Growing From Within: Career Paths at GreenLancer

When looking for a new opportunity, growth potential matters. Job seekers want to be able to build new skills and take on new challenges within their company.

At GreenLancer, growth means giving people opportunities to build new skills, take on new challenges, and discover new ways to contribute. As our business evolves, we want our team members to have opportunities to grow alongside it.

GreenLancer is a Detroit-based platform for solar and EV charging contractors. Since 2013, we've delivered solar permit design, engineering, interconnection support, and EV charging station engineering for more than 7,500 contractors on over 200,000 clean energy projects.

When the clean energy market shifts, so do the roles of our team — but our mission to drive change stays the same. As People Operations Lead, I've seen how that plays out firsthand. Here's how a few of our team roles have shifted over the years, allowing them to grow and pursue what they’re interested in.

Growing Into Broader Roles

Our operations team keeps engineering, permitting, and field service work moving for our customers, from coordinating site surveys to getting permit packages approved. Two people on that team have grown into broader roles over time.

Lauren Durbin has been instrumental in building GreenLancer's Field Services department, developing its original documentation and processes and helping them evolve as the business has grown.

Lauren started at GreenLancer managing individual projects. Today, as Director of Field Services, she leads the team and processes she helped build.

"A lot of that growth came from stepping outside my comfort zone and taking on challenges I didn't always have the answers to," Lauren says. "One of the biggest lessons I've learned since becoming Director is that leadership isn't about solving every problem yourself, but about giving your team the confidence and tools to work through challenges on their own."

For anyone hoping to move into leadership, she says: "You don't have to have everything figured out to take that next step."

Liz Milenkovic has also helped shape GreenLancer's growth from the production side. Over her four years with GreenLancer, she's helped evolve production processes as the business has expanded. When we spotlighted the women of GreenLancer in 2025, Liz was a Production Supervisor. Today, as Partner Manager, she oversees partner relationships, performance, and growth across our network.

"Working closely with partners helped me develop stronger communication, trust-building, and relationship management skills," Liz says. For her, the role is about "building trust, creating value, and fostering long-term success for both our partners and the business."

When I joined GreenLancer as a People Administrator, I initially focused on foundational HR processes and supporting team members with day-to-day needs. The role gave me an opportunity to build a new chapter in my career.

When my previous manager left for another opportunity, it created room for me to step into a bigger role and take on some of her responsibilities. During my next performance evaluation, I spoke up about taking on a broader scope of work. Since then, my role has continued to expand across workforce planning, organizational development, team member experience, and the full team member lifecycle.

I've had the opportunity to learn new things, take on challenges beyond my original responsibilities, and find new ways to contribute as the organization has evolved. My experience has shown me that career growth can come from a combination of changing business needs, being willing to step up, and having open conversations about how you want to develop.

Shaping Roles to Interests and Strengths

Sarah Lozanova, our Content & Creative Lead, works remotely from Maine. She joined GreenLancer as Content Marketing Manager, in a role focused mostly on blogging and written marketing. As her work expanded to include more creative projects, Sarah approached the team about a promotion.

"My promotion felt like a true reflection of where my marketing strengths and GreenLancer's needs overlap," Sarah says. "The role was built around content, design, and customer education, which are the areas where I feel I can make the biggest difference for our customers and our team."

Where Sarah's role was shaped around her strengths, Jay Stewart's has grown alongside the company itself. Jay, our Vice President of Sales Operations, joined GreenLancer in 2013 as its very first salesperson. He's worn many hats since, and today his role connects sales, operations, and partner management.

Jay has helped GreenLancer expand beyond solar design and permitting into EV charging design, telecom engineering services, and in-house solar interconnection support.

"Over my 13+ years here, I've learned how critical it is to be nimble and apply what we've built, including our platform, services, partners, and relationships, to an entirely new vertical," Jay says.

Jay credits much of that growth to the smart people who have helped take GreenLancer to where it is today. Looking ahead, he sees ambitious team members who take initiative as key to the company's next stage.

What Supports Career Growth?

Career growth doesn't happen by accident. At GreenLancer, our teams have clear goals and room to decide how work gets done, with regular check-ins to stay aligned.

We value continuous learning, sharing knowledge, and giving team members opportunities to build skills and take on new challenges. A few things help make that growth possible:

• Taking initiative. Tackling challenges, spotting ways to improve, and owning your work all build experience for your next step.
• Staying connected. Our team works remotely, in the office, and in hybrid arrangements, and our new downtown Detroit office gives in-office days more room to collaborate. Regular conversations with team leaders keep career goals on the table, and relationships across teams open doors to new projects.
• Being open to expanded responsibilities. Growth doesn't always start with a new title. Taking ownership of a project, learning a new skill, or stepping into an unfamiliar area can help you build experience, contribute in different ways, and discover where you want to grow next.
• Making career development a shared conversation. Team members should feel comfortable sharing their goals, while team leaders play an important role in providing feedback, recognizing growth, and helping identify opportunities for advancement.
  
  

Growth Is a Shared Effort

Career development doesn't rest entirely on the team member, and it can't happen through a formal process alone. It takes individual initiative, honest conversations, and a commitment from the organization to recognize contributions.

For team members, that means being open about your goals and seeking feedback. For team leaders, it means understanding their team's strengths and helping people find room to grow.

Some of our team members step into leadership, while others build deep expertise, shape different roles, or take on new parts of the business. The path isn't always tidy, but it's how Lauren, Liz, Sarah, and Jay found theirs, and how I found mine.

Interested in building a clean energy career with room to grow? Explore careers at GreenLancer or submit a general application.