Project Director Melanie Bowden recently clocked her sixth year working for CPB Contractors. Joining as a Senior Project Engineer in 2018, Melanie’s focus on collaboration, open communication and safety has fuelled her impressive career.
With more than fifteen years of experience delivering complex construction projects in Australia and internationally, Melanie believes that diverse perspectives enable exceptional outcomes and is passionate about seeing more diversity in the construction industry.
In a full circle moment, Melanie also started her construction career working with CPB Contractors’ international parent company, HOCHTIEF, in Essen, Germany. In this interview, Melanie shares her career journey and insights into the projects that have shaped her professionally.
Have you always seen yourself working in construction?
Funnily enough, I never planned to be an engineer. Like many soon-to-be school leavers, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, so I just decided to apply for scholarships instead. While applying for scholarships, I noticed there were loads available for engineering. I enjoyed maths at school, so I thought it was worth a shot. My first site job was through an international internship exchange and I was placed on a HOCHTIEF project at a power plant in Germany.
And here you are all these years later, working for one of the CIMIC Group and HOCHTIEF’s operating companies – meant to be! What has your journey in construction been like post-study?
Post-graduation, I spent about six years working on various road and tunnelling projects in Australia before taking my skills abroad again to London. There, I contributed to the London Underground as part of the Crossrail initiative, which was a fantastic experience. Eventually, I felt the warm climate calling me back, so I returned to Australia to continue my career.
If you had to pick a project that was a "real gear shift” for you professionally, what would it be?
There’ve been some great ones, but my involvement in the delivery of Sydney Metro as part of the Line Wide team was pretty special. I’m proud to have played a role in delivering an asset that has genuinely improved how so many people travel each day, myself included!
I joined the project as an Area Manager for the Northern Connection works. I led a team of 10 to take the project from planning to delivery, which was incredibly fulfilling. My time here really shaped my leadership skills, helped me hone my design analysis acumen, and gave me the opportunity to work collaboratively with different stakeholders to achieve best-for-project outcomes. My experience here also saw me land my first role managing my own project, Canberra Light Rail Depot Modifications!
What advice would you give to someone wanting to take a similar career pathway to yours?
Say yes to opportunities and look for a company that prioritises promoting and developing from within. Over the past six years at CPB Contractors, I’ve been fortunate to have leaders and mentors who've supported my professional growth both on site and within the industry. If you're a female in our industry, my advice is largely the same: seek out opportunities to learn and build connections, and find an organisation that genuinely values your skills and wants to help you reach your potential.
Tell me about your role at the moment.
I'm currently working on a few projects, some in final handover and others in the tendering phase. I lead a team of about 15 across various projects, and they are all very brilliant. It is the people that make what can be a difficult job incredibly fulfilling and fun. I get a lot of satisfaction out of seeing them develop and succeed. It helps that this is a focus across CPB Contractors in general, where we've got an in-house Project Fundamentals training program that teaches the "CPB-way" plus a variety of mentoring opportunities, internal committees to drive change (sustainability, diversity, digital engineering) and access to industry association memberships like NAWIC.
How do you achieve a work-life balance?
As a leader, my team looks to me as an example, so I hope seeing me balance work and life encourages them to do the same. CPB Contractors’ Ways of Working toolkit makes flexible working streamlined and accessible across our business. For me, balance is:
- Optimising my workload and grouping together tasks I can deliver remotely so I can work from home more often.
- Leaving at a reasonable time as much as possible. I try to coordinate my diary, so I leave the office when the rest of the team does.
- Actually switching off when I take annual leave. I prioritise leaving a detailed handover, which ensures the team is well set up to progress things in my absence
- Turning off email notifications on my phone – I use the app to check and respond to emails as I need to, but I found it was too much having my phone notify me of every single email that came through.