Vision & Strategy

Founded 75 years ago, SIL International is a faith-based organization that studies, documents, and assists in developing the world’s lesser-known languages. SIL’s staff shares a Christian commitment to service, academic excellence, and professional engagement through literacy, linguistics, translation, and other academic disciplines. SIL makes its services available to all without regard to religious belief, political ideology, gender, race, or ethnic background.

SIL (initially known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics) has grown from a small summer linguistics training program with two students in 1934 to a staff of over 6,000 coming from over 60 countries. SIL’s linguistic investigation exceeds 2,550 languages spoken by over 1.2 billion people in more than 70 countries.

SIL focuses on unwritten languages. People who speak these languages often live in geographic, social, and economic isolation. Studying these languages results in practical help for local people and contributes to the broader knowledge of linguistics, anthropology, and ethnomusicology. SIL publishes its research and widely distributes it to libraries, universities, governments, and international agencies.

As a leader in the research of the world’s endangered languages through language survey, SIL facilitates language development to prevent the extinction of language and culture.

SIL’s premier publication, the Ethnologue: Languages of the World, is a comprehensive catalog of the world’s more than 6,900 living languages.

Restructuring of SIL Cameroon Administration

Times change, and we see the need to adapt ourselves as well. We wanted to see more clarity and flexibility in the Administration and Language programs departments and wanted to include Cameroonians in the leadership team. They provide valuable input in both Administration and Language program issues. Furthermore, we realized it was time to put all human resource management (expatriate and national staff) under one director to achieve more consistency in the way we treat all staff. This is why the General Director of SIL Cameroon wrote a plan to restructure the leadership team of SIL Cameroon in 2008. The plan was finalized and set in motion in February 2009 featuring five directorates and seven coordinators.

The setup of the new team is as follows:

1. Director of Administration and Finance - Steve SANTOS
• Coordinator for Finances and Accommodation - Philip NSAH
• Coordinator for Support Services - Steve WITTIG
• Coordinator for Public Relations - Martin BEYALA
2. Director of Language Services - Larry SEGUIN
• Coordinator for Language Programs - Teresa HEATH
• Coordinator for Language Administration and Finances - Vreni GEIGER
• Coordinator for Training - Sinclair TCHEGYEU
3. Director of Personnel - Joe RIDER
• Coordinator for Employee Relations - Etiennette GADO
4. Director of Bamenda Region - Ria HEDINGER
5. Director of Greater North Region - Not appointed yet

We think that with this new setup people can cover for each other within both the “Administration and Finance” team and the “Language Services” team. The smaller administration team will also be easier to supervise and the involvement of nationals in the leadership team will bring in another view of issues from a Cameroonian perspective.