Getting the most out of your GIS strategy and investment
High start-up costs, hard-to-find niche skills, data acquisition and a technology landscape that’s ever changing, makes navigating GIS investment decisions tricky. With many varied applications of GIS tools and techniques, it’s difficult for information and technology leaders to know if investment is being applied to the right area and if maximum returns will be achieved.
A GIS team does not work in isolation. It is a critical business function that serves multiple business units across an organisation, often supporting several different business processes and providing valuable data-informed insights.
In particular, GIS is used by local councils to enable:
- A rapid way to find properties to respond to questions on rates or complaints
- Analysis to determine the prime locations for services such as health and creche
- Carry out land use analysis to support town planning
- Acts as a link between asset management systems and field teams
- Provide public-facing web maps showing council and locality data
- Support emergency services response
- Enable field teams by providing mapping tools on phones or tablets to aid operations such as dealing with dumped rubbish or compliance inspections
- Provide data analysis that informs climate adaptation response.
Any business case that sets out GIS investment requirements, should be prepared in the context of an overall business strategy. If executed correctly, a good GIS strategy can increase operational efficiency and improve organisational and community outcomes.
When developing a GIS strategy, it is critical to first identify business and stakeholder requirements and understand the potential for GIS to support these requirements. Development of a good GIS strategy should include:
- Consultation with business stakeholders to understand their requirements and identify how and if GIS can support these requirements
- A review of the overall business and technology strategies to establish if they support the GIS team to adequately meet stakeholder requirements
- Identify any risks or shortcomings in the current environment
- Define the future state and ensure this is supported by the Executive
- Identify investment needs e.g. software, tools, training, data, resourcing
- Provide recommendations and a roadmap of actions required to meet the agreed future state.
Spatial Vision has developed many GIS strategies, of which over a dozen have been for Councils and Government departments. We have built trusted relationships with these customers who return and seek continued support.
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Geospatial strategy for City of Kingston
City of Kingston requested support from Spatial Vision in the development of a Geospatial Strategy to more effectively utilise geospatial information in decision making.
