To mark GIS Day and PostGIS Day in 2023, Amy Jackson from Elmbridge Borough Council joined forces with us to suggest six ways to raise awareness of GIS in your organisation. We’ve now updated this content for 2024!
1. Bring home the bacon
Amy is the manager of a small GIS team. To mark the launch of the council’s new GIS Strategy in 2023, she invited colleagues to a Big Breakfast on GIS Day. With bacon butties, pastries, coffee and maps on offer, it sounded like the ideal morning out! Attendees were invited to play GIS Cluedo using iShare and make origami from maps. Attendees at our 2023 User Group attempted the map origami with mixed results!
2. Reserve your place at our 2024 User Group
Mark the day by booking a place at our User Group in Birmingham on November 8th. It’s the ideal time to talk GIS with peers and our team.
3. Showcase GIS projects
There are many ways to whet your colleagues’ appetites for maps, for example:
- Posting maps on internal notice boards
- Promoting mapping case studies on your intranet
- Running a ‘show and tell’ webinar for colleagues
- Turning part of your reception, canteen or break room into a temporary map gallery
4. Get social (ideas for councils)
You can ask your social media team to help raise awareness of how the council uses mapping to transform service delivery.
You can also ask them to promote public-facing maps which allow residents to self-serve or share information. Here are a few ideas that can help residents improve their fitness, stay safe and improve their environment this Autumn/Winter:
- Gritting routes
- CCTV zones
- Green spaces
- Public amenities
- Map-based fault reporting (e.g. graffiti or potholes)
5. Give awards or momentoes
If you’ve ever read about our staff nights out, you’ll know we’re big fans of tongue-in-cheek awards. Why not create certificates for colleagues who use location-based data to its full advantage? You could also award certificates to colleagues whose datasets are a joy to use!
We’re offering a small number of GIS Day momentoes to attendees at our 2024 User Group and the first two PSGA events in 2024 (Edinburgh and York). Simply ask one of our team on the day if we have availability.
6. Mapping Mondays
Think about freeing up a 30-minute space in your diary every Monday so colleagues can talk to you about what they are trying to achieve and find out how GIS can help them.
Helpful resources
Case studies:
Relevant case studies can be found on our customer stories page, including:
- GIS and the customer experience (Walsall Council)
- How to improve the Call for Sites process (Dudley MBC)
- Using iShare to create single-topic web maps (Dudley MBC)
- Using iShare to enable the public to compare maps from different providers or eras (Dudley MBC)
Blogs:
How iShare supports digital transformation
Five indications that your Call for Sites process could be improved
Four ways to improve the Call for Sites user experience
Short videos: