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From Bricklayers to Battery Storage: Juniel Miller's Journey in Renewable Energy Project Management

• Walt Sparling • Season 1 • Episode 57

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Ever wondered how growing up in a family of bricklayers could lead to managing large-scale renewable energy projects? This episode of PM Mastery features Juniel Miller, who takes us through his captivating journey from a construction-heavy upbringing to spearheading ambitious battery storage and solar initiatives across the Carolinas and Florida. With roots in real estate and construction, Juniel not only highlights the importance of teamwork and adaptability but also shares the unique satisfaction that comes with bringing a project to life. 

Navigating change in project management can be daunting, yet Juniel provides actionable insights and strategies to tackle these challenges head-on. This episode unpacks the necessity of personal growth to keep up with technological advancements and the value of self-awareness in identifying areas for improvement. Juniel underscores the importance of consensus-building within teams and stresses that leaders must fully understand the changes they propose to foster effective process optimization. Whether you're a seasoned professional or a newcomer to project management, Juniel's wisdom promises to inspire and elevate your approach to leadership and project execution.

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Intro/Outro:

Welcome to the PM Mastery Podcast. This podcast is all about helping you master your project management skills by sharing tips, tricks, tools and training to get you to the next level, while sharing the stories of other project managers on their journey in project management. And now here's your host, walt Sparling.

Walt Sparling:

All right, welcome everybody to the current episode of PM Mastery, and today I have with me JuMiller Miller. Hello Janelle, Welcome to the show. Hey Walt, how? How you doing, sir? I'm doing great. We're going to get started. I'm going to have you tell us a little bit about you personally. Then we'll jump into some other questions on job and things like that. So tell us a little bit about yourself.

Juniel Miller:

Alright, my name JuMiller Miller. I live here in Charlotte, north Carolina. I have a wife of 15 years, eanna Miller, who's a teacher here in Charlotte, and I have two twin boys. They'll be 10 on Friday. Yeah, that's who I am.

Juniel Miller:

Good deal. So what is it that? Manager working for a Fortune 150 utility company, 20,000 plus employees, and my focus is on regulated renewable battery storage and solar in the Carolinas and Florida. Ok, but the majority of my career up until recently was in the real estate and construction space, where I spent nearly 20 years doing those types of projects in multiple different business segments.

Walt Sparling:

And that's where I know you from is we've worked together Right, and we've both made some recent transitions, so it's kind of exciting to see you know moving on, learning new things, doing new stuff. That's right. What drives you. So you've been doing this a while. You indicated that you've been doing the project management. You've been in the construction space. Now you're in the renewables. What keeps you doing this kind of work?

Juniel Miller:

It doesn't really feel like a pivot for me. It's still construction. Instead of doing buildings or spaces or you spaces or pharmaceutical plant type work, I'm focusing on solar and battery storage. It's still the construction aspect of that work and really what drives me.

Juniel Miller:

I grew up in a construction family. My dad and my uncles were bricklayers and just seeing how things come together, brick by brick, has always been a thing that just attract, that I'm attracted to supporting building, the building things and overall built environment, something that I always wanted to do. And, uh, when I started my career I didn't say I was in california. Just seeing how different the building I was on came together in an area that was prone to earthquakes versus in an area where I grew up in Arkansas, with the 12-inch or 8-inch block walls in an area that's prone to tornadoes. Just seeing that difference is something that continues to fascinate me. And you can never do the same project twice. Everything is always different. You can take the same blueprint, same house and try to build it twice, and it will be completely different the second time, especially if you use different people.

Walt Sparling:

Yeah, exactly the experience. If nothing else will be completely different, which, in my view, is that's all about controlling that, experiencing and managing it.

Juniel Miller:

That's absolutely right and really the team aspect of project management. You know, it's not just one person that drives or delivers an asset, it's a team of people. Most people come from different backgrounds. It's a team of people Most people come from different backgrounds. You're working to collectively bring different attitudes, different skill sets and everybody collectively delivers this particular product. I think it's fascinating. It's a great thing to be a part of and you can see the results of your labor.

Walt Sparling:

Yeah, that's the one nice thing is you get to walk away and be pointed down the road. Yeah, so your family, there's construction in your family. Um, now, as far as the project management side, how long ago did you get like in a role where you were considered, even without a formal title, where you were actually doing project management type responsibilities?

Juniel Miller:

my first opportunity as a true project manager and it wasn't really the title, it was more so the word uh was when I was still in california. This is, I was probably two years into my career and it kind of happened based on some attrition type issues I won't quite get into. But, uh, thrown into the fire every aspect of, and it was a special project where it was me and a superintendent and we had to figure it out, to drive it out, to drive this particular project out to close. And I learned a lot in dealing with just the dynamics of the relationship between project manager, superintendent, project manager, superintendent, client. And when you run into a relationship with someone who may not quite be okay with you but is okay with your partner, letting that relationship with that partner take precedent so that you can get to where you need to go.

Juniel Miller:

That's what I learned, that very early on in my career. Um, but from that working through a different, a few different roles, but but from that working through a few different roles, but true project management really hit the end and those learning lessons were kind of things I continued to piggyback on throughout my career from there. So, big grief, I hadn't really thought about it that way. Well, that was my first opportunity.

Walt Sparling:

One of the things that's always a common discussion topic is like how, how people got started, and especially the newer folks, because they're usually they're coming from another career, like educators. I've had some teachers on here, people from the pharmaceutical industry, where they've transitioned into project management, and it's like, okay, so how did it happen? It's like, well, it just I don't know, it just kind of happened. It's just, you know, you went from doing one aspect of the job and to where you were. You were very skilled in that area and they said, well, you know, we got this thing, we got to get done, can you manage it?

Walt Sparling:

And then all of a sudden, you're a project manager and it's like nobody in high school says I want to be a project manager when I grow up. It's like right nowadays it's. You'll see a lot more professional courses on that and maybe some maybe your kids might say, oh, dad was did great as a project manager.

Juniel Miller:

Maybe I'll do it, but it's not a common path I keep trying to make it sound cool to my 10 year olds. I haven't figured out what to say yet. I'm trying to overcome Mr Beast.

Walt Sparling:

I think a lot of times you say you're a project manager and there you go. What does that mean? What do you do? Yeah, yeah, all right. So you've started out a while back. You kind of got thrust into it. I know you from your past. You've been in some lead leadership roles. You're doing you're doing projects now in a different area, similar to construction, but not exactly how do you. Oh, you're also, I believe, you're going for your MBA. That's right, all right. So you're you're keeping up on education, which constant learners are are awesome with what you do on a daily basis, like how do you continue to learn and grow?

Juniel Miller:

Right now, with this new role, I'm learning everything things every day from my peers, right. So I'm going to answer that question based on what I did before the transition. In some ways, and because of what we do taking a village, so to speak, and you're working with so many different people I found a lot of value in professional organizations. You get people who are like-minded, whether it's a PMI chapter or I mean. You and I both come from the construction and real estate space, an organization focused on those types of things, where you get like-minded people. They may have different titles, but you're talking about a similar thing and in just general conversation, it's amazing what kind of things you can learn from it. So I'll tell you those kind of things.

Juniel Miller:

Linkedin has a lot of good tools and people post a lot of videos, podcasts like yours, different articles that might get published in different publications, the NR and things like that. The NBA thing was something that was actually encouraged the first time for me, not only just for my family, but in my PMP boot camp. The guy who did my boot camp at the end of it said OK, you guys have done a boot camp. No, take the test soon. But let me tell you this one thing His advice was to get the MBA. He said you'll be surprised by how much more you can get out of your PNP by understanding the business size of the corporations you support. So that's why I went down this path. It's a lot, but that's why I went down this path.

Walt Sparling:

And I like, like I said, I like the continual learning. Yeah, all right. So now, now, in your current role, you've got a lot to learn, just from your peers, the people you work with, trying to get up to speed, yeah. So what about tools? I know whether you did project management or leadership in the past. You're going to school now, so you're probably doing some studying and you have studied materials and tools. What are your favorites? How do you keep organized and do all your work?

Juniel Miller:

One of the things I had to come, I had to really kind of just come to grips with, is I'm not a kid anymore and that is okay. I see the younger people coming to the industry and they're using tools. I'm not a kid anymore and that is okay. So I see the younger people coming to the industry and they're using tools I'm not familiar with and they get a certain result. My main go-to to this very day still is Excel, and I do a lot of things in Excel. I will write a letter in Excel because it just makes sense to me. The boundaries of it, the sales, that's my, that's my go-to for most things. And then Bluebeam the Bluebeam.

Intro/Outro:

PDF software.

Juniel Miller:

Bluebeam is a fascinating tool to me and to see some of the capabilities of it, some of the things I've seen other people do with it. It's it's an amazing tool, just something that's just like different layers you can do.

Walt Sparling:

I think bluebeam is amazing tool, yeah yeah, it's used a lot in the construction space and in the design space as well for like drawing comparisons and markups, and yeah, it's uh, it's a pretty sweet tool. It really is All right. So what about OneNote, do you?

Juniel Miller:

use OneNote much. I try. It's one of those things that I really try to do, especially when I'm working with a team, where you can collectively have all the notes in one place and everybody can actually go to them. So when I have a team, one of those, one of the things I maintain if I'm keeping up, just manage herself or random meetings, we might have one of those. A good thing for that, but it's not my goal to just personal things.

Walt Sparling:

It seems like either some people use the crap out of it or some people are just getting their their hands, you know dirty in it and trying to learn it. Yeah, so okay. What about challenges? Now? You're or some people are just getting their hands dirty in it and trying to learn it, yeah, so okay. What about challenges? Now you can talk about past challenges, current challenges. What are some of the challenges you deal with, do or have?

Juniel Miller:

So I recently went through you know how you do the feedback 360s, mm-hmm. Get people to give feedback on who you are as a leader and a peer and all that. And one of the things that I did was I said, okay, I'm going to take this feedback from this 360, work with an executive coach to dissect it, and one of my challenges that I'm working through is really getting better at admitting my faults. Challenges that I'm working through is really getting better at admitting my faults, and one of the faults that was pointed out to me from somebody who was part of 360 was Janelle is not very open to change and it kind of put me back on my heels. You know, as project managers, change is what we do. You know you manage your way through it and go through that, but that's change based on a building and a project. It's change based on, you know, working through changes with the team and making sure you come to a solution, but with overall change in certain dynamics is what this person was getting at and I talked through it and now I'm trying to work through how do I get better in dealing with change?

Juniel Miller:

And we're in that age now, walt, with really rapid change. I mean we think about the dynamics that AI is creating for all of us, or different technologies that come about, different PM tools that someone says, hey, you must use this thing that has a thousand capabilities, but you only need 12 of them. Things like that that has, you know, a thousand capabilities, but you only need 12 of them. You know things like that. You know, um, but change for me. I'm trying, I need to get, I need to work on getting better at dealing with change, major changes, say like that Okay, yeah, and I think the for some.

Walt Sparling:

Anyway, as they get older, it is harder to change because I don't know, it's just, it's you're, you're kind of stuck in your ways Cause you really know how to do it and you're. And I think a lot of people are scared about learning something new because it took me this long to really figure this stuff out. Now I got to learn something new. How long is that going to take?

Juniel Miller:

Yeah.

Juniel Miller:

Yeah, and really for me? I don't. I don't so much struggle with adaptability in that way, but change is such an it's such a big thing. You know it's not just one aspect, though you might be good at you know, changing how you dress. You know be good at changing. Ok, I'm not going to stay up all night, I'm going to start work. You know getting up early in the morning instead. That kind of change is not that hard for me. It's certain dynamics within how we navigate our business that I have to get better about. Because for someone who was a I don't know if it was a peer or somebody who was once one of my direct reports for someone to actually know that my thing is is let me not look at it and say, oh, let me not scoff at it, let me understand it. Let me dissect everything and take it for what it is, what was noted, and work through it, and I might not be as bad, as you know.

Juniel Miller:

I think I am, you know, but I'm working through it.

Walt Sparling:

It's the whole idea of self-awareness yes, I just had something I was thinking, but it basically had to do with change, and you're purposely working on changing and addressing and addressing your maybe inflexibility and in some manner of change. So that's, that's a, it's a positive.

Juniel Miller:

Absolutely, Absolutely. The biggest thing is being able to look at yourself, understand hey, this is an opportunity for growth here, face it and actually work through it, Admitting to yourself oh, I was actually wrong about this particular thing.

Walt Sparling:

Next time I will approach it this way, that's where I am Good deal, I approach it this way. That's where I am Good deal, I like it, yeah. So any other particular topics you'd like to go over, maybe with your new position or some change that you have gone through?

Juniel Miller:

Let's see here. Okay, let's talk about the dynamics of process improvement. So, when you think about working amongst a team and again, everybody has their skill set, everybody has their way of things, some people are more open to change, some people not so much when you think about overall process improvement and approaching it, um, one of one of the things I'm knowing I'm trying to work on is making sure that you know I I navigate in a way to where there's more, I work toward more consensus. You know you just can't go into a situation where you say, okay, all right, y'all, I think this is a great idea, let's go do it like this and everybody's done it that way. Right, and we all know that, we all know that. But what is your way? How are you, when you're working through, trying to navigate the team to a certain way of doing things? That's something that I think about a lot.

Walt Sparling:

And that is um, that's. That's an interesting topic too, because you know there's there's change with process improvements through like professionals. That's what they do.

Walt Sparling:

You know they're, that's their specialty, there's change where, like, as a leader, you have a way of doing things that's been working for you for years and you think it's the best thing since sliced bread, and you talk to your team about it. How are you guys doing this? Well, I'm doing this, I'm doing this, oh, this is how I do it. And then sometimes they just out of maybe intimidation, or well, that's the boss. If the boss does it that way, maybe I need to do it that way or I need to use that tool, so you'll have different situations with that. And then you, I mean, one of my biggest pet peeves is when you have, like, a PMO and I've been involved in a lot of different PMOs over the years and talked to a lot of PMO professionals Is are they experienced? Have they done your job, do they understand? And when it comes to process improvement, I think that's really important.

Juniel Miller:

That part that you just said as far as, have they done the job? Do they understand? It goes back to something I learned on, you know, bridge hours with my dad. You don't. You don't ask someone to do something that you're not willing to do yourself, which goes into. You don't ask someone to do something that you may not or that you don't quite understand before you you know, deploy that, you must. You understand what it is you're asking for right, right.

Walt Sparling:

If you've never done it, you don't realize the potential impact.

Juniel Miller:

That's absolutely right and that's something that we see so much of in the workplace. Another thing I have to really make sure I watch out for and I saw it in something I was dealing with recently. You know you can have these ideas oh it'd be cool if we did blah, it'd be cool if we did this. You know, oh, it would be cool if we did blah, it would be cool if we did this. But what do you do with that idea? Are you willing to take that idea, write it down and actually make some actions? Not just create the actions, but take out some of those actions in order to drive out that idea? So what I'm doing now is making sure that I'm not becoming just an idea guy With a whole bunch of dynamics going on.

Juniel Miller:

You can throw a bunch of ideas out there and listen to somebody for it, and somebody may take it and run with it, but are you part of the actions? Are you documenting the actions? Are you capturing some of the actions? Are you taking some of those actions and taking responsibility for them? And my whole thing right now, in all things, is to be cognizant of that thing. Am I, am I? Am I being actionable with the ideas that I put out.

Juniel Miller:

And, um, because I found myself in a situation where, you know, working with the uh, this wasn't at work, this was on something I was doing with a non-profit uh, working with the, working with the and throwing some ideas out.

Juniel Miller:

I'm thinking that this idea is something that's for this particular person or this particular part of the group, so I have no action. But I never said it. I'm thinking that they interpreted what I said and time goes by and the idea goes to the, the abyss, and I bring it back up again and try to do it, to try to come up with a way to create the action later, and it's fizzled. I have to let it go. So so now my thing is okay. When I put this idea in the air, let's make sure we talk about the actions as far as how it goes. If it's a dumb idea, let's get somebody to tell you. If it's a dumb idea, you can move past it to where it doesn't sit there and stay in the space. But my whole thing is really just making sure that I am acting on the things I say.

Walt Sparling:

Good policy.

Juniel Miller:

It sounds simple in practice, but it's hard. It's hard sometimes.

Walt Sparling:

So many things that that we do in life is it's simple on paper and then you go yeah, totally, I get it, but follow through is the tough part, absolutely, absolutely. So one of my favorite parts of the interviews is always the did you know I always get to learn some cool new things. Do you have a cool did you know for us?

Juniel Miller:

I do, I do and I don't think I've talked about it that much in this conversation. But I am a kid from Arkansas and most people don't really know much about Arkansas or that you know southwest part of the country. But when you look at the map you know. You look at the state lines on the US map and between Arkansas and Mississippi you got this big wide river, mississippi River. You got this big, you got this state of Mississippi there and everybody believes that that river splits Arkansas and Mississippi. That river splits Missouri and Tennessee. But the reality is there.

Juniel Miller:

If you look closely into that map and zoom in and like Google Maps or something, and I learned as a kid there are a number of spots where you can jump between the states and never cross the water. It blew me away for a long time because I learned this without seeing a map and there was this hunting ground that my dad had this project on and we rode the levee to get to it and we ended up in this really like refuge type area. We were in Mississippi, coming out of Arkansas. I had never crossed the river. It blew me away. So my thing was, where is this on the map? And I looked at it and I saw where the state lines crossed and I saw that there were a number of areas where this happened. So that's my. Did you know? You don't have to cross the river to get between Arkansas and Mississippi. There are areas where you jump between states without crossing the water.

Walt Sparling:

That is an interesting one. I'll have to look that up. Awesome. Well, janelle, I appreciate you coming on and it was great talking to you, and I wish you luck in this new venture, both in your uh your job and in uh your mba yeah, well, hopefully we can get the chance to work together again.

Juniel Miller:

That'll be really cool.

Walt Sparling:

You never know, we're old dogs, but we're not done.

Juniel Miller:

That's right, hey. Thank you so much for having me on.

Walt Sparling:

Thank you All right and for everyone else. We'll see you on the next episode of PM Mastery.

Intro/Outro:

Thanks for listening to the PM Mastery podcast at wwwpm-masterycom. Be sure to subscribe in your podcast player. Until next time, keep working on your craft.