Our women in STEM: from mechanical engineer to program lead

Meet Steph

Steph Baranello is Program Lead of our Asset Delivery Transformation Program. She leads a team of experts who improve the assets that deliver water and sewer services to Melbourne’s growing western region.

“The program is all about bringing people together to solve complex problems facing our industry right now, so that we can scale up and deliver the infrastructure needs for the community into the future.”

Steph values being part of a team who provide an essential service to the community. She finds satisfaction in contributing in a small way to people’s lives through her work.

“I love being part of the mega machine of awesome people in our industry who keep the water running and toilet flushing. So much goes into this, and people literally work around the clock. It’s not always glamorous work, but it’s essential. I have always been drawn to solving problems behind the scenes to give back to the communities that we live in.” 

Although she’s often been the only woman in a room, or on a project team, Steph has always felt at ease at Greater Western Water (GWW) and she values the support from those around her.

“I’ve been coached and mentored by great leaders and experts in their fields, men and women who have really supported me to be myself at work, on site, at the depots, and really valued what I bring to a project team.” 

As a mechanical engineer, Steph has worked with teams to build projects across Victoria. She's worked on water, sewer, gas and electricity projects, wind and solar farms as well as hospital and university buildings. Currently, she combines all her construction industry technical knowledge with her leadership skills. 

“Every day in the role is different. I work with the team to plan, implement and deliver our work, and I get to learn from the wonderful team at GWW and from our external partners.”

We are all about water, but there’s a huge variety to the work we do. To learn more about working with us visit our why work for us page.