Geospatial Strategy: What are the key issues? (Part 1 of 4)

Several months ago I started an on-line questionnaire of what the biggest issues are for GIS/geospatial teams. This is of interest to me as part of the work that I do at Eagle Technology to develop strategies to deal with those types of issues. That questionnaire is still running if you want to participate (see footnote), however I have had 50 great responses to the survey from many countries around the world and from people working in many different industries, so I have began collating some of the data and the results are interesting.

The questionnaire was spilt into questions around some key topics:

1. Leadership, Management, Governance and Organisational Structures
2. Challenges with Data and Information
3. People, Skills and Training 
4. Challenges with Technology

This article covers the first of these topics and will be followed by subsequent article covering each of these.

Questionnaire Ratings

The questions were all rated on a Likert Scale where

10 = a major challenge

through to

1 = my organisation does not have an issue with this item

Questionnaire Results

Management of my organisation do not truly understand the capabilities of GIS. The results below clearly demonstrate that this is a major issue for many GIS Teams. This is discussed in the next section where some comments from the respondees are collated and analysed.

Our organisations IT Management treat GIS in the same way as they treat most of their other systems, but GIS is different to many other systems for a wide variety of reasons. The results below indicate that this is a major issue for many GIS Teams, but interestingly there is also a spread of results and a handful of responses where this is not too much of an issue.

Our GIS personnel are always too busy ‘making simple maps’ or dealing with immediate issues and so they never get sufficient time to devote to longer term projects *(including projects that could make it easier in the future to make maps, or to make it easier for users to make their own maps, or to put in place proper long term solutions that would mitigate the short term immediate issues). The results below are some of the most 'balanced' of all of the questions analysed. This indicates that this is a major issue for some teams but not so much for others.

The culture of our GIS team or the wider organisation is not optimal. GIS personnel don’t feel that they are properly valued nor that their work or talent is being utilized to the extent that it should be or that the teams that they are part of work well together. This again is a major issue for many GIS teams.

Management do not prioritise making the best use of all of the capabilities of GIS. This could include making use of recently emerged technology options (geospatial technology on mobiles, drones, Internet of Things, better engagement with members of the public etc). This is a concern for many GIS teams but is not as critical as some of the other responses.

Risks related GIS are not properly understood nor managed. For example data that was created for one purpose is being used for a different purpose without a full assessment of whether that data is suitable for this new job: the management don’t understand that perhaps the data is not of sufficient quality, spatial accuracy or currency for that new purpose. This is a concern for many GIS teams but is not as critical as some of the other responses.

Selected commentary from respondees

The following are quoted text from the respondees on these topics, with an indication of country and industry sector that they work in (note: some comments have been edited to ensure anonymity)

USA- Water Utility and Wastewater Treatment 

"GIS is seen as a record for the network and it seems that the upper echelons of the organisation do not have an appreciation that GIS could be a major business tool that can save money and generate revenue"

USA- County Government

"I work within a county government who manages the enterprise GIS with limited staffing. Our biggest challenge is getting the departments to take ownership of datasets/workflows/application feedback. They want a five course meal but do not want to do the prep work. I am currently trying to work through this with Project governance including project documents and sign off."

Nigeria- Consultancy

"I believe here in Nigeria, GIS is in the back burner, once it is been discussed, all they say is can't Google maps solve that? And If you manage to convince management on the importance and benefits, the cost of implementing a GIS in organisation is another hurdle, developing or purchasing a GIS software, the data needed for enrichment, personnel needed etc. If you get past this, sustainability is another issue, constant updating of software and data, training and upskilling of personnel. I believe it is either they don't fully grasp the power of GIS/Location intelligence or they just feel money is best invested in other departments and work with standard BI. My thoughts from experience."

Denmark- Utilities

"In my experience the biggest challenge to advancing a modern GIS in the organisation can be IT-technicians who have worked for the organisation for a long time and don't want change. They have built the legacy system, and while they have been handling geospatial data and used GIS software (as a singular tool), are not GIS folks. They hold a lot of informal power in the organisation due to their vast knowledge about the workings of the legacy system, and the data managed through it. Knowledge which is often times undocumented. Therefore management can be reluctant to support champions for change, even if they agree with the argument."

New Zealand- Central Government

"A significant challenge in my organisation was the inability of people outside the GIS team to see the distinction between ‘making maps’ and the actual function of a GIS platform. Management didn’t understand the value of having different ways to represent info and were challenged in understanding the utility of GIS over words on a page."

New Zealand- City Government

"I've been doing strategic planning for GIS for years, in the end it's dedicated staff, hard work and a supportive management/executive that will determine the whether the full potential of GIS is realised."

New Zealand- Engineering

"In my situation. (4 years GIS analyst at engineering consultancy). Our consulting structure is such that it's hard to sell the longterm gains of GIS investment up front. Projects are time bound and have finite start and end periods. Managers and clients think within these. Our knowledge management practices and meta data processes are frustrated by this. The company makes money off charging hours and any process to improve efficiency and reduce staff hours struggles to demonstrate value to the company. Getting project managers or technical staff to use GIS really relies on the strong person to person connections between our GIS team and the wider business."

India- Utilities

1.Our teams are bifurcated as development and operations. Operations do not largely understand GIS in a true sense affecting overall change management and production deployments.

2. Once business team gets to know some possibilities and capabilities of GIS, they start expecting everything out of it!! This is a major challenge I face to make them understand other simple Solutions! Some times GIS leadership has to follow what the business demands even if silly or herculean task!

Canada- Utilities

"I think Esri (and others like URISA) have provided some good information and courses on leadership, management, governance and organizational structure but too often I see the recommendations and best practises not applied (either not requested by people above GIS that would otherwise make these types of requests in other areas or by GIS Managers and the people working as GIS Professionals). This also gets compounded by conferences that show "how easy it is" without talking about the challenges organizations and people will face when dealing with real business data (not cookie cutter conference data) and real business challenges. I believe by facing these challenges in GIS and executing on effective solutions, we can truly take GIS to the next level which is ultimately where it should be!"

New Zealand- Utilities

"We have a drawing office mentality where our records are really good, however our spatial accuracy isn't fit for the purpose/outcomes the business demand. Getting management to give the time of day to even have a conversation about these issues is very difficult. GIS are very much an after thought here, but our work underpins so many systems. "

USA- State Government

"The problem is not with GIS, it's with an organization that has no meetings, no planning, is understaffed and underpaid. And the talent pool in the Midwest is dreadful. Solutions.. Making GIS much more accessible to the average person thus building demand, exemplified by the prevalence of COVID dashboards."

New Zealand- Water Utilities

"My biggest struggle is getting management to understand how powerful GIS is and the wide range of tools available in the Esri platform, for spatial visualization to tell the story of the world of where.

As GIS professionals there is lots of time spent learning and developing and at the moment not a lot of resource to get stuff done. As you already alluded to the visions and fancy titles "we will provide the best .....etc" does not explain the many steps to get to the end product and does not explain where the data sits behind the application. This is where our challenge lays, with the importance of data governance and systems processes, however most things are built as we discover and learn."

New Zealand- Central Government

"A Geospatial Management Role needs to be at the right level of an organisation to ensure that geospatial is understood and positive change can occur."

CONCLUSION

There are some clear issues that GIS teams are having that are recurring and common problems. Given the prevalence and difficulty in resolving these issues strategic approaches are needed. Some of the recurring areas to be addressed include:

• GIS literacy (basic knowledge) at management and executive levels
• Appreciation that while GIS is 'part of IT' there are some aspects of GIS that make it different to other systems.
• Governance of GIS operations and projects needs to include appropriate methods to prioritise resources so that there can be continuous improvement.
• GIS team members need to feel valued. Management needs to provide suitable reward, training and career advancement opportunities.
• Strategic Environmental Scanning of emerging technological advances needs to be undertaken regularly by personnel that have the skills to understand the benefits (and costs/disadvantages) of implementing newer technology.
• Governance needs to know what risks are being taken, for example with using data inappropriately for a certain use-case.

Currently Eagle Technology are working with many organisations to establish strategic approaches to deal with many issues such as those outlined above. Fortunately there are many tools, resources and approaches that can assist organisations to overcome these challenges and meet their objectives.

If you want to discuss any of the items raised above then please get in touch with me or my colleagues at Eagle Technology.

If you want to know more about the questionnaire (or what the other questions in the other sections cover) then I would encourage you to complete the questionnaire yourself using the link below.

Strategic GIS Challenges Questionnaire:

See: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/strategic-gis-challenges-what-biggest-problems-nathan-heazlewood/

The second of four articles in this series is available here: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/geospatial-strategy-what-key-issues-part-2-4-nathan-heazlewood/

Views expressed are solely my own and do not necessarily represent the views of my employer or any other party.