Ambassador Spotlight ‘Narelle Underwood’

Introducing our new Brand Ambassador Narelle Underwood, our Australian distributor from NSW Surveying Taskforce.

Where did you study? University of NSW

What are the requirements to be a surveyor in your area? Depends on the type of surveying you are doing.

How did you get into surveying? While I was studying civil engineering at university I managed to score a job with a small surveying firm as a CAD drafter – absolutely fell in love with surveying so changed university and degree and have never looked back.

How long have you been in the industry? Started in 2003 – so 17 years now.

Are you part of any associations or organisations you would like us to mention? I work for the NSW Government as the Surveyor-General of NSW and I am chair of the NSW Surveying Taskforce.

Why do you want to be a GKiS Brand Ambassador? It’s a great way to explore the concepts of surveying and geospatial with children. Surveyors have traditionally struggled to explain what we do and capture the imagination of kids, the GKiS concept captures the variety of career opportunities in a way that is fun, exciting and engaging to kids.

Why is it important for kids to know about surveying and the wider geospatial industry? Because you can’t be what you can’t see – there are so many career opportunities in surveying, geospatial or related fields and people miss out on those opportunities because they just don’t know about it as an option. There will continue to be a growing demand for people with surveying/geospatial skills as we as a society continue to realise the benefits of access to digital data.

What are you going to do as an ambassador for GKiS? Promote GKIS to not only children but to other surveyors and geospatial professionals – getting as many people involved as possible to spread the word to as many children as possible.

What are your hobbies? I play AFL (Australian Football), train in Muay Thai Kickboxing, I love reading and going to the movies.

If you/your company had a GKiS character, what would it be? I love my character/avatar – sharing my love for surveying with my son and having my car on a poster is pretty cool. Looking forward to incorporating it into my presentations.

What poster or resource would you like to see next from GKiS? Broader applications of surveying and geospatial. Plus some really traditional stuff like property boundaries and construction (roads / buildings / bridges).