Engineering the Middle East with Helen Forster

3 years ago Helen Forster had no idea she would be engineering in the Middle East!

And while she never expected to have landed where she is…..

Helen holds a Bachelor of Engineering in Civil Engineering from UNSW and a Graduate Diploma in Project Management from the University of New England.  

She is a Chartered Engineer who has also achieved the status of Fellow and EngExec with Engineers Australia. She is a senior Civil Engineer and Project Director/Manager with over 19 years’ experience in the water, transport and built environment infrastructure industries.  

Currently, Helen is working with Jacobs as the Regional Director of Projects for the Middle East portfolio.

This is a “close” copy of the words that were spoken during the Podcast, Season 3 Episode 4

It is not 100% accurate.
The guest was Helen Forster

Mel De Gioia  0:25   

Hi!  Welcome to Season 3, Episode 25 of Engineering Heroes. A podcast that presents the incredible engineers that are shaping our society and battling our challenging issues.   It’s one thing to have a single Australian working overseas.  But what is it like when 90% of the engineers working on a single project are from all different countries.  It’s a regular hot pot, but to hear how they are able to work and communicate together is truly inspiring.  And the projects they are working on aren’t small.  These are globally-defining projects.  Our guest today is right in the middle of these projects and this mixture of engineers from around the globe.  She will share with us some of the steps taken to not just acknowledge, but to truly celebrate the cultural diversity on these projects.   My name is Melanie. And my co-host and our podcast’s resident engineer, speaking to us from the trenches, is Dominic.   

Dom 

From the United Arab Emirates, we are very excited to have Helen Forster joining us.  

Helen holds a Bachelor of Engineering in Civil Engineering from UNSW and a Graduate Diploma in Project Management from the University of New England.  

She is a Chartered Engineer who has also achieved the status of Fellow and EngExec with Engineers Australia. She is a senior Civil Engineer and Project Director with over 19 years’ experience in the water, transport and built environment infrastructure industries.  

Currently, Helen is working with Jacobs as the Regional Director of Projects for the Middle East portfolio. 

Mel De Gioia  

Helen was born in Darwin and growing up didn’t really leave it. When it came time for applying to Universities she was looking for something that would allow her to see the world. And with her strengths in being quite organised and good at maths and physics, Helen would say she just fell into engineering.  

Guest  2:12   

I don’t think I really even fully appreciated what it was until I started doing it. I was just looking for a degree. Having now done it. I can’t imagine doing anything else, because it can be so broad  

Dom  2:25   

After you finished your degree. Do you remember what your first project was?  

Guest  2:28   

Yes, I worked for Sydney Water, a water authority. I wanted to join them because they had a Graduate program at the time. I don’t have a specific project but I worked in a team that did a lot of projects that have asset maintenance and capital upgrades on the SWSOOS, so the Southern and Western Suburbs Ocean Outfall Sewer.   

Mel De Gioia  2:49   

You still remember the acronym!  

Guest  2:51   

I do remember the acronym it is the longest sewer in Sydney, its really fascinating in terms of the size of the asset, where it goes. It runs all over Sydney through parts of, that I don’t think I ever would normally go and visit or suburbs that I would never have been to. But you get to go and see all sorts of different places going into the sewer. At the time I thought ‘this is what engineering is all about”, you know, you get all dressed up in the gear and confined space entry and all that sort of stuff. So yeah, lots of projects for about a year from working on everything from vegetation clearing through to relining, repairs, sewer vents, ventilation systems, repairing those and also it’s a heritage asset, which I think a lot of people would go, why? But it is, it’s actually a heritage asset. So you have to do all of your upgrade work keeping that in mind and making sure that you maintain the integrity of the assets. Yeah, it was really quite an interesting and good starting job. I think actually.  So understanding the asset creation, tendering, bidding, whilst also supervising works on site. So that was quite interesting.  

Dom  3:55   

That’s amazing that people forget about those sorts of assets. They’re running under the city and all the way out through the suburbs as you said and some of the historic mains, like the brick mains, that are out there, that people don’t even realise that they’re there.  A project that was at Moore Park where there was the heritage main that ran underneath it. And they were building a building that ran over the top the developer was saying, “well, can’t you just move that main? Just shift that main, can you?” It’s like, it’s an historic brick main, I really think you’re better off moving your building than you are trying to build over the top of it.  How did you find working in Sydney Water as well, because they consistently in the top couple of companies that are rated as the best companies to work for?  

Guest  4:37   

oh, look, well, it was several years ago, two decades ago now that I worked for them. So but look, I really enjoyed it. I did genuinely like the fact that the rotation program, so being able to move through a couple of different parts of their business and get a good overview of how that business works, but also from an asset perspective. I think I also spent one year at Bondi Sewage Treatment Plant, which has got the best view of any sewage treatment plant i think i’ve ever heard of, up there on the cliffs. But yeah, it also I think in terms of now I’m in consulting, it was really good to be able to spend time client side and understand, you know, what are the drivers and how many different stakeholders there are within a client organisation as well as in the community. So yeah, I totally enjoyed it. I’m glad I did it. And I got to work in three different offices within Sydney Water and none of them were head office. So I had no time to actually spend time in the CBD. So it was all out on the regional depot’s or on the plants.  Yeah, just a really fascinating role. So I definitely yeap, I enjoyed that.   

Mel De Gioia  5:37   

It really does sound like you’ve got a lot of in the field experience, which is something that we’ve spoken about in the past that some engineers are lacking, to the detriment of the industry. So you’ve gone straight in there. So it’s great to hear. I’d love you to explain where you’re at now what are you working on?   

Guest  5:55   

So at the moment, I am in Dubai, so, the Middle East. I’ll be honest, I don’t think I would have pictured myself as working here, maybe two or three years ago. The opportunity was there, I visited for a work trip and all the stars aligned and the role was here. What I’m actually doing is I’m sort of overseeing the whole project portfolio. So looking at project governance, looking at improving project delivery, consistency, educating our project managers and delivery teams on systems and best practice, but across the whole portfolio. So, you know, it’s not just Dubai and the UAE. It’s all the countries that we operate in, in the Middle East. So it’s really quite interesting, you know, different types of clients, the size and scale of the projects, the pace of the projects, which present different issues and challenges. But yeah, just really fascinating. They have a real desire, I think to push forward here and the scale of the project, you’ve got World Cup, you’ve got Expo 2020. So there’s a whole heap of really big ticket items and big events coming up that the region’s working towards. And so it’s quite exciting to sort of see how those events can have a flow on effect to the rest of the infrastructure. So it’s quite an interesting place to be at the moment.  

Dom  7:08   

So because they’re sort of pushing forward, are they also utilising new technology. Do you tend to find the innovation something because I’ll embrace more because of that speed that they need to work with?  

Guest  7:21   

Yes, I think so. I think that they’re really looking to be more innovative. And sustainability is also a big push. You know, they want to be world leading. They want to… these are big events that the world can see and will be a part of, so to lead the forefront of that, I think is definitely a big part of what they are trying to do.  

Mel De Gioia  7:41   

Being sustainable as well is a real great box to tick. We’ve just come out of month long miniseries all about engineering and sustainable development and the World Engineering day for Sustainable Development lately, that was just early March. So to hear that these countries are embracing that is very reassuring. 

Mid Roll 

Mel De Gioia 

So working in a new country can be exciting and a great adventure. Helen is finally living the dream she had back in dawn. However, the reality working somewhere with so many varied cultures would take some adjustment by anyone. Helen speaks to us now about what she’s learned working on large engineering projects in the Middle East.  

Guest  8:27   

I think what’s really interesting about it is not just the pace of the projects or the size and scale but if I look at things that I wasn’t.. I probably wasn’t fully prepared for when I moved over and it’s not until I’ve been here that I’ve appreciated. So we’ve got you know, in the in the UAE, I think 90% of the population is expat, so not from the UAE. They’re from somewhere else in the world. We have 60 plus nationalities, working for our organisation. So whilst the diversity is fantastic, being able to bring all of that different experience together in the different cultures and communication styles is probably the biggest challenges that I would actually say I’ve had. And it’s really helped me to… I think in two fronts. One is the importance of communication, being clear on messages, simple messages, because English is not always the first language. And I guess I’m lucky that I can speak the language that is commonly used for everybody, but it isn’t everybody’s first language and fascinating how many words can be interpreted in different ways. And you don’t realise that until you’re trying to communicate with people. So that is important – planning communication and being really simple and clear about what it is that what we’re trying to achieve. And the other part on the cultural side, bringing teams together. So again, you know, we’ve got a lot of great technical expertise that I work with and wonderful experience. But if if you bring all of that together combined with different backgrounds and languages, the importance of planning jobs, getting the buy in from the teams and the chartering of the team. So you know, having well planned, upfront project initiation. Team building actually becomes quite important because you do have to bring everybody together quite quickly sometimes. And I’m really starting to see that. And hopefully, I think having a bit of influence there and how we do that a little better. I think also apart from just the project delivery, and planning and executing the project, the other benefits is that you could, I think it starts to allow you to bring in better development of staff. So you can actually, you know, create opportunities within projects for succession planning for people to step up and take on different roles, which again, you know, encourages people to stay in the industry to aspire to the next level in their career. So I think that there’s a lot of flow on effects as well from from being able to do that. But there I would say definitely two of the biggest challenges that I’m facing at the moment,  

Dom  10:49   

Because there’s so many cultures and so many people from so many different backgrounds, is there also like a millange of all of the standards and the codes and the practices and the trades.  Or is it, is there very much a base kind of requirement of what you need to work to in the UAE? Or does everyone bring their own sorts of technologies from and design opinions for each of their various backgrounds?  

Guest  11:12   

So, yes, the short answer is everyone will bring their different backgrounds, and I guess, ways of doing things. But at the end of the day, there are common standards that we use. So typically it will be British Standard, but also a lot of our clients have their own standards, which I guess even in Australia or something like that, they might be based on either an international standard or an Australian standard, but they will have their own requirements over the top of that. So that still applies.  They’re quite open here, I think a lot of our clients to looking for international expertise and different ways of doing things. So that’s not to say that we still don’t have to follow the set standard, but they’re quite open to reaching out to you know, the US or the UK or Australia or wherever it is. To get sort of the the expertise from around the globe to help out with things that they don’t necessarily, they haven’t necessarily done here because it’s relatively new, young nation, or simply because you have a transient population an ex-pat population that comes and goes, so they were quite happy to reach out to the rest of the world and get the best. And I think that’s Yeah, they’re open to that, while still complying with the standards.  

Dom  12:24   

Because I can imagine a lot of the buildings and the construction that goes on there, you’re talking about size and scale that it hasn’t been seen anywhere else around the world. So you really would need to almost start from the beginning and from those fundamentals and build it all up from from there sort of taking a bit from the knowledge that you’ve learned, but also kind of having to actually start right back from the start to build these amazing things that they’re developing.  

Guest  12:52   

Yeah, look, and like I said, it won’t depend on which sector were in, that they might apply different things from time to time, but broadly speaking, General default would be British and yeah reaching back to do whatever suits. 

 Mel De Gioia  13:04   

So you’ve disappointed you blew me away when you’re saying 90% of the engineers working on site work from around the globe. That’s a huge statistic. And you were saying one of the issues was that cultural diversity, I’m not going to assume that everyone’s all happy days, and it’ll works really easily. Is it? Is it difficult? Are there a very conscious efforts put in place to allow that merging or is it something that everyone’s on board it’s like yet we’re in this together. It’s a party and accepting it. So I’m wondering how how it works.   

Guest  13:39   

Yes, is the short answer. So it does present a lot of challenges within the project teams and within our office. I think what we work hard at though is a lot of work around celebrating the diversity for a start. So firstly, acknowledging it, and we do a lot of, you know, cultural days or celebrating if there’s, you know, Australia Day we’ll have.. which we’ve had recently.. you know, all the Australian’s sort of, we took some photos with the flag and all that sort of stuff, you know, I’ve never seen and experienced so many different religious holidays that are actually celebrated. Because of… you’ve got Indian cultures, Irish, European, all sorts of different things that.. Holidays and national days that I didn’t even realise, there’s lots of great meals and lots of great cultural events in the office. So I think, you know, some music, singing all sorts of things that I have seen. So it’s been really quite lovely in that respect to bring that out and to celebrate that. And I think the other thing that we do or we’re aware of, and I think still working through it does need constant work and maintenance, I guess, but cultural awareness. So there are things and we’ve been discussing this a little bit recently in our office but cultural awareness. So for example, you know, different styles, so some cultures are far more upfront and forthright, happy to provide feedback directly or ask questions of senior leaders. You know, as an Australian, I noticed that I’ve quite happy to ask a lot of questions and that sort of stuff. And it took me a while to realise that some cultures actually would not do that, because they’re maybe more respectful than I am, or in their culture, it’s a bit more hierarchical. So they’re a little bit more hesitant perhaps, to, to ask those questions. And it’s not.. I don’t believe I’m being disrespectful. I’m curious. And I just want to know the answer. But that’s not necessarily always the style. So I guess again, it comes back to the communication letting people know what you are okay with either as an individual but then on a company level, trying to celebrate that give us our company values and things like that, which gives us the ground rules that we are all able to operate on and so referring back to those quite a bit. So again, we have that in common even if we’re all coming from slightly different backgrounds.  But it is a journey and we have bumpy bits along the way, for sure. So we just need to keep learning from that, spending a bit more time unpacking what happened, what worked, what didn’t, and what can we do better next time. And I think that there will certainly be a bit of work for us to continue over 2020. And doing that with our leadership team and then working with our staff to do that more. So it’s a constant thing, you can’t stop doing it. You can’t stop talking about it, learning from the lessons, but I do think that we’re really embracing it. And also that means recognising that it will be bumpy along the way and being comfortable with being uncomfortable.  

Dom  16:31   

It also has the benefit of you get to learn about all these cultures in one spot without having to travel literally at the various places around the globe.  

Mel De Gioia  16:38   

Correct me, is this unique this cultural hotpot, is that unique to the Middle East? Or is that something that you’ve seen elsewhere?  

Guest  16:45   

I think certain countries in the Middle East, it’s more prevalent than others. So the UAE in particular, has a lot of different cultures and a lot of ex-pats. A lot of countries in the Middle East are a lot more open to Westerners than I had appreciated. I will admit that, my experience has been a lot more that everyone’s welcoming and friendly. You know, I think again, a lot of our perceptions are yeah, not what we are led to believe, I guess in terms of the media that we might see. So, you know, first question I often get asked is, do I have to wear a headscarf? And the answer to that is no, not in every day. Obviously, some countries or if I’m going to particular buildings and things I might need to be respectful in terms of my dress, but no way, I don’t have to. Yeah, those are the things that I think being here it is. There’s a lot that’s actually quite westernised. But I do also admit it does vary a little bit from country to country, but on the whole, I’ve had a very positive experience.  

Dom  17:40   

So what are your thoughts on the future of engineering?  

Guest  17:42   

Future of engineering, I think is going to be a lot of technology and innovation. We don’t even know where it’s going to go right now. You know, I think back on talking to someone the other day when I was at university, I remember somebody getting a DVD player and we all thought that was the absolute you know, height of sophistication at the time, and we would all crowd around to have a look at this thing. And now I don’t think I could find anyone that actually owned one. So we’re moving very fast. And the other thought that I was having was around, particularly things like cashless society. So it’s something else I was looking at was that we’re becoming increasingly less dependent on cash. And I can, I can understand that I don’t really remember the last time I did use cash myself, but making sure that we don’t disadvantage members of our society that are perhaps either older or different backgrounds, socio economic backgrounds, or whatever, that do not have access to that sort of technology. So just making sure that we’re still giving them a means to live in this society, even if we move more towards those technological solutions. So that’s going to be a bit of a balancing act going forward.  

Mel De Gioia  18:48   

Yeah, I actually find in Australia were shielded from that cashless society in that we are so advanced with our technology in that respect.  In the future. Are you seeing more of this cultural hotpots in these engineering projects that more people from a global destinations will all come together on projects.   

Guest  19:10   

I think yes, there will always be a need to come together and bring certain members of the team together. But I think also there is going to be more of a push to move work around. Partly because from a sustainability perspective know, we can all hop on a plane and come to where the project is being built or being delivered. Also, you know, Centres of Excellence, technical expertise is highly sought after. So in some respects, you might build up specialist skills in one location or a couple of different locations. So we need to be able to move the work to them rather than being able to have everybody all the time that skill set on ground. So I think that it does mean understanding, or having a clear picture on how you would like to communicate and understanding those cultural differences is still important, but then you’ve also got to add in the remote factor, or the distance factor.  So, yes, bringing teams together will be needed. But I think there will be continued to be a remote factor, especially from that sustainability perspective.   

Mel De Gioia  20:10   

And what would you say to people just starting out in engineering?   

Guest  20:13   

So I would say yes to as much as you possibly can, if you had an opportunity that scares you a little bit, definitely say yes to it. It is much easier to say no, later on, having had the experience, and I think also, that you, you don’t really know what you can’t do or you don’t like until you’ve tried it. And even if you do try something, and it turns out that it wasn’t for you, at least, you know, and no one can take that experience away from you. So yes, say, yes. Seek out opportunities. Put your hand up and do that as often as you can.  

Dom  20:46   

Just to start wrapping things up a little bit. Is there a piece of engineering that impresses you?  

Guest  20:51   

Oh, lots of different things impress me.  I think everything from you know the driverless metro train here in Dubai, I absolutely adore it, it’s every five minutes. It’s the most regular thing I’ve ever experienced in my life and there’s no drivers, I just think it’s wonderful to retractable pens. So you know, you click the button and I like that because clicky pens, not because I like the clicky. But because I don’t lose the lid. So that’s me a very practical thing. But to be honest, I think at the moment, the fact that we’re, you know, communicating… I’m on my phone, I can communicate with my family in Australia all the time via a phone, I can learn two languages through different apps on this phone, read a book on this phone. I just think that smartphones , an amazing piece of technology. And I think I would be lost without it at the moment. I never thought I’d be one to say that but it’s Yeah, it’s the one thing that I’ve decided I can’t you know, leave home without it. So I would have to say that at the moment. It’s my favourite thing.  

Mel De Gioia  21:49   

I have to agree with that one  

Dom  21:51   

The clicky pins, though I think you’re right. The fastest way to tell if there’s an engineer in the room because you just put it in front of them and in 2 seconds they’ve pulled it apart and laid it out. and then start putting it all back together again. You just go, you’re definitely an engineer.  

Guest  22:06   

I do that. I definitely do that.  

Dom  22:08   

I’m the same.  I do it.  

Mel De Gioia  22:11   

And this is a fun takeaway to finish off. Is there an engineer that you admire?   

Guest  22:16   

Yeah. Look, this is actually an easy one. I think to me, I have two and both my grandfather’s were engineers as it happened. So one was electrical. And one was civil. And, you know, there’s lots of engineers that I admire.  They’ve both passed away now. And maybe, unfortunately, before I became an engineer, and really was able to have good engineering conversations, but I, I hear the stories about what they did, and you know, just how it’s changed over time. And I yeah, I just think it would be, that’d be really proud of me. And I like the idea that Yeah, I’ve done something that they did. So yeah, they’re my heroes.  

Dom  22:49   

I wonder if there’d a bit of rivalry in regards to the whole electrical civil thing going on there.  

Guest  22:55   

I have no doubt. I have no doubt that would become an issue. I may have had to get a double degree or something like that.  

Mel De Gioia  23:03   

Thank you so much for that.  

Dom  23:06   

Thanks for joining us.  

Mel De Gioia  23:07   

It’s been wonderful.  

Guest  23:08   

Thank you so much for having me. It’s been awesome.   

Mel De Gioia  23:10   

And thank you for listening to Episode 25 of Engineering Heroes. You can find out more about our show by visiting our website at www.engineeringheroes.com.au. If you enjoyed today’s show, go and tell someone It’s that easy to show your support for engineers everywhere. We look forward to you joining us next week when we bring you another interview with one of our engineering champions.  

Transcribed by https://otter.ai