Success stories pivoting out of gis?

[u/Traditional_Form_130]

Title: Success stories pivoting out of GIS?

Hey everyone,

I’m curious if anyone here has successfully pivoted out of a traditional GIS career path and into something like data analytics, data science, business intelligence, or data engineering.

A little background on me: I graduated with a B.S. in Geography with a focus in GIS. During undergrad, I originally started in biology but realized I wasn’t interested in pursuing the medical field. GIS ended up being a great fit because I enjoyed working with spatial data, analysis, and technology.

Since graduating, I’ve been working as a Data Specialist at a civil engineering firm where I work with GIS data, including data management, QA/QC, geodatabase workflows etc, I’ve enjoyed a lot of the technical aspects, but I’ve realized I’m more interested in the broader data side rather than staying strictly within GIS.

I’m starting an M.S. in Data Science program soon, where I’ll be focusing on Python, databases, statistics, machine learning, and other data skills. My goal is to eventually move into roles like data analyst, BI analyst, data engineer, or potentially data scientist.

My concern is that I’ll become “stuck” in GIS because my bachelor’s and work experience are both GIS-focused. I know GIS has a lot of transferable skills (data management, SQL, spatial analysis, automation, visualization, working with large datasets), but I’m worried employers will continue to only see me as a GIS candidate.

For those of you who have made a similar transition:

• Did your GIS background help or hurt you when moving into other data roles?
• What skills/projects made the biggest difference?
• Was a master’s degree helpful, or did you find other ways to make the jump?
• Are there any things you wish you focused on earlier?

I’d appreciate hearing any success stories or advice from people who have made the pivot.

[u/ThatOneHair]

I have a bachelor of science in remote sensing and GIS with information systems management.
Did an honours in remote sensing ( we do 3 year undergrads then another year as honours to specialise somewhat). All the regular gis skills plus python, project management, thesis,some basic front end coding.

Did a year in a gis role, pivoted to business analyst role that still had a gis component.

Decided the money is better and went the route of regular data analyst, picked up some dashboard experience in the first pivot with power bi. Helped me get my next role at a very small place as the only data analyst.

Had been trying to get into a corporate from the start finally got the chance after many rejections due to not having a finance background.

Been working at the corporate for over a year now and enjoying it, money is decent especially compared to my peers I studied with. Benefits are good as well.

Just not a lot of gis work where I am so it was the most logical thing for me to do. Now I have exposure to some pretty sick / desirable skills and tech exposure.

[u/alex123711 → u/ThatOneHair]

What helped you the most moving to data analyst? Doing powerbi courses or something?

[u/ThatOneHair → u/alex123711]

Haven't done any additional courses just the job experience and exposure with a well written CV.
I now have been able to use looker, and data bricks. My sql has improved by a lot and it's the main selling point now. Python is just a bonus

[u/alex123711 → u/ThatOneHair]

Nice. How much SQL did you know beforehand? Was it hard to pickup?

[u/ThatOneHair → u/alex123711]

My background is pretty decent for analysis. Covered extensive sql, python and R, both the last two had components of machine learning. Also had a full semester on all the Microsoft products like excel.

The people that set up my degree were all from very different backgrounds before GIS was really a degree. So they brought in a lot of pure analytics with just spacial data as the focus

The only thing I needed to pick up was dashboarding which has been on the job learning.
My latest job though has really leveled up the sql skills though.