Rolex Watchmaking Training Program, Class of 2026

I was born and raised in the Southwest neighborhood of Detroit, Michigan to a working-class family. As a kid, I loved taking things apart and fixing things that needed fixing. After graduating high school, my mother helped me get a holiday job at a place called Shinola where I’d work in a factory and learn to work with leather and make straps for watches. After a while, I chose to stay and learned as much as I could. After 5.5 years of work, I had the skills to build a watch from the inside out. From there, I was picked up by an Official Rolex Jeweler who was in the process of expanding their watch repair service into a full-fledged service center and were looking for a head technician. I eagerly accepted their offer and started training on performing Rolex case work. My co-workers informed me of Rolex’s new program in Dallas, and I filled out an application that same day.

“Why watchmaking?”

In all honesty, the possibility of becoming a watchmaker more or less fell into my lap. It would’ve never crossed my mind if I hadn’t worked at Shinola and worked closely with their watchmaker. For a long time, I was more focused on helping people with whatever skills I had. I wish I had a better explanation, but helping others just feels right. If I have the ability to help others, why wouldn’t I? As I matured, I found this Japanese ideology for finding purpose and joy in life called “ikigai” and it helped me align myself with the kind of work I want to do. It can be depicted as a large Venn diagram with 4 main parts: doing what you love, doing what you’re good at, doing what the world needs, and doing what pays you well. The overlaps go further, describing how these criteria interact and what could be missing if you forego any one of them. Ikigai is at the center, representing a harmonious balance of all 4 aspects. Watchmaking is something I think I can be really good at, it’s something that will pay me sufficiently well, it’s a job that the world needs right now, and it’s something that I think I’ll grow to love.

The potential for sentimentality and a genuine sense of care in watchmaking makes it an area where I can be proud of the skills I’ve cultivated in order to keep memories and heirlooms alive for the customers I serve. This sentiment for helping people runs deep, as my mom is currently in the works to try and open her very own optical back home to provide corrective eyewear to non-English speaking families that might not be able to afford them, even going as far as brainstorming a way to offer free exams or glasses to kids. Maybe one day, I could provide my own services and even be able to implement a similar program just for the sake of helping people with their cherished heirloom watches.