Many thought that by the year 2012, GIS would not be a profession anymore. After all, it was more than 10 years ago that ArcView 3.x was released, a product which many thought was ushering in a new age of user-friendly GIS software that anyone could understand and use. It did turn out to be true that major improvements in the GUIs to GIS software (in open source land too) would make them easier to use. But along with those improvements came more analytical tools to understand, larger and more complex datasets to crunch, and a higher expectation for decent cartography.
These changes kept GIS professionals employed as long as they continued to be proficient in the skills listed above. And, according to a new McKinsey Institute report, GIS professionals may continue to be in demand for many years. Their take on it is that data analysts will be in major demand in the near future, which one can safely assume will include GIS analysts(see note at the end of the article), because organizations:
1) have a lot of data, and
2) that data is increasingly “an important factor in production.”
Another interesting take-away from the report is that, “Leaders in every sector will have to grapple with the implications of big data, not just a few data-oriented managers.” This implies a change in the clientele for GIS businesses. Perhaps GIS businesses will no longer deal with mid-level “data-oriented managers” who very often have the ability to say no but not the power to say yes, and instead be able to deal directly with the senior-level people in the larger organizations. This could catapult the field into a whole new level of importance, not only within those organizations, but also in terms of what it can achieve.
The report also cautions that there will be a shortage of workers, perhaps in the amount of 140,000 to 190,000 by the year 2018, who posses advanced analytical skills. An even larger shortage is predicted in management positions, where a sufficient skill set to enable the understanding of the potential of these large datasets will be needed. GIS analysts will surely be a significant subset of the workers needed to fill these gaps.
*Spatial analysis is mentioned in the report as one of the many techniques for analyzing “big data” on page 30.
#1 by @GeoNetworks_Soc on January 18, 2012 - 5:05 pm
Demand for #GIS Analysts on the Rise? http://t.co/RhR8idoG via @PetersonGIS
#2 by @Lew_Nelson on January 19, 2012 - 8:00 am
Demand for #GIS #Analysts on the Rise? http://t.co/uvxiRlQH via @zite #careers
#3 by @nickjaustin on January 19, 2012 - 8:28 am
#BIGdata needs spatial analysis – Demand for #GIS #Analysts on the Rise?
http://t.co/jAolXrEJ via @PetersonGIS
#4 by Rick Rupp on January 19, 2012 - 10:27 am
I know my workload certainly isn’t getting any lighter 😉
Universities are starting to deal with data management issues because granting agencies are requiring DM plans in research proposals. They are turning to the geospatial folks because we have been doing it for years (metadata, sharing, etc.)