Under Barbara Ryan’s leadership, millions of satellite images have been made available to the general public at no charge, allowing scientists, planners, and policy makers to make better-informed decisions on a range of environmental problems. Her advocacy for revamping the 36-year-old Landsat Data Policy (in 2008) has resulted in annual economic benefits of $2.1B globally. Barbara’s career began in 1974 at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) where she spent the next 34 years working in seven States and Washington, D.C. From 2008 to 2012, she was Director of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Space Programme, and from 2012 to 2018, Ryan was the Secretariat Director of the intergovernmental Group on Earth Observations (GEO) in Geneva, Switzerland. In January 2021, Barbara became the second Executive Director of the World Geospatial Industry Council (WGIC), a global not-for-profit trade association of private-sector companies working in the geospatial and Earth observation ecosystem.  Her interests build on a long career in environmental governance, science and technology, and international collaboration.  She is a strong advocate for open data policies, the integration of Earth observations, and hyper-partnering to ensure that existing and planned resources can be more effectively used to address the significant environmental and social issues facing the world today.

Linda Foster oversees Esri’s worldwide strategic vision for land records, cadastre, surveying, and land administration. Long recognized as a champion for bringing GIS and geospatial technologies to unique and challenging situations, she has spent much of her career improving the outcomes of timeless, lands-based challenges. A leader in professional organizations, she is currently serving on the National Society of Professional Surveyors (NSPS) board of directors, has served as a mentor for the URISA mentorship network, and led statewide design of low distortion projections for inclusion in the National Geodetic Survey’s (NGS) upcoming datum updates. Foster is a registered professional land surveyor and certified GIS professional. She also holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Geological Engineering, and a Master’s degree in GIS from Penn State University.

Nikolas Smilovsky, PhD, GISP is a Geospatial Evangelist, Solutions Provider, and Educator, as well as Geospatial Solutions Director with Bad Elf. For nearly two decades Nik has focused his efforts on the professional and academic expansion of the geospatial professions. Whether working for a plethora of different types of private consulting firms collecting, analyzing, and displaying geographic data or working as an academic, researching and contributing to the corpus of educational knowledge, his passion in life is geography. As an energetic and enthusiastic public speaker, teacher, and thought leader he has enjoyed sharing successes with others and seeing them flourish. Specifically, his interests in the geospatial fields include the geography of behavior, sustainable and resilient geodesign, geographic science pedagogy (especially online education), and geospatial technologies as a whole. Nik loves innovative GIS tech and is a Geoholic! He is also a certified arborist, UAS Remote Pilot and Esri ArcGIS professional.

Greg Jameson is the GIS Technician at the City of Grimes, where he leads all aspects of GIS for the City. He’s building a new ArcGIS Enterprise to be the system of record for all data at the city. Greg is also a licensed drone pilot and meteorologist.

Phil and Marty Shaeffer founded Engineering Mapping Solutions (EMS) in 1995 in Phoenix, AZ. With a focus on GIS utility mapping, EMS delivers world-class engineering-based digital data solutions based in best-practices data design, conversion, and custom software applications.

Chris Fox leads a team responsible for designing, developing, and supporting ArcGIS Solutions for public works, transportation, and election departments within state and local government.

Daniel Wickens is a Product Engineer on the State and Local Government ArcGIS Solutions Team. He focuses on the Infrastructure community and has a strong interest in public works solutions. Daniel has nearly a decade of technical experience applying GIS in the state and local government space.