Geomatics, Profession or Industry - Essay Example

Running head: Geomatics, Profession or Industry Geomatics: Profession or Industry By ___________________ Geomatics refer to all those Geographic information, which is analysed and processed in the light of professional guidance and advices and under the supervision of qualified survey experts. Land surveying is one of the versatile and immense field of research in Geomatics, which involves two broad perspectives: A profession and an industry. It is not necessary that a professional land surveyor also fulfill the criteria of field engineer, which requires the task of analysing and interpreting land and building surveys, well equipped with the latest measurement technology. According to PLSO, "Surveying is a highly technical field that requires expertise in real property law, public records research, evaluation of historical survey evidence, mathematics, statistics, measurement systems, planning regulations and current computer technologies". (PLSO) Geomatics tradition in land surveying and mapping science has enabled today's modern era to understand the scientific methods used in the same way as the challenge of representing a round Earth on a flat surface which was the basic confront for map projection; therefore land survey and graphical presentation were standard skills of the geographer as map maker. The principles of good measurement and models have enabled us to understand more or less 'land surveying' as a profession or an industry. Land analysis in surveying, usually done in professional concern is never so much neglected as forcefully rejected by the people. The reason is the perception built by customer, they are not concerned by the analysis and measurement, the only concern, which they possess, is the cost and commercial value of the asset. There are good grounds for most of the realignments, as flaws in analysis are recognised and replaced by very different approaches. Yet the rejection is too all embracing and it is a clear case of 'throwing the baby out with the bathwater'. The best example can be seen by the confusion people possess to accept it in the form of profession. There was a time when physical geography and mapping sciences were largely untouched by these perturbations and the scientific method in its broadest sense continued to serve them well. The question for human geography is now the form in which the heritage of spatial analysis may coexist alongside more recent qualitative methodologies and how both can contribute to the continuing development of the discipline. Some of the inheritance has never really gone away. Qualitative methods compete with the quantitative and each has something of value to offer. Research practices from anthropology such as participatory and observational techniques have a part to play. Although the teaching of Geography still reflects the influence of spatial analysis, it is far less evident in the weight of ongoing research and probably that is to the disadvantage of the discipline. As Turner (2002) pointed out, much of human geography has lost touch with mainstream social science research where positive science remains a strong component. This is not to denigrate the quality of the raft of research in human geography, simply to say that the balance needs to be restored and some of the prejudices removed. (Herbert & Matthews, 2004, p. 28) Increasingly competitive and complex real estate market surveys require international investors to become more knowledgeable about the unique requirements of real estate assets. The demand for the objective counsel of property advisers with technical knowledge of functional areas and products appeared to rise incrementally with the expansion of commercial property investment. Land surveying advisory services covered diverse disciplines within the profession, which includes mostly the real estate: the sale and leasing of property, real estate finance, institutional investment, property and asset management, portfolio investment management, and project management and construction. In light of the professions broad scope, the firms studied included several types of organizations: full-service and fully diversified firms; "niche" firms with limited, specialized practices; and other professional service firms, such as accountants, attorneys, mortgage lenders and financial counselors, which began to introduce specific real estate advisory service capabilities in the late 1960s. (Watkins, 1998, p. 65) The client market was also unstructured at that time. Clients, typically the source of investment capital, commissioned real estate advisers for third-party counsel and for specialized expertise about particular property and financial markets. Most property service firms advised both real estate and non-real estate entities: individual investors, multinational corporations, commercial and merchant banks, building societies in the UK, savings and loan associations, insurance and pension funds, universities, local governments, securitised investment and unit trusts, and international developers and construction firms. Land Surveying - A Profession A professional surveyor is required to work with the desired qualifications along with experience to handle three-dimensional objects, to make appropriate use of GIS (Geographic Information System) and is always in search of new technologies globally according to the emerging market trends. At present, land surveying involves the working on real estate advices and concerns. Real estate advisory services expanded into new service products and foreign markets to capture the clients, the expertise and the market positioning created by the tremendous growth in cross-border investment. Some factors which include the strength and size of domestic property markets are the government regulations, national foreign trade policies, multinational trade by domestic corporations, and the regulation of international financial markets and investment vehicles. Each of these elements is subject to long-term and abrupt economic shifts, which affected the direction and rate of expansion into foreign markets. (Herbert & Matthews, 2004, p. 89) The ability of individual firms to coordinate innovations across multinational and multifunctional divisions is an equally important factor. Thus land surveying with the help of professional services has now become a full-fledged industry, which on a professional level provides the following services to its clients: 1. Analysing, mapping and positioning with the help of GIS (Geographic Information Services) 2. Surveys using Cartography 3. Consulting advices Land Surveying - An Industry Land surveying from Industrial perspective involves the following factors: 1. The relationship between real estate services and domestic economies and national real estate markets. 2. The importance of recruiting skilled professionals. 3. The influence of government policy on competition. 4. The role of supporting industries. 5. The role of multinational corporations in international trade. 6. The internationalisation of financial markets and investment vehicles. 7. The importance of adapting organizational structure to domestic and international business needs. (Lapier, 1998, p. 33) The growth and prosperity of international real estate advisory services principally depend on consistent, long-term growth in the domestic economy. By extension, the relative demand for real estate services in home markets determines the competitive strength (or weakness) that each firm experience in the global market either providing or limiting opportunities to develop superior capabilities in diversified and innovative services, and to gain exposure to a broad range of clients. The two most reliable measures of economic conditions that affected real estate advisory services were GDP (the size, rate of growth and annual volatility of a nation's economy) and commercial construction investment. In about 1955, UK investors and advisers began to transport capital and professional resources to markets worldwide where diverse investment opportunities existed. During the late 1950s and early 1960s, developers and investors were principally focused in the London market, retaining quantity surveyors and chartered surveyors for estate and development management. (Chartered Surveyor) Yet by 1964, when Parliament passed the Brown Ban Act to restrict new building by specifying the amount of new office development in central London and later throughout all of England, several of the UK's leading estate agents, such as Jones Lang Wootton and Weatherall Green & Smith, had already opened overseas offices to assist British clients investing abroad. (Erdman, 1982, p. 181) Investors benefited from the tight property market through inflated asset values in the 1970-2 period, but they were limited in investment opportunities by the restricted amount of developable land. The majority of domestic capital investment occurred through institutional pensions funds, insurance companies, banks, and a growing volume of publicly issued property bonds. The 1974-5 recession and property crash, as well as the government's rent control edict, further constrained the UK's commercial market as well as land surveyors due to the decrease in customers. Domestic estate agents thus gained competitive advantage early on by their international perspective and local expertise in foreign markets, as well as through long-standing client relationships with institutional funds, bond funds, and domestic banks. (Lapier, 1998, p. 41) British institutional funds, such as the National Coal Board Pension Fund, remained major investors abroad through the mid-1980s, with substantial real estate investments in the US. British corporations were also active in foreign property markets, including golf course and resort developments in the US. For example, Guinness Enterprise Holdings, Inc., an affiliate of the London-based multinational, purchased an historic hotel and golf course in Vermont in 1991. Also in 1991, the US office of Chesterton International, a UK chartered surveyor, arranged its first golf course community investment with a $5 million participating mortgage. (Golf Business & Real Estate News) UK outward investment in real estate peaked at $5.6 billion in 1991, after which it declined steadily to $4.5 billion in 1995, probably due to the decline in real estate values in the US. According to research and surveys it was found that retail financial services companies are changing in response to the environmental and technological challenges, though progress varies. Many of the firms participating claim to have reached a period of structural transition and research aimed to chart their progress in four key areas: the shift from hierarchical to flattened structures, from function and procedure-orientation to process-orientation, from control to empowerment, and from administrative-focus to customer-focus. To achieve economies of scale, large companies have traditionally organised in a hierarchical way with business processes broken down into narrowly defined tasks or procedures and spread amongst several surveying departments. In most sectors today, bureaucracies with rigid hierarchical structures are finding that their efforts to compete in new markets and to increase productivity are hindered by the functional barriers, which separate decision makers from customers. As previously stable and predictable markets become more dynamic and uncertain, many have begun to introduce new structures, which allow greater functional flexibility in terms of multi-skilling and cross-functional capability. (Lapier, 1998, p. 43) These structures, with fewer levels of command, are designed to speed up communications between customers and surveying decision makers ensuring that rapidly changing consumer needs, characteristic of today's market, can be dealt with more quickly and effectively through industrial market trends. Though hierarchies are reduced, the best characteristics of bureaucracy are left in place to enable the organisation to continue ongoing administration and other routine tasks. Decision-making is devolved and, with fewer levels of control, there are fewer opportunities for promotion. 'Parallel organisations' such as profit centres, business units and project teams responsible for business development and special projects are set up. (Lapier, 1998, p. 68) As the UK population is also ageing, the customer base is changing and becoming economically free, with more interest in industrial property matters, which is a factor leading to changes in land surveying from professional to more industrial manner. Such realignments point to a situation in which (Blackburn, 2003, p. 64) customers are more oriented towards "regulated" profession rather than a "free market" profession. Perhaps one reason for choosing industrial land surveying and rejecting "professional surveying" is the promise of trust industrial companies offer, however whatever be the circumstances land and building survey on industrial basis guarantees the customers the freedom of peace of mind which bare professional services lack, due to practicing unregulated and informal trends. References & Bibliography Blackburn A, Robert, (2003) Intellectual Property and Innovation Management in Small Firms: Routledge: London. Chartered Surveyor, "Development, the Economy and the Chartered Quantity Surveyor", (5 November 1965), pp. 243-6; and (May 1966), pp. 595-7; A.T. Brett-Jones, "The Future Role of the Quantity Surveyor", Chartered Surveyor (July 1969), pp. 13-15; A. Bailey, "Property People", The Estates Gazette, vol. 219 (31 July 1971), pp. 597-601. E.L. Erdman, People & Property (London: B.T. Batsford Ltd., 1982), p. 181; O. Marriott, The Property Boom (London: Abingdon Publishing, 1967, reprint 1989), pp. 120, 138-9, 150- 60; and The Economist (11 November 1967), p. 639. Golf Business & Real Estate News (8 July 1991), "Pension Fund Advisor Funds Golf Resort", p. 3. Herbert T, David & Matthews A, John, (2004) Unifying Geography: Common Heritage, Shared Future Routledge: New York. Lapier Terrence, (1998) Competition, Growth Strategies, and the Globalization of Services: Real Estate Advisory Services in Japan, Europe, and the United States: Routledge: London. Robertson Margaret & Walford Rex. (2000) Views and Visions of Land Use in the United Kingdom In The Geographical Journal. Volume: 166: 3. Page Number: 239. Watkins Jeff, (1998) Information Technology, Organisations, and People: Transformations in the UK Retail Financial Services Sector: Routledge: London. PLSO, accessed from Read More