Dirt road born and raised in rural South Carolina, Michele Heyward is a civil engineer turned tech founder on a mission to build a more equitable infrastructure future, one inclusive workforce at a time. As CEO of PositiveHire, she’s helping AEC firms tackle two of their biggest challenges: the engineering talent shortage and the underrepresentation of women of color in technical roles.
Michele holds a BS in Civil Engineering and an MS in Industrial Management from Clemson University. She spent over a decade in the energy sector as a construction project manager, where she helped build the power grid, breaking gender barriers in the field. Her career spans technical sales, technology transfer, and leading billion-dollar infrastructure projects. It’s women’s work, so someone had to do it.
Recognizing that solving the engineering talent crisis means retaining the talent you already have, Michele launched PH Balanced, a proprietary software platform that helps AEC companies retain technical professionals, especially mid-level women of color engineers and scientists.