strData="1981|Kim Victoria|engineer"
#IFS is the separator, read -a puts the parts into an array;
#IFS set before read changes it for this one command only
IFS='|' read -r -a arrData <<< "$strData"
year=${arrData[0]}
#year is 1981
name=${arrData[1]}
#name is "Kim Victoria"
position=${arrData[2]}
#position is "engineer"
#cut takes one field by its number, counting from 1
fromCut=$(cut -d '|' -f 2 <<< "$strData")
#fromCut is "Kim Victoria"
echo "year is $year"
echo "name is $name"
echo "position is $position"
echo "fromCut is $fromCut"