Maria Esperanza McGuinness

I came into my current role in environmental protection one year ago after being laid off from my position as a human resources assistant with the federal government during restructuring. In my current role, I communicate with constituents on different projects that are affecting the environment here in New Mexico, and I do data analysis with our permitting team. I process deposits and communicate with other departments and different bureaus, assisting in communications across various branches. The biggest challenge we face is individuals and constituents that disagree with certain projects. We hear out their complaints and give them that empathetic ear, let them know that we do hear their concerns, and not take it personally because some people point it as if it is your fault, but we don't have any control over certain things. We just have to give them that empathetic ear, hear them out, get their information, and pass that along to our compliance team to make sure that we're protecting the environment. Before this, I worked for a behavioral health organization as a home visitor, providing tools to parents on how to teach children through play. I studied in traumatic counseling and how to assist people that have gone through very traumatic experiences, mentor them, and teach them how to goal plan and achieve those goals through smaller goals. My greatest professional accomplishment has been training and supervising other employees.