Pier Pressure - Women Improving the Built Environment - Mina McCullom, PE

We return with our blog series and man, are we excited to share this incredible woman with all of our followers! While drafting our list of potential contributors for this series, she was at the very top. This month’s Pier Pressure blog guest, Mina McCullom, is the President and CEO of SynEnergy Engineering, a firm focused on Mechanical/Electrical Engineering for high performance buildings. Mina studied Aerospace Engineering at Long Beach State, Mechanical Engineering at CU Boulder, and Management Science at Stanford.

Mina has conducted research on designing energy efficient commercial buildings, residential buildings and military installations at the University of Colorado Boulder and the National Renewable Energy Lab.  She studied organization management at Stanford University and, as a former Astronautical Engineer with a focus on thermal subsystems in spacecraft, Mina is able to integrate computational fluid dynamics and heat transfer models with mechanical design yielding high performance building systems.   

With over 20 years of experience in project management and mechanical engineering, Mina brings her unique understanding of multidisciplinary expertise to deliver efficient building-systems solutions to projects from concept phase to execution.  She holds a Professional Engineers license in the State of CO, NM and TX. 

We thank her for sharing her insight and wisdom with us, and look forward to an opportunity, hopefully in the near future, to work with her. Enjoy!

Describe your job without using any industry terminology.

As a President & CEO of an engineering firm – my roles and responsibilities consist of solving problems for clients and providing leadership while motivating my engineers. Customer service is absolutely obligatory, as well as providing a value that differentiates us from other companies. 

What is the advantage of being a woman in a man’s world?

The ability to get free drinks from men??? I believe that women in leadership (in general) have an acute level of soft skills such as active listening and demonstrating compassion and empathy. These soft skills have been shown to increase morale within the workplace. 

What one piece of advice would you give women just starting out in this industry?

Learn the industry and organization in which you work – in addition, seek out multiple mentors that can help you with the trajectory in your career. I advise getting a technical mentor as well as a mentor in a senior managerial position. Plan to meet with them once a month and allow them to provide constructive criticism to assist your growth. This is paramount to striving in your career. 

How do you move forward when everyone is telling you your idea won’t work?

Believe in yourself more than they believe in you. It is also very rewarding to prove them wrong. 

What is your very favorite part of your job? And the least favorite?

Favorite: the ability to create unique solutions to complex problems. 

Least favorite: the implicit bias that I sometimes face as a woman of color – CEO and engineer, after 20 years of experience and multiple engineering degrees, from some of the most prestigious academic institutions, this gets very frustrating.