Story Feature: Lia

“The speed of the leader is the speed of the crew.” – Lia Lamela (Personal Adaptation)

Lia notes this is a phrase she’s adapted over time rather than a quote tied to a specific source. Her leadership philosophy is equally uncompromising. If a team is failing, the leader needs to look inward. “If everyone around you is the problem, maybe you’re the problem.”

Highlights from Lia’s Story:

Lia did not grow up dreaming of conduit, switchgear, or control panels. Her early vision of the future was deeply traditional. “My dream was to have a family. My dream was to be a stay-at-home mom,” she says. Construction was never presented as an option, let alone a calling.

For a while, Lia imagined she would follow a medical profession, thinking a doctor or a physician might fit as a career path because she deeply cares for people and wanted to find ways to help them. She eventually landed in the path of becoming a psychiatrist. She studied abnormal psychiatry and through her schooling and by shadowing psychiatrists, but that is when reality hit hard. “The win ratio is very small, and there’s a lot of pain,” she explains. “I was too empathetic. I couldn’t separate myself.” The emotional toll and slow progress made it clear that path was not sustainable for her.

What followed was a series of career pivots. Medical aesthetics, veterinary tech work, pre-K assistance, medical assisting. Although she was able to experience different career paths, none of them felt like home. Career, she admits candidly, was never the priority when she had dreams of white picket fences. Stability through partnership was what she thought she had to find, until it vanished.

Lia is a survivor of domestic violence. She shares that her thoughts on relying on a partner felt safe until it wasn’t. Escaping that relationship meant fleeing the state with nothing but the clothes she had, her dog, and sheer willpower. She landed in a women’s shelter, stripped of the safety net she had unknowingly relied on. “When you’ve lost everything, you’re more open to try any opportunity,” she says. That openness cracked the door to a future she never imagined.

It was during this time that her brother-in-law mentioned an all-women’s pre-apprenticeship program he had heard about on a podcast. Lia laughed at first. “I thought, you have to have money to go back to school, and I had none.” When she found that this was a funded program, Lia shares “I literally had nothing to lose.” She applied, she was accepted and that is when everything changed for her.

The pre-apprenticeship exposed her to carpentry, plumbing, and electrical work in an all-female environment that felt safe and empowering. Electrical stopped her in her tracks. “I was like, oh my god, this is it. I’m basically Magneto,” she laughs. Lia, with her background in anatomy and medicine, saw electricity as the nervous system of a building. “Our bodies are electrical. Electricity brings light, warmth, life. Providing that is honorable.”

That sense of purpose mattered. Lia knew what life felt like without power, without security. “When you don’t have electricity, you don’t realize how much it shapes humanity. Survival instincts take over.” Being part of the system that restores stability felt profound.

Breaking into the industry, however, was not simple. “Unions I had tried to get into were still operating as a good old boys club,” Lia says bluntly. After being turned away through traditional applications, she found what she calls the “backdoor.” After networking with contractors in her area she was able to learn which were union contractors, meaning they hire union laborers. She applied directly to a union contractor, was hired as a helper, and became union by default.

She is clear about the value of unions. The IBEW local she was with paid for her schooling and books, and the training was rigorous, though each union operates differently. “Union education is very, very good,” she says. “But it was also rigid.” She distinguishes rigid structure from value, making it clear the rigidity wasn’t a flaw, just not right for her timeline.

For Lia, time mattered. She had entered the trades later in life and refused to wait four to five years to advance. “I wasn’t going to let anyone tell me how long it would take me to do something.”

Lia left the union and went non-union, working relentlessly. Twelve to fifteen hour days. Seven days a week. Studying constantly. “I lived, ate, and breathed electrical. I had no life for three years, and I loved it.” She passed her licensing exam on the first attempt and reached a six-figure income within three years. “I would not have hit that number that fast if I stayed union.” Even so, Lia says she highly recommends starting union, despite currently being non-union.

Dyslexia also shaped how she learned and succeeded. “If I try to do things the way everyone else does, I’ll probably fail, I have to be creative.” That creativity guided her next move. She specialized in low-voltage fire alarm systems, drawn to the complexity. “It combines mechanical, electrical, electronics, and coding. You’re helping these devices talk to each other. I’m a sci-fi geek. I love that.”

Fire alarm also offers security, life safety systems are non-negotiable in building construction. Lia is not done evolving. She is now transitioning into Building Information Modeling (BIM), bringing her field experience into medium-voltage electrical design to improve constructability for crews in the field. The motivation is personal and collective. “I’ve seen some engineers design things they’ve never installed. I want to make things better for the people on the ground.”

On the difficult days, Lia runs on sheer determination. “Sometimes it’s willpower, sometimes it’s rebellion,” she laughs, “…tell me I can’t do something and just watch me do it.” But she always comes back to solidarity. “You are not alone, a lot of us have been there. That moment you want to quit? Just remember that you’re making it better for the next woman.”

This drive to improve the industry extends beyond her job. Lia founded Sparky Life and hosts a podcast to confront the toxic culture she has seen firsthand. “Construction hasn’t caught up to 2026 yet,” she says. She believes increasing the number of women in the trades is one of the fastest ways to shift that culture. “Studies show when women are present, there are fewer accidents and more productivity. We’re built to work together.”

Lia also shares that she has a deep heart for women’s shelters. She emphasizes how isolating that experience can be and speaks openly about the need for access, information, and financial independence for women in those situations. She points out that shelters often do not have the resources or connections to link women to programs like pre-apprenticeships, and how devastating that gap can be. Through her lived understanding, and having come through it personally, she advocates for pathways that offer real stability and a way forward.

Her advice to women considering the trades is direct. “Listen to Sparky Life Podcast. Join legitimate networks. Talk to people who are actually living it.” She warns against misinformation and performative online spaces, advocating instead for credible communities and nonprofits that offer real support.

Lia’s journey is not linear, polished, or easy. It is forged in survival, grit, and a fierce love for the trades. From a women’s shelter to a six-figure career, and from the field to BIM, and from isolation to advocacy, she is not just building systems, she is building pathways and she is doing it loudly enough for the next woman to hear.