Adapting to rural Alaska cultures: engineers learn village communication.

• Author: West, Gail
• Position: ENGINEERING: SPECIAL SECTION

Alaska encompasses 663,268 square miles, 12 land-based regional Native corporations, 260 villages and 229 federally recognized tribes. According to the Alaska Native Heritage Center, Alaska also has 11 distinct Native cultures. Add to these staggering figures four different Native language families consisting of 20 indigenous languages and a host of separate dialects spread across the state, and contractors and engineers who work in Alaska know they're a long way from Kansas.

Each year, according to the State's Capital Projects database, between $500 million and $750 million in federal and State funding goes into rural Alaska villages off the road system for capital projects, and many engineering firms depend on these projects as a crucial part of their office workload. With each capital project, however, come challenges their engineering counterparts in the Lower 48 seldom encounter.

Setting aside logistical and technical considerations, such as traveling, shipping materials to a site, project coordination and changing permafrost condition, there are two primary challenges for engineers working in rural villages. First is the language and communication; second is the culture.

Not only must engineers be able to explain technical issues in layman's terms, but also they must have knowledge and patience to communicate with village residents, especially elders, in a style very unlike urban communication.

According to Willy Van Hemert and Mike Rabe, both principals at CRW Engineering Group LLC, when engineers from their firm go into a village to talk with residents about a proposed project, village elders like to have the discussions or presentations translated into their Native language.

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"We take PowerPoints, flip charts and handouts," Rabe said, "and usually, a village member translates so the information reaches elders in their own language. But the real key to communication is to listen. We need to hear what the village wants and to understand their goals."

MWH Global Pacific Northwest Regional Manager Chris Brown said that listening to what the village has to say about a project is simply respectful.

"If you show respect," Brown said, "then the community will help you understand how to navigate things to make the project more successful."

RURAL PROJECTS REMAIN VITAL

CRW and MWH have both completed a myriad of rural projects across the length and breadth of Alaska, as have many other engineering firms. According to...