Deciding what job or career you want to have in the future can be scary. It seems scarier when it looks like other people have everything sorted and you’re left asking ‘how did they get there?’.

Well, everyone had to start somewhere! Even Sir David Attenborough, and other familiar faces like Professor Brian Cox, had those early moments of inspiration that sparked the careers they chose. Find out more about their career influences to help you get thinking about your own future.

Sir David Attenborough, naturalist and broadcaster

“By and large there were two things,” says one of the world’s most revered nature broadcasters, Sir David, on what inspired his dedication to nature. “First of all there was the Leicestershire countryside which is where I grew up and apart from that, there were wonderful books.

“One of the [books] which I don’t think anybody, well, very few people know about now, [was by] a man called Ernest Thompson Seton, he was a ranger in the Canadian prairie and he wrote about the animals that he knew, the wolves and the buffalo and so on.

“He drew, he was a good artist as well. He drew the little footprints down the margins, the side margins and I adored those books,” says Attenborough.

Professor Brian Cox, physicist

Before he made physics accessible to a whole new generation, Professor Cox played keyboards for 1990s dance act D:Ream. But it was sci-fi that led Professor Brian Cox on the road to the stars.

An inspiration to aspiring scientists and science communicators, Cox explains: “I was a huge science fiction fan.

“I couldn’t tell the difference … between science fiction, and science and physics and I suspect that … exciting mixture of the tail end of the moon landings, this great science fiction renaissance … fed into my desire to be a scientist and a physicist.

“As far back as I can remember there’s something about science and about the excitement of exploration … that always appealed to me.”

Alex Scott, footballer

A former England and Arsenal player, Alex has continued to use her passion for football through work such as commentating on the FIFA Women's World Cup 2023. Football has been always been a massive part of her life.

For Scott, fun and teamwork were as much a part of her inspiration as the game itself. She remembers: “That moment at school when the school bell rung, I would get so excited because I knew I was heading out to that football cage to play with all my school mates.

“No-one had positions, you played any position that you wanted to be. It was just about having fun, being part of that team environment and I knew that was what I wanted – to be a footballer.”

So there you have it, three different stories which show that there’s no standard way to get a career you’ll love. Passion is the thread which binds them all. If there’s a career out there you want, then go for it. There are tons of career options, so make sure you find a role that suits you.

This article was updated in April 2026.