Lisa Kelly
Area Operations Deputy
Earth and Environmental Sciences (EESA)
As an experienced manager with over 35 years in operations management, Lisa leads and fosters a team of operations professionals towards harnessing, aligning, and developing the workforce to ensure effective and efficient support of EESA science. Lisa also participates as a member of the EESA Senior Leadership team, where she develops and leads the execution of operations strategic plans to address both short- and long-term goals for the Area. Prior to joining Berkeley Lab, Lisa started her national laboratory career with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. When Lisa is not at work, she enjoys her favorite thing in the world, which is being Grandma (G-Ma) to her two grandchildren. She also enjoys snow skiing, antiquing, and everything having to do with life.
What inspires you to work in STEM or operations?
For operations, I truly believe I can make a difference. I enjoy mentoring and developing individuals into their full potential. Watching their development and growth fills me with such pride. For the STEM portion, I couldn’t ask for a cooler area of research: Everything happening within EESA is so important for the world we live in. I am truly privileged to have this daily opportunity to hear about new amazing research directions our folks are exploring to preserve our beautiful planet.
What excites you about your work at Berkeley Lab?
What I do helps our Area. The sense of accomplishment, the respect, and the honest appreciation I both hear and feel from my colleagues are the most important reasons I work at Berkeley Lab.
How can our country engage more women, girls, and members of other underrepresented groups in STEM or operations?
This is an excellent question and an area where I think Berkeley Lab could do more to help engage our female population. For STEM, I have seen recent progress to do more. However, for operations, I am not aware of what we are doing. I will make this my personal goal for the coming year to engage the Women Scientists and Engineers Council and Human Resources on ideas to develop a communications campaign around improving outreach efforts for operations, especially for the higher-level positions.
Do you have tips you would recommend for someone looking to enter your field of work?
Sometimes in life you may find that, to achieve your goals, you need to take a few steps back to move forward. For me, I took a demotion to secure a job with Berkeley Lab where I could see a brighter future from where I had previously been employed. While I had to get beyond the stigma of stepping down a few levels (coupled with a cut in pay), I held on to my strong belief in myself to persevere and reach my goals.
When you have free time, what are your hobbies?
Being a grandma first and foremost, then antiquing, dining experiences, and visiting Hawaii.