NSW/ACT Spatial Business Lead
Veris
Total years of experience :18 years, 6 Months
I was headhunted by Veris to establish, grow, and lead its Spatial offerings in the NSW/ACT regions, and to consolidate it with its existing Digital Engineering offering. My role includes extensive business development, market research, collaborating and strategising with the senior leadership team, and harnessing the power of spatial data to drive business success by bridging the gap between technical aspects of spatial analysis and the strategic goals of the organisation. My previous experience working in engineering and management consulting in both Sydney and Melbourne meant that I have an extensive network within government and the industry to ensure success in my new role.
I also manage several major infrastructure projects with the most recent being the Canberra Light Rail Stage 2B. My role includes managing complex projects within the environment, planning, urban renewal, development, and infrastructure sectors, and overseeing all aspects of project planning, execution, and delivery.
I was the Spatial Research Manager for the Centre of Urban Research (CUR) at RMIT University. My role was to lead the geospatial team and manage the spatial research program, provide technical leadership, and contribute to the overall development and leadership of CUR and the Australian Urban Observatory group research program.
In addition, my role was to develop strong collaborative relationships within and beyond the research group, as well as being responsive to key academic and government stakeholder consultancy and research grant requests. I was responsible for the scoping, planning, budgeting and managing the spatial team’s work program alongside developing and monitoring a long-term strategic program-of-work.
With thought leadership and effective use of resources and collaborations, my role was also to advance the state-of-the-art in the use of spatial information to benchmark, monitor and design healthier, liveable cities.
I was headhunted by Spatial Vision to help set up the International Consulting branch and to consolidate it with its existing Domestic Consulting branch.
My role included business development, project management, and client liaison in digital and non-digital space. I was also responsible for running stakeholder interviews and workshops, data analysis and synthesis, writing reports, and preparing strategy and roadmaps for clients. I managed over $1m in international and domestic strategy projects. I led and managed the planning, delivery, scope control and change management of multiple critical, highly complex large projects concurrently. Part of my responsibility was to ensure projects are completed on time, on budget, to quality standards and within the agreed scope.
Internationally, my main clients were the Saudi Arabian government including the General Commission of Survey, and the Saudi Geological Survey. While domestically, my main clients were the Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC) and the NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment.
As the GIS team leader and project manager, my role included providing geospatial services from data analytics to managing spatial data and projects as well as providing advice on major infrastructure and transport projects around Australia and overseas. As team leader, I was responsible for the short- and long-term resourcing of my team, team management and development, designing the strategy for the ANZ GIS growth, and developing GIS protocols and processes for SMEC. I led and managed the planning, delivery, scope control and change management of multiple critical and highly complex major projects concurrently. Due to the multidisciplinary nature of SMEC, I also organised, led, and enabled a cross-functional team in developing and implementing project deliverables with an emphasis on quality,
productivity and consistency.
My main projects included several high-profile water, roads and rail construction and major projects including the Warragamba Dam Raising, Snowy 2.0, Sydney Gateway, Parramatta Light Rail, Melbourne Metro, upgrade of Pacific Highway, and several traffic pinch point projects for the Roads & Maritime Services. Previously, I was seconded to the Department of Planning & Environment to develop and implement urban and regional planning strategies for Sydney on behalf of the Greater Sydney Commission. A Plan for Growing Sydney will help to ensure Sydneysiders have greater access to the things they value - great outdoor spaces, greater housing choice, shorter commutes and world-class job
opportunities.
I completed a Masters by Research (transferred from PhD) in Remote Sensing at the School of Civil & Environmental Engineering. My research focused on tree stem classification and extraction from terrestrial and aerial lidar. I was also a tutor and a guest lecturer for undergraduate courses within the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Built Environment. As a result, I am able to communicate complex information in a simple manner, and this further honed my written and oral communication skills, whilst building excellent interpersonal skills. I published and presented three papers at international conferences, including at the prestigious Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
conference. The higher degree research helped me acquire a strong research, analytical, organisational, and teaching skills in a research and academic environment.
I spearheaded the Logistics navigation project at TomTom, in producing and updating a real-time rerouting navigation system of heavy vehicles based on the maximum dimension restrictions such as height clearance, weight and HAZMAT restrictions, for Australia and New Zealand. I also worked closely with the lidar processing teams based in Poland and Belgium for the automatic extraction of road signage data for the TomTom maps database. The TomTom map database is relied upon by millions of motorists worldwide. I also coordinated and managed projects including a team of researchers and analysts, as well as liaising with the processing units offshore, and coordinating the weekly progress meetings and presentation of results to the team.
I was a senior consultant and project manager in several major infrastructure and construction projects in NSW, ACT and VIC, including the Regional Rail Link, Sydney Light Rail, and Barangaroo development projects. I was also responsible for providing technical data analysis and GIS support to several environmental, infrastructure, construction, rail, and
climate change and sustainability projects. I travelled extensively across Australia to negotiate business development opportunities whilst building and maintaining relationships with our clients. I was also responsible in coordinating, managing and running the Australia-wide strategic initiatives to standardise GIS practices and outputs to the highest standard and consistency. This included managing all data, processes and systems for all of the offices throughout Australia.
I started at Whelans Insites as a 3D modeller working on the Sydney Metro project. Within two months of joining the team, I was promoted to lead the 3D Technical Modelling team for the Sydney Metro and subsequently the North West Rail Link projects. I also led the Research & Development team within the Spatial division, in addition to providing GIS
and CAD support for visualisation and mapping projects, as well as supervising and managing digital data for surveyors, engineers, planners and architects. The multidisciplinary nature of the projects enabled me to gain a broader experience in meeting a variety of client’s needs including exposure to planning issues particularly in NSW.
During my time at SKM, I worked on various Surveying projects including the Pacific Highway upgrade, as well as leading and project managing various GIS projects, which included liaising with internal and external clients, managing and
analysing datasets for Spatial Analysis, and mapping purposes. The multi-disciplinary nature of SKM has enabled me to gain a broader experience of both infrastructure and environmental projects.
Masters of Engineering in Geomatics Engineering specialising in Remote Sensing PhD transferred to Masters by Research due to School closure impacting scholarship and supervisorship. 7 out of 8 chapters completed for PhD. Dissertation: Tree Stem Classification and Extraction by Terrestrial Lidar
Bachelor of Engineering in Surveying (Geomatics) & Spatial Information Systems