Industry Tour Reflection

A follow-up report prepared to summarize our class trip to Halifax for a Geomatics Industry Tour (February 9,2017)

Research

Prior to arriving in Halifax, I worked from my existing knowledge to research the locations in our itinerary for the two-day trip. In this research I also discovered the work environments housed in each office.

I found it challenging to find specific details about the downtown HRM/HALIFAX planning office – due to the creative work at the Alderney office taking the higher priority in the online presence of the city. However, these shared workplaces are in fact diverse houses of creative geospatial strategies to manage data and coordinate services for the city.

Bedford Institute of Oceanography is an amalgamation of a variety of research-centric offices. The website is detailed and organized in a manner which points to links of a number of references. I learned about their focus on maintaining adequate research supplies, survey techniques, and health of ocean ecosystems.

In preparation for the complete two day tour I also researched the three meant for that day:

• Nova Scotia Power (learned about their interactive outage map, winning SAG award for implementing service network GIS)

• Department of Natural Resources (minerals branch; government involvement with data access (aware of schoolwork resources using GeoGratis downloads)

• Halifax Water (an office with implementations of planning professionals, service workers, management professionals, and employees dedicated to infrastructure development.

Presentations

During the presentations at Halifax Planning office in Duke Tower we learned about ongoing transformations taking place within the office as the government introduces complex geospatial software. They recognize it is an ongoing project to properly manage, coordinate, and cross-platform synthesize the digital office. The first presentation was regarding data stewardship across the tiers of management and responsibility of partnerships. This tied into the next presentation from Darren, about the diversity of imagery solutions applied in the current working network of municipal management. One of these is the integration of Pictometry with various web applications to ensure property assessment is as accurate as possible, and presented to the public in an accessible manner.

Darren presented to us about the use of Pictometry by PVSC for assessing changes to properties in the municipality using remote sensing aerial technology integrated with cadastral vector data. The use of pictometry by GIS technicians is allowing information to become selectively available to the public via integration with ESRI Online mapping options. A few of the programs mentioned in this presentation are used in collaboration with this imagery office, including: ReGIS, Connect Explorer, ArcGIS Online, PIctometry as ArcGIS Desktop basemap, Pictometry Mobile (using office login), Pictometry AutoCAD. These visualization opportunities are opening up the ability for the city to have up-to-date information for real-time change detection. Due to a number of types of users in the database network – including contract workers, service workers, and long term salaried staff – it is important to this office to have an integrated suite of programs for proper data management.

The next presentation was from a recently hired employee, and COGS alumni, Vanessa, presenting her work with ESRI’s Survey123 to help collect on –the-ground data. I found it incredibly interesting as a real-time story of working in industry to find solutions to existing problems, and improve solutions for efficient management of city work. I was especially interested in this project as I saw some flexibility for it to be included with a delivery system, where there could be real-time note taking. I asked about the exporting of data to excel format because it was something which could be applied to small business systems for collecting and management of weekly spatial data. This use of smart forms has many uses as sensor data becomes more accessible, not limited to cell phone tracking and in-car GPS systems; on-the-ground adjustments to database details have the power to impact small business solutions in startups and at the enterprise level.

The ideal goal with integrating this technology into the municipal workplace is to allow all users to best manage each collection of ‘business unit’ data. This approach works toward the goals set out by the initial presentation’s assertion that a single source of truth is important to collaborate information from a number of programs to one resource holding cross-division information.

Greg, the manager of IT and GIS team, discussed the various job descriptions of the types of roles he coordinates within the office team. In order to enable the team to work seamlessly, each hiring process requires approval from the CAO on both internal and external applicants to ensure the proper requirements are met. The nature of a government job requires a matrix of required skills are met by the successful applicant; we were told that as COGS graduates we are prepared with the required skillset, though this test would also evaluate competencies to determine which soft skills will best shine within the current workplace environment.

Bedford Institute of Oceanography (BIO) hosted us for the afternoon, and through a series of speakers, demonstrated a number of projects their offices have and will continue to work on based on the current demands of government cartographic requests. In summary, coastline monitoring throughout the study area is critical ongoing work, to ensure researchers do not damage costly equipment while enacting field work studies. The teams communicated to us the change in process to adequately produce a sound, legal hydrographic chart – from hand drawn transparency overlaying techniques to current digital data collection. The importance of accuracy and team collaboration to ensure attention to detail were stressed.

Presentations from each office gave insight to the types of research conducted by BIO, collectively, and while they are all inspiring, complex studies of climate impacts and marine ecosystem changes, it was not made readily apparent how we as first year COGS students could find ourselves working in this environment. Nonetheless, I found the presentations interesting from a scientific and cartographic perspective, though somewhat disconnected from our geomatics work this past term and a half.

Choice of Concentration

Prior to this class trip I was considering community/environmental planning and GIS as concentrations for the second year, due to what I imagined to be competitive industries requiring focused strategizing using digital geomatics.

The industry tour showed that the concentration is really only about half of the decision when it comes to choosing this discipline focus. Offices will hire regardless of the title of the individual, but rather, the capacity to learn new skills and become integrated into a workplace seamlessly. It secured the inkling that I had, about the importance of understanding spatial awareness when it comes to collecting data. The power of patterns in city management is crucial for determining best practice strategies.

It was mentioned at the Halifax Planning Office about the importance in revising a resume to include only immediately valuable information to the job

To this end, I am less concerned with the actual title of the concentration and am inclined to consider particular skills I will be choosing as associated with becoming a team member in that subset of geomatics. As well, I consider it important to understand this will also form new groups of classmates to spend a year working alongside. Based on the coursework we have completed so far, there are some individuals I enjoy collaborating with, though some others whom can be more challenging to interact with and remain productive. Regardless of the combinations of classmates, our collective learning opportunity is going to define our introduction into the industry and I wish for us all to be able to make the best of it.

As a form of professional development, I seek to improve my technical skills and capacity for growth as the geomatics industry continues to expand. I wish to continue learning flexible database solutions in GIS and CAD software to manage individual and complex datasets. My interest in solving community issues further guides me in the direction of community planning applications of suitability analyses using SQL querying, scripting, and graphic model building. It seems apparent that in many computer-centric workplaces, the ability to script and appropriately improve efficient geoprocessing is highly valued as a problem solving technique. Regardless of the concentration I choose, I would like to creatively implement systematic adjustments in future workplaces and solutions for entrepreneurial opportunities.

I see value in studying cartographic principles though I am situated within social justice networks and would like to develop skills associated with solving community issues. The capacity of remotely sensed imagery is emerging, and while a focused study does not immediately interest me, I am now confident enough with raster imagery to integrate into projects as they may arise.

Simply put, I would like any future job I hold to allow for one or more aspects of my geography and/or geomatics education, and am most naturally drawn towards the tasks of the planning concentration but also has applicability in GIS functionality. This tour helped to understand the diverse backgrounds of those working in large office networks, and keep our training in perspective for future applications in similar industry workplaces.