Michelle Doolan

On track to shape our cities with transport infrastructure

Medicine and Engineering were her preferred choices. But at the last minute, with offers for both, Michelle Doolan (BEnvEng/Arts(Hons) 2014) had a change of heart:

“I’ve always been a ‘big-picture’ person,” she says. “Ultimately I reached this conclusion: doctors fix people but engineers fix society.”

And so Michelle opted for Environmental Engineering at Monash. Combining this with an Arts degree gave her a chance to explore geographical science and language units, as well as study abroad in Botswana and Chile.

“Nothing teaches you better how the world works than overseas experiences in new and different cultures,” maintains Michelle. “Given that engineers can have a global impact on the future, an appreciation of how the world works seems fundamental.”

Along her journey, Michelle has become proficient in Spanish, which she insists has now eclipsed her proficiency in French and Setswana (a Bantu language spoken in Southern Africa by about five million people).

“Depending on where overseas I decide to work in the future, it will just be a matter of sparking the right language back to life,” she remarks. “It gives me more freedom and comfort knowing that an international move will be much easier with a bilingual baseline.”

For now, Michelle is based in Australia, relying on her native tongue and wit, at multinational engineering firm AECOM.

“I’m a track and civil engineer on the Rail Infrastructure Alliance – one of the large works packages associated with the Melbourne Metro Tunnel Project,” explains Michelle. “As the Track & Civil Design Package Lead for Western Portal, my role involves the design, 3D modelling and coordination (including digital engineering coordination) of track alignment and formation across different construction stages.”

As an undergraduate, Michelle had worked during her vacations at Aurecon, an engineering and infrastructure advisory company. She rotated through different teams in their infrastructure unit, which gave her exposure to various areas.

“After graduating, I couldn’t settle on any one field – so I started in rail and haven’t look back,” shares Michelle. “The range of projects, both within Australia and overseas, makes rail a very exciting industry – I’m continuously learning and never get bored. Rail is city-shaping transport infrastructure.”

Michelle has also been involved with the Monash University Underwater Club, where she served as President.

“There I met likeminded students and alumni, many of whom were engineers from different disciplines – I learned about what they did, as well as about opportunities available to engineers,” she relays. “As the club president, I gained transferable skills through project-managing club trips, handling the budget, interacting with stakeholders (in this case, Monash Sport) and implementing a safety program. And I dived on weekends before exams to de-stress! These days I teach scuba diving on some weekends throughout summer.”

As RTSA Young Rail Engineer of the Year 2018-2019, Michelle offers some sound advice to others just starting out:

“Stay open to opportunities, but be patient. If you hop from one thing to the next, you may appear flighty and unreliable (but that’s not to say don’t grab the right opportunities when they come). Learning from things that seem mundane is just as important as learning from what seems glossy and exciting.

“Also, I never compromised on my aspirations or the sort of place where I wanted to work. I never hid any part of my personality. I believe this is extremely important when starting your career because it means you’ll start in the right place and on the right foot. If you don’t feel comfortable being your ‘true you’ at work, then you’re going to be pretty miserable! Always be yourself.”