By Julie Sirvent, Project Manager

I joined SLPE at the start of 2025, stepping into the final stages of the Inch Cape Detailed Design phase and the beginning of Fabrication and Installation support. Having started my career in shipbuilding, working closely with offshore wind farm fabrication felt like a dream come true.

More than that, working at SLPE offers rare opportunities. I was able to spend an afternoon at the Global Offshore Wind Conference, and through our parent company Smulders, I had the chance to visit not one, but two fabrication yards, one in Newcastle and another in Hoboken. These experiences put our designs into perspective and help me appreciate the true scale of what we create.

Additionally, I was given the unique opportunity to explore important topics in depth. I am at a stage in my career where I have begun to consider how I can make a lasting impact, and being invited to help develop new Project Management procedures allowed me to put my thoughts to paper on a discipline that is often misunderstood.

Recently, I saw a post on LinkedIn suggesting that Project Managers are just glorified administrators, and at times during my nearly two decades of work experience, I have been made to feel that way. Especially as a woman, I have had to face more than my fair share of misogyny and have often been systematically underestimated.

Yet to me, a good Project Manager is essential. You wouldn’t go to the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and not expect to see a conductor, would you? In my view, a good Project Manager is a conductor: the ultimate decision-maker, but not without having first consulted the experts to reach an informed conclusion on the best approach to any problem.

I am a Mechanical Engineer by education. I love solving problems, but I have chosen to move towards project management for two main reasons:

• I couldn’t see myself as an expert; I felt it would narrow my fields of knowledge, when I wanted to grow and expand in multiple directions.
• I noticed that sometimes, a good Engineer is put into a Project Management role and expected to show the necessary leadership, but often they lack the tools for effective project management, because they are first and foremost engineers who would naturally prefer to focus on technical subjects.

A former colleague once described her unique selling point as, “my speciality is that I’m a generalist,” and that’s exactly how I consider myself. Now, at SLPE, I have the opportunity to detail all the essential tools that make up a Project Manager’s day-to-day, and which are often neglected for the sake of time, forgetting that these tools make projects not only more efficient, but also more profitable.

I’m excited about the numerous opportunities ahead in this growing company, alongside such passionate colleagues.