Finding family and forging a career, Powerlink style
At Powerlink, we believe leaders are made, not born. That’s certainly been the case for Narelle. Find out how our Manager of the Property team went from life on a dairy farm to building an impressive and impactful career in the energy sector.
A career that lasts
When Narelle arrived at our Brisbane office in 2002 as a Trainee Administrator, she felt a world away from her childhood home on a dairy property in Esk. Although excited about her new role, Narelle initially only planned to stay at Powerlink for 12 months. Little did she know that she’d build a lifelong career here.
“It happened like this, I did my traineeship and then jumped at an opportunity to move into the Property team for a fill-in administrator role. After that, I had the chance to move across into the Property Services Team, and from there, well, I’ve never really looked back!”
Narelle has continued to challenge herself ever since. In 2005, she stepped up to Team Leader of Property Services, moved into a property management role in 2014, and then, in 2022, she accepted her current position as Manager of the Property team (within the Major Projects division).
Narelle says she’s felt supported every step of the way through her Powerlink journey.
“Across the organisation, I have always found people will endorse you and give you a go. I think one of Powerlink’s strengths is the number of opportunities it offers. You can come to Powerlink, grab your role with two hands and you’ll be supported to take on other experiences or larger projects and responsibilities.”
The journey from trainee to leader is something Narelle will always be proud of.
“I didn’t set out with an ambition to become a leader. However, I got the opportunity to become one and found that supporting people to grow was very fulfilling. It’s a rewarding space when you can look at what's been built together through mutual trust, respect and empowering people”.
Projects that sustain
As manager for the property group, Narelle leads five teams responsible for everything related to property, projects, and development - from the initial prospecting and acquisition of land to ensuring that land reaches the final, shovel-ready stage. This means her teams perform a broad range of functions across corridor selection, environmental and planning approvals, community engagement, tenure assessments, land titles, powerline easement negotiations and compensatory payments to landholders.
“At any one time, we’re working on numerous projects, securing additional corridors, maintaining about 2,000km worth of existing easements, and managing about 140 parcels of land across the state. As the grid expands to accommodate the energy transformation, we’ll look to more than double that, so we’re always a very busy team,” Narelle says.
The property team has a big scope. But what matters most to Narelle, who comes from a close-knit community, is understanding how projects can be tailored to best work with the needs of regional communities.
“At Powerlink, we’re not just about delivering a project at all costs but also about the how. We want to deliver projects that allow coexistence. That’s always our goal. It’s about a lot more than just putting a transmission line in. It’s engaging and sustaining our relationships with landholders, Traditional Owners and the community, understanding where an easement could sit best on a property and factoring in each landholder’s future use plans. It’s learning about these communities and appreciating their special characteristics and needs.”
Narelle says the project completion stage is important. At this point, she can focus on giving back to the community for longer-term benefits.
“Maybe it’s connecting a community to more modern technology, like better telecommunication services to reduce mobile blackspots, or being able to secure land for environmental protection through our offset projects. Those sorts of things are part of the legacy we want to leave.”
Diverse perspectives, real relationships
It was a tough decision for Narelle all those years ago to move away from her family and join Powerlink. So, how does she feel about the Powerlink team now?
“Well, this is my family,” Narelle says.
And it’s true in more ways than one - Narelle met her husband, Glen, our Manager of Network Customer Solutions, at Powerlink!
“I love him dearly, but we work better in different teams,” Narelle laughs. “In my team, everyone comes from different walks of life. There are valuers, planners, technical experts, people with high-level property administration knowledge and others. You can always ask someone, ‘Hey, how would you handle this matter?’ and they'll help you unpack it. We've got this really nice network that naturally happens across the team.”
Narelle says what she values most in her team-mates is their commitment and their attitude. Our people are invested here and build real relationships.
“My team is a dedicated and passionate group of people; we share this mutual value of what we want to achieve. We’re all focused on the projects, but we’re also looking at our work with that broad sense. It’s having that connection to community, including Traditional Owners, and the whole industry. We want people to feel that, to feel connected to the wider team, to become part of that broader journey of energy transformation we are on.”