This month, the SSSI National Young Professionals Committee have been focusing on consolidating learnings from Locate19, and are in the planning stages for Locate20. We are working with SSSI nationally to produce a $10,000 Locate20 Young Professionals Travel Grant, which will sponsor 5 lucky young professionals $2,000 each to cover registration and accomodation/travel costs to attend Locate20. We’re absolutely thrilled about this, and will get you more details in coming months on how to enter to win!

Exciting plans are underway for the South East Asia Survey Congress 2019 (SEASC2019, 15-18 August, Darwin Convention Centre), where there is a full day of jam-packed high-value content specifically aimed at young professionals. See below for more information!

The White Paper on Young Professionals in the Australian Geospatial Industry is being prepared in response to some excellent points that came out of the Young Professionals Symposium at Locate19, so keep your eye out for this in coming months as well.

In the webinar space, we are also excited to be planning more in our Career Development Webinar Series, with plans for a four-part series on GDA2020 in conjunction with Geoscience Australia, as well as a webinar on BIM in Australia. We’ll keep you updated on the details of these very soon!

The committee is always open to feedback and submissions from the community regarding things that we could do better, feedback on past events, ideas for new events, or anything that might make the YPs better than ever. Please send an email to chair.yp@sssi.org.au.

SSSI Young Professionals Career Development June Webinar: BIM

Wednesday, 12th June, 2019

12.00pm - 1.00pm AEST

Dr Mohsen Kalantari Soltanieh and Peter Sippell

Dr Mohsen Kalantari Soltanieh leads research and teaching at the University of Melbourne in the space of land administration, cadastre, BIM, 3D GIS and spatial data infrastructure, while Peter Sippel is Principal Surveyor at Veris and is heavily involved with buildingSMART and regulation of BIM in Australia.

Mohsen will explore with us the nexus of BIM and GIS as an opportunity for surveying and spatial professionals, focussing on solutions for the way forward. There is increasing recognition of the potential of Building Information Modelling (BIM) in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry. With the growing use and adoption of BIM, AEC becomes a fountainhead for a flow of 3D spatial data. Often rich in content, with higher levels of development BIM can be an invaluable source of data not only addressing AEC objectives but also other domains that use 3D spatial information. The effective integration of data produced through BIM workflows in GIS provides more opportunities for surveying and spatial professionals in urban planning, disaster management, infrastructure engineering and facilities management domains.

Peter will talk with us about ‘Establishing the Foundational 3D Spatial Model’ through his work at Veris Australia Pty Ltd, who are a national survey and 3D spatial business with demonstrated major roles in key infrastructure projects across Australia (including  Brisbane Cross River Rail & Airport Link , Sydney  Light Rail & Norwest Rail link, and Melbourne  Metro Tunnel & Stations PPP  & West Gate Tunnel Projects). Using these examples, he will look at the integration of  survey datum connection with boundary and geospatially acquired data sets to establish the foundational 3D spatial model, enabling a digital platform for the development of Building Information Modelling (BIM)  through design, construction and operational phases of the infrastructure. Critically spatial integrity and veracity of the 3D digital model in the first instance enables informed  design delivering client / owner confidence,  construction efficiency through simulation (augmented reality) through to spatial certainty of as built providing maintenance economies for the balance of the life of the project.

This webinar will help you to gain an understanding of what BIM is, how it is applicable to the work that you and your business do, and what are the developments that are happening in this space internationally and in Australia.

Registrations via: https://sssi.org.au/events-awards/events/bim-webinar

Submit your entry now for the Career Pathways Competition: “My story: How I came to be here”

Clarity on career pathways in our industry can be clear as mud at the best of times, and for many young people thinking about their future, as well as many of us who are already working in the industry, it’s not always apparent what options are available to us. To add to this, our industry is diverse in the depth and breadth of experiences and backgrounds that each one of us has - but this is not immediately apparent and can take quite a lot of digging beneath the surface to uncover.

To make inroads to changing this, we are extremely excited to announce the SEASC2019 Career Pathways Competition! We encourage you to apply, especially if you are a young-at-heart professional who would like to inspire students and young professionals to enter, stay in and improve our industry.

THEME: “MY STORY: HOW I CAME TO BE HERE”
How did you end up in the spatial/surveying industry? To highlight the depth and breadth of people in our industry, we would love to hear about your personal journey to where you are right now. What steps have you taken to get here? What have been your biggest inspirations and motivators? What do you love about your job? From timelines of your studies and career to photos of your childhood and family, maps of your travels, and experiences in the context of entering the spatial profession, we’re interested in hearing what your journey is, no matter where you are.

How hard would it be for you to record a 3-minute video sharing your story? Or to create a digital poster or story map sharing where you’ve come from and where you hope to go?

Entries close on Friday 9 August 2019, 11:59PM ACST.

To stay up to date with SEASC2019 for speaker and program updates, subscribe to the newsletter at  https://goo.gl/6syYAf. To register, check out https://goo.gl/UzkrTU.

Jam-packed Young Professionals Day program for SEASC2019 in Darwin (15 August) released!

SEASC 2019 will be hosting Young Professionals Day on Thursday 15 August 2019 - a jam-packed day specifically designed for the future leaders of the Surveying and Geospatial industry. The Opening Plenaries will focus on setting the scene for personal growth, followed by a series of Discovery Workshops themed on discovering the skills needed to manage innovation, unpacking the challenges that young professionals face and flipping these into opportunities, and diving deep into  how next generation capability and skills can unite to strengthen the future of the industry globally. Interspaced amongst these we will have YP Live! Sharp lightning talks from across the globe, a career development workshop on Delivering the Capability Boost You’ve Always Wanted by Amy Hetherington, and RPAS and drone field demonstrations. To wrap the day up we will have a Closing Plenary by the Superstart of STEM Narelle Underwood on Professional Development: Invest In Yourself and Get Others to Invest In You, and finally a panel discussion on The Way Forward with Chairs of ASEAN YPs and SSSI YPs. The day will then conclude with Georabble and an Icebreaker open to all SEASC 2019 delegates at the Darwin Convention Centre, offering the chance for global networking opportunities for attendees.

Date: Thursday 15 August 2019

Time: 9:00am – 5:00pm

Location: Darwin Convention Centre

Find out more and register now at https://seasc2019darwin.com.au/yp-day//

SSSI National Young Professionals Mentoring Program 2019 kicks off!

The 2018 (inaugural) NYPMP was a fantastic success, with 80 graduates who gained many good things from participating in the program. This year, in the second year of the NYPMP, we have had almost 300 applications from around Australia and around the world, and are SO excited to be holding our launch events all around Australia between Monday 17 June to Sunday 7 July. The program will then officially begin on Monday 8 July, going for 4 months. During this time, participants will cover 8 topics on career development, with the program wrapping up with graduation events for successful completion of the program in early November.

To find out more about the program, keep up to date with our website https://sssi.org.au/sssi-community/special-interest-groups/young-professionals/national-yp-mentoring-program.

SSSI National Young Professionals Committee Member Highlights

This month, we’d like to introduce Jason Heritage, our Victorian National Young Professional Representative. Jason completed his studies at the University of South Australia before moving to Melbourne to work for the Surveyor-General Victoria as a Data Analyst on the Digital Cadastre Modernisation Project. The project aims to modernise the authoritative digital representation of the State’s land parcel and property boundaries.

He has been an active member of the SSSI and found that volunteering is a great way to meet people from all areas of the industry.

“I gain a lot of inspiration from meeting people who are confident in their field of work, and learning about the latest in research”

Volunteering has given him a real boost to his professional development, as well as providing a great insight into the workings of the spatial industry. If he could give one word of advice it would be:

“Get yourself out there, meet people and make a contribution.”

Do you know what a Body of Knowledge is? Have a look at this video exploring the BoK concept.

Interested in continuing professional development that you can do in your own time, at your own pace for a low/free cost? Check out edX, a global nonprofit platform for education and learning founded by Harvard and MIT that delivers a large range of courses that are relevant to you.

Are you curious about the future of governance of sustainable infrastructure? Have a read of this article from Infrastructure Magazine about this today.

Have you seen the Diversity and Inclusion Action Plan for the Australian Spatial Industry, part of Agenda 2026? Have a read now and see how it applies to your organisation and your career!