Alicia Hill on her path from field engineer to leading the Multifamily Business Sector

Following her curiosity led Alicia Hill from environmental engineering to geotechnical engineering, local client development to national account management, and her New England “bubble” to touring the country learning and making connections to better serve her clients. A self-described “people person,” she credits nurturing relationships as the reason for her biggest wins.

Q: Did you always want to be a geotechnical engineer?

No. I was a civil engineering student at Notre Dame, thinking I would pursue environmental engineering. Then, during my senior year, I took some geotechnical and geophysical classes and found them far more interesting. After that, I decided to get my master’s in geotechnical engineering at the University of New Hampshire.

Q. Is there a project you worked on that stands out?

When I was a fairly new engineer, I was involved in a project with three or four retaining walls. One was planned to be 50 feet high supporting the 100,000 square-foot building and part of the parking lot. I was nervous and overwhelmed, so I leaned on my manager for technical support. Additionally, I asked a well-respected colleague at my former employer, aka “the wall guy,” to peer review our work, and the collaboration among the team led us to the best design option for the client.

Q. When and why did you begin focusing on client development?

I realized early in my career that I enjoyed speaking with and meeting with the clients who benefited from our work. It grew from there, and in 2011, I became part of Terracon’s National Accounts program.

As you get to know your clients, you begin feeling their pain points and thinking like they do; you might realize they need additional services they may not know we provide, or they need services in other parts of the country, and you can help make it happen for them seamlessly here at Terracon.

Q. Do you miss engineering?

I don’t miss the daily grind of running calculations and preparing reports, but I still consider myself an engineer; I solve problems and put out fires all day long. Without my diverse background and engineering education I wouldn’t have the analytical skills to deal with everything that comes my way daily, or the ability to assist with solving my clients’ problems.

I also enjoy talking with our folks about specific project challenges. I’ll ask our local engineers, ‘What’s the typical foundation design in this area? What are the rock formations like? What are your challenges with the soils?’ Learning about stratigraphy and typical engineering designs elsewhere in the country has been extremely exciting and keeps me in the weeds a bit.

Q. What do you find most gratifying about your work?

A huge reward is when a client contact leaves their employer and calls me from their new place of employment wanting to work with Terracon. This exemplifies the trust they have in me and in Terracon as a partner to help them succeed in their new role. I always appreciate the challenge of working for a client at a new employer because even though our relationship dynamics are the same, the logistics of doing work together change, from the contract vehicle to the timelines and the work scopes.

Q. Speaking of new roles, you’re now leading our multifamily sector. What is that like?

Exciting! I already had several multifamily national clients providing senior housing, student housing, and various multifamily rental options, so it has been a natural transition and focus area for me. Rental demand is higher than it’s been in several years, so our clients are continuing to develop and acquire properties in numerous geographies throughout the country.

Our work ranges from providing due diligence services during property acquisitions of existing facilities to providing environmental remediation, geotechnical engineering design, construction materials testing, and building enclosure consulting during development and construction of 20+ story high rises. The projects are diverse and multifaceted, so I’m working with local Terracon offices and divisional teams to provide support in understanding the multifamily sector and assist with client and project pursuits.

Q. Complete this sentence: Life at Terracon is like …

Always being able to find the answer because of our collective brainpower.