Michelin nevertheless manages to find in this loyalty to its roots the sources of its originality, strength, and common sense. Its expansion is largely explained by this fierce determination to draw fully and abundantly from its own earthy and rural roots.”

“This work of preparation for constantly different tasks can only be done in the motherland. Clermont-Ferrand is the place where “in a perpetual work of training, the common know-how” of engineers, technicians, workers, salespeople, managers is forged. In the capital of Auvergne exclusively, far from the Parisian viruses that could contaminate it. “The day the House leaves its walls, it will lose its soul,” says François Michelin. And the basic training—the famous Michelin “internship”—which targets sharp minds and strong characters more than well-filled heads, consists of addressing a concrete problem. “Engineers who enter the factory are assigned to address questions whose solutions are not found in books or speculative reflections, but in the field. They must go and find them there, and for that, know how to look, listen, spot a detail, cross-check information, ask questions that allow going further, change perspectives, and reduce the problem to a set of well-established facts upon which one can finally reason and build. And if reasoning leaves room for several solutions, it is ultimately experience that will decide.””