Page 25 - Winds Of Change Fall 2018

abuse in his community — often the only type of failure he understood. “I had to look at failure as a part of experimentation rather than an end-all. I felt a lot safer with trying and being OK with it not coming out as perfect as I wanted,” he explains.
Now Dunlap is busy trying new ways to recruit Indigenous employees. “We want to be the most preferred place for Natives to work,” and he adds, “and to shop.” If he has his way, there will be an Indigenous marketplace on Amazon and tribes will be ordering items in their own languages using voice-activated Alexa. But Dunlap’s not stopping at Alexa speaking Indigenous languages — he’s looking at economic development in Indigenous communities. “How can we get a ful llment center to tribal lands?” he wonders.
If Dunlap has his way, there will be an Indigenous marketplace on Amazon and tribes will be ordering items in their own languages using voice- activated Alexa.
One way he’s going about his plan is through Indig- enous@Amazon, Amazon’s newest employee resource group for Indigenous employees globally, which he founded earlier this year. “As Amazon becomes a global company, our group must think bigger and anticipate the needs of not only Natives here in the U.S., but for all of our Indigenous employees to come,” he says.
Dunlap was heavily involved in AISES at UCLA. He points out with pride that the efforts of their AISES chapter were rewarded with the Outreach and Community Service Award and Chapter of the Year in 2010. “A year after my graduation though,” he jokingly adds. Now he’s bringing Amazon to the National Conference, recruiting alongside companies like Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. “I respect that Natives have worked at these companies, but I want to show Natives there are other options,” he says. “AISES will look different as the world of technology grows. I want to hear Native kids say they want to work at companies like Facebook and Google.”
But most of all, he wants Natives to gravitate to Amazon, where he says there are opportunities for all sorts of skill sets, not just the tech savvy. And Dunlap is casting a wide net. “As a recruiter, I get to in uence our business to consider candidates with more diverse backgrounds and experiences,” he says, adding that a resume doesn’t always tell a person’s whole story. He wants to help Amazon understand what the vast and unique Indigenous communities have to offer. “Amazon is such an innovative company, and Native people, we’re just as innovative,” he says. “If there are more Indigenous people here, we can in uence Amazon.”
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FALL 2018 • WINDS OF CHANGE 23
— Patty Talahongva