GIS Project Management

Abstract

GIS project managers are the people who manage a staff in geographic data analysis for a specific goal. GIS project managers may become more integral and important to address the challenges of the projects. Project management like the knowledge application, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities in order to meet or exceed end user needs and expectations.This paper describes definitions of GIS project management and specifies the resources and tools required. It ends with an overview of external factors and a discussion of the expertise required of a GIS project manager.Project means a temporary administrative environment created for the purpose of producing one or more specific products according to specific specifications within a predefined time frame using predefined sources. There are many definitions of a project. Wysocki et al. (2003), one of them, define a project as “a sequence of unique, complex and connected activities having one goal or purpose that must be completed by a specific time, within budget, and according to specification” (p. 38). It is a logical sequence of activities that must be completed within a specific time frame. The Project Management Institute (PMI) (2013a, p. 8) defines project management “the application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities to meet the project requirement”. This definition is added to five Project Management Process Groups (PMPG) that describe the lifecycle of any GIS project, and ten knowledge areas for the project managers should be competent.