2023 Esri GIS Manager’s Summit – Back and Even Better
The 2023 version of the Esri GIS Manager’s Summit was the start of a new era for this special event. Back in-person for the first time since 2019, the Esri GIS Manager’s Summit was held on the Sunday prior to the International User Conference. In its eleven-year history, the Summit had never been held on Sunday. This was an important change as it allows more people to attend than when competing with other sessions during the conference week. The Summit will continue to be on Sunday of conference week from here on out, so if you’re planning to attend future Summits, please plan accordingly. Also, it should be noted that there is no charge for this event, and it is open to any User Conference attendee, no special invite required. For 2023, there were over 200 people in attendance.
The Summit ran from 9:00AM to 3:30PM and included an ambitious agenda focused on The Path to GIS Success. This is a framework developed by Esri and Esri Canada based on decades of experience and research of documenting enterprise GIS best practices in the user community across the globe and all industries. The Path to GIS Success is broken down into five key pillars: Strategy, Governance, Data & Technology, Engagement, and Skills Development. For the first time, the event kicked off with a welcome video from Jack Dangermond. The agenda included activities used in past Summits, like networking and group discussions using the Lean Coffee method. Users and their work were also highlighted, with presentations from Marna McLain of Austin, TX, Kara Shindle from Franklin Co., PA, and Anika-Aduesa Smart from LA Metro.
Each of the five key components had an Esri Subject Matter Expert (SME) present on their key pillar. The SMEs were:
- Strategy: Jim Pardue
- Governance: Deepti Kochhar
- Data & Technology: Jim VanOstenbridge
- Engagement: Michael Green
- Skills Development: Justin Ogden
- The Holistic Approach: Matthew Lewin
At the end of the day, Matt Lewin from Esri Canada brought it all together with brief explanations on why each of the key pillars matter, and provided four steps to get started:
- Build a Case for a Geospatial Strategy
- Show Quick Wins
- Formalize a Base Level of Governance
- Focus on Your Team
Matt’s presentation was followed by a panel discussion which included all five key pillar SMEs, Matt, and the three users. The attendees were then surveyed to provide suggestions for future Summit topics and available resources were reviewed. Another first for this event was that the day was closed with a GIS Manager’s Social at the Marriott’s poolside.
Whether you missed having your question answered, or missed the event, you haven’t missed out completely – I’ve attached a copy of the presentation slides in three PDFs below, the presenters will be answering questions submitted during the summit in future posts, and we’ll be sharing more details over the next few months, all here in this community, so be sure to check in regularly.
Lastly, I hope you will consider joining us in 2024, you can expect even more of your peers to be there, with even more interaction and participation next year.
Thanks again for everyone’s support of the Summit and we have already started the planning for the 2024 event, so add it to your calendar now!