If you ask Colleen Wallace where her inspiration and motivation comes from, she’ll give you three answers: “The outdoors, science, and learning.”
As the Manager of Electrowinning Development at Electra in Boulder, Colorado, Colleen says she gets to pursue all three of these passions while helping to solve one of humanity’s biggest challenges – climate change – at the same time.
“Finding a balance between professional development and personally fulfilling work can be tough,” she says. “Some jobs will give you lots of independence, but the impact is small. At other places, you could be working on a technology with a huge influence, but your individual contributions may feel small.”
“Electra is different. Here, you can make an impact on a big problem,” she says.
After graduating with a Bachelor of Science in Physics from James Madison University, Colleen decided to explore the idea of being a science teacher. From JMU in Harrisonburg, Virginia, Colleen moved cross-country to Southern California to become an instructor with Guided Discoveries, which runs STEM-based outdoor education camps in the San Jacinto mountains just west of Palm Springs.
Eventually, however, Colleen decided that she wanted to work more directly on “climate and the impact of human activity on the environment.”
She wanted to work in practical scientific research, looking for the kinds of breakthroughs that can make a big difference in a hurry. In 2018, Colleen joined a grid-scale battery startup near Boulder, Colorado. She later moved to another early-stage firm working on hydrogen electrolyzers, before joining Electra in late 2020.
Across the different firms, Colleen worked with the same core group of scientists and engineers, led by Sandeep Nijhawan and Quoc Pham – the co-founders of Electra. And as a member of this team, her career as a research scientist has flourished.
“You get so many development opportunities when you are part of the Electra team,” she says. “You pick up a lot of practical skills.”
As the Manager of Electrowinning Development at Electra, Colleen also gets to flex her teaching muscles, helping newer team members design and run experiments, interpret the data, analyze the results, and communicate the findings.
“You are working with people who are so smart and from many different disciplines,” Colleen says. “They push you to be a more well-rounded scientist. If you want to work a bit harder on something that could have a big impact, this may be the place for you.”