Marie‑Laure Canonne is a project manager at VINCI Energies. This is a key role that offers ample autonomy but requires remarkable adaptability.
“An accomplishment” is how Marie‑Laure Canonne describes the construction of the Laboratoires Servier Research and Development Centre on the Plateau de Saclay. “I’m extremely proud of this operation because I found it really challenging, as it was my first project in the role of project manager and the second-largest VINCI Energies contract in the Ile-de-France region at the time.”
Marie‑Laure Canonne learned a great deal during her four years on this Paris-area project between 2019 and 2022: “It was a hugely technical project, for example with the installation of purified water circuits and sealed rooms, and technical constraints requiring seriously advanced expertise that you just don’t come across on every project.”
Since then, she has been involved in another major project: Austerlitz A7A8, an extremely large-scale tertiary structure built for Kaufman & Broad as part of the Paris Rive Gauche ZAC (joint development zone). By the end of 2026, it will offer offices, apartments and shops, plus a hotel, community space, workshops, parking and planted areas,
She continues: “Working on a multi-product project like this is fascinating. Above all, I love working as a team, where you have to create a collective and understand a new customer’s needs. The project manager role offers great autonomy and makes you feel like one of the links in a chain leading to the actual construction of a project. In my job, no two days are alike!”
International experience
This 44-year-old engineer believes that the crucial skills required to do her job are listening, anticipating, understanding technical professionals and their needs, and above all, adaptability. These are qualities she has acquired and cultivated throughout her varied 20-year career.
“Getting my boots on and heading to a construction site is way more exciting!”
While studying at ESTP, Marie‑Laure Canonne discovered the world of construction during her second work placement at Citeos (VINCI Energies) in Chartres. “Having always loved factories and robots, I saw myself working in the automotive industry. But my experience at Citeos convinced me that I’d be happier on a construction site than in a factory. Relationships there are more open, more direct.”
And so, in 2023, at the end of her third year at ESTP, she joined a construction group subsidiary in Turkmenistan on the VIE programme. “At the end of my VIE placement, the company offered me a job in Tahiti, but I wanted to stay in Turkmenistan, where the projects were exciting and really diverse, and become a technical trades site supervisor.”
For two years, the young engineer gained wide construction-industry experience, moving between sites on the group’s numerous projects in that central Asian country: an ice rink, cable car, theatre, mosque, etc. In 2006, she headed to South Asia for a casino project in Macao, then a year later, to the Middle East, for a large hotel complex in Dubai complete with a shopping centre and luxury apartment. In 2010, she was in the Caribbean, working on a hotel project in Cuba. “This was a difficult experience, during which I had to learn to work under conditions of constant shortages. We were a long way from Havana and had very limited resources. We just had to improvise and get on with things, but I have great memories of the people involved.”
Collaborative management
In 2012, our globetrotter of the construction world decided to return to France. “My husband and I wanted to start a family,” she explains. “So, I started what was a brand-new role for me, as a project manager in a sales department.” Close to five years in this role allowed her to meet many people, from building contractors and customer organisations alike, and gain a deeper understanding of the challenges and requirements of project management.
“Everyone said I would be off travelling internationally again before long, but that didn’t happen! The professional environment is far more stimulating in France. The challenges there are bigger, and there is far greater emphasis on environmental issues.” Following this experience, she wanted to reconnect with the world of construction. “Getting my boots on and heading to a construction site is way more exciting! You meet such passionate people doing so many different jobs.”
In 2019, through a former colleague she met in Turkmenistan, Marie-Laure joined VINCI Energies as a project manager. “This job suits me perfectly,” she says. “A project manager doesn’t have a hierarchical relationship with all the stakeholders they’re coordinating; it’s more about collective management. It’s more demanding but also more rewarding!”
02/14/2025
Photo: ©DupontRenoux
