Megan McDougall grew up in Sydney, and after studying architecture at NSW University, worked for 5 years in the UK and Papua New Guinea in private architectural practices before completing her architecture studies in Canberra where she initially registered as an architect. It was in Canberra where Megan developed a deep interest in heritage, completing her thesis on Early Government Housing in Canberra. She worked in private architectural practice with her husband Martin Fowler in Canberra and Tathra NSW, before moving to Melbourne in 1988.

She has worked at Heritage Victoria since 1989. Heritage Victoria is the Victorian State Government's principal cultural heritage agency and is part of the Department of Planning and Community Development.

Her many and varied years of experience at Heritage Victoria includes assessing nominations of places for the Victorian Heritage Register (VHR), dealing with development proposals involving heritage places, development of policies for managing places and objects listed on the VHR and providing advice to owners, managers and other government departments. Her current position is Manager, Assistance Programs which involves developing and managing the grants and assistance programs. She is taking time out from this position in 2008 to work on assessments of late 20th century architecture and co-ordinating a project reducing the backlog of nominations to the VHR.