How a geospatial nervous system could help us design a better future Jack Dangermond

Transcriber: Ivana Korom
Reviewer: Krystian Aparta

Simone Ross: Jack, I would love you
to tell us what Esri is

and also why GIS is so important.

Jack Dangermond: So it is a company,

it builds software products
that are used by millions of people.

Kind of like a platform technology,

but not literally platform.

It builds tools that help people
do their work better.

And that’s a very general statement,

but helps them do their work better
using geography as a science

and visualization
as a science and technology

to help them make better decisions,

or help them be more efficient

or help them communicate
what they’re doing better

It’s kind of mapping.

I mean, the way normal people
would think of it as map-making.

So this organization has 350,000
organizations that we support.

They’re our customers, you might say.

And they range from NGOs,
thousands and thousands of them,

working in conservation
or humanitarian affairs,

to large corporations,

but our majority of users
are in the public sector,

in cities and counties,

in national government agencies,

and they’re basically running the world,

that’s the way I would say it.

SR: So right now, we hear a lot
about companies using tech

to improve the world,

but it sounds like that has always
been baked into your DNA.

JD: I grew up as a young kid in a nursery,

my parents were servants,

and they started a little nursery
to help put me through school,

that’s the way I saw it.

They were immigrants and they grew plants.

They were attracted to landscaping,

which I grew up understanding,

so I went to design school,

first environmental design school

and then landscape architecture
and then city planning.

And in that progression,

I came to understand very clearly
the idea of problem-solving,

because that’s what design
really is about,

you see a problem
and you come up, creatively,

with something that solves the problem.

And at Harvard,

I started to get engaged
with systems and computing.

And I realized, wow, this was in the ’60s,

you know, when the environmental movement
was still just in its birthing,

I saw, “Wow, you could actually apply tech
to environmental design.”

And so this idealism that often happens
when you’re in school,

you know, “I can really do something!” –

well, I loved the idea
of taking systems theories

and technology

and applying it to environmental
design problem-solving.

SR: Do you call Esri a tech company?

JD: We started doing little projects,

you know, locating a new town,

locating a store,

locating a transmission line,

doing environmental studies
as a foundation, using tech,

to be able to make decisions,

which were largely design decisions
or planning decisions.

And we did that for about 10 years.

Just gradually growing
as a professional services company,

all the time continuously innovating tools

that would help us do our projects better.

And this idea of continuous innovation.

I mean, we invented some of the first
digitizing tools for maps,

we invented some of the first
computer map-making tools.

We invented the first
spacial analysis tools

that were commercial in nature.

And over that decade or so,

customers began to say,

“Gee, I’d like to do that work
that you’re doing, Jack.”

So we started to think
about the idea of a product,

that is, our technology that we applied
on project by project

could actually go into a product
that people could use everywhere.

And the big idea of this product, Simone,

was the integration of information
using geographic principles.

Bringing all the different
factors together

to not only first help us do the projects,

but then build these systems
that help other people do the projects,

and then later build systems.

So we went from a project company
to a product company

that built systems that helped
organizations do their work better.

SR: What you’re doing, I believe,

is sort of the integration
of human and built systems

with natural systems.

And then helping people visualize that

and figure out then how
they can design and build for that

in a better, smarter way.

Is that accurate?

JD: That’s one aspect of it.

We sometimes call that geodesign.

We digitize or abstract geography,
the science of our world.

You know, Simone, all of the factors
that you think about,

I think of as layers.

Physical features, environmental features,

demographic features.

We bring all of those things
together in a GIS

and then by overlaying those things,
we can actually do better designs.

We design with all
the factors holistically.

That’s what actually,
as a student, got me excited,

because I saw you could bring
all of the “ologies,”

all the geology, the sociology,
the climatology, all together,

and then make better decisions on that,

so I think of geography
as the mother of all sciences,

because it’s an integrative technology.

And then digital geography,
what we call GIS,

allows us to be able
to use that instrument

to empower the transformation
of how people make decisions.

They can look at the whole,
not just one factor,

not just making money,
not just conserving land,

not just this or that.

It’s optimizing many factors
at the same time.

Yeah, so in the retail sector,

people like Starbucks
or Walgreens or Walmart,

all the big retailers,

both here in the US but in the UK,
all around the world,

use geographic factors
to pick the right location.

They look at the demographics,

the traffic,

and then the large insurance companies
and reinsurance companies

look at all the different factors
that are necessary to understand risk.

And they overlay them and they model them

and they visualize high-risk areas
or low-risk areas.

In disaster response,

whether it’s fire, or like today,
the big earthquake in Turkey,

there’s a whole cycle of work
that has to happen

when disasters happen.

You know, response, recovery,

all these work activities are underpinned
by having good information.

And that information
is geographic in nature.

So disaster response, public safety,

health and looking at issues today
that are troubling all of us

in the areas of social equity.

Where is there disparity?

And when something
like the pandemic happens,

or unemployment
due to the economy happens,

we can look geographically and see
these factors all coming together.

So it’s like your mind does in many ways.

I mean, we built a tool
that allows you to abstract reality

and see it,

and then look at all the relationships
between these factors

in order to create understanding.

So Richard Saul Wurman, the founder of TED

often describes us
as an understanding organization.

“You’re all about understanding, Jack,
it’s not about technology.

Your users use your tools
to create better understanding.”

And the way he describes it is
understanding precedes action.

This is essential to our work.

SR: And it is a platform
that you’re building,

so you’re sort of connecting all these
different areas of knowledge, right?

JD: Today, we have what we call Web GIS.

So GIS lives in the web

with distributed centers of information
that are pulling data out,

georeferencing,

and using location as a way
to do the integration.

We might call it mashing up
different layers

from distributed services
or distributed sources of information.

And our users are now bringing
this knowledge together dynamically

in things like smart cities

or the popular vernacular
these days is digital twins.

So all of that geographic reality

can now be beamed into organizations,

whether they be emergency
response organizations

or utility organizations or government.

And any of the different departments,

whether they be law enforcement

or you know, science,
climate change, biodiversity,

all of that series of issues
that we’re facing today

can be enriched by not only bringing
together the information in real time,

real-time measurement seen on maps,

but also integrating those
like using spatial analysis

or location analysis to look
at the relationships and patterns.

You see, it’s not just seeing it,

it’s also explicitly understanding

the relationships between something
like breast cancer and pollution

that might exist
in a particular geography.

And saying, “Aha,

we can quantitatively understand
these different factors

and, as a result, respond.”

SR: So you can do that

because you are putting
all these different layers on

and then you help visualize that.

JD: Visualize it,
but also spatially relate them

with math and modeling.

So it’s not just a matter
of visually overlaying material,

it’s a matter of connecting the geometries

or the factors or the features
on these maps to each other,

like your mind does.

SR: I have to read this,
because I don’t want to get it wrong.

You had said at some event last year,
the Geodesign Summit –

which sounds fascinating
to me – you said,

“Transformation is not just about change,

it’s about leaving behind the past
to focus on the future.”

So can you talk a little bit about that?

JD: Historically, we have been
at the effect of the environment.

I mean, this is the history of the world.

The world constrains us
in what we can do as human beings

and we often adapt and adopt
to various environmental situations.

This field of geodesign

is about bringing geographic
systems and knowledge

into the design process

so that we can actually
be guided by nature

and be more sensitive to it

so that we can be responsive
to the greater forces of the environment

and do it in such a way
that we can take –

it’s thinking of the world as a garden.

It’s like gardening,

you must pull out the weeds,
you nurture your plants,

you take care of certain things,

you make sure things are watered.

And at this point,

because of the way we are organized,
and the way we think

and the way our information
is brought to us,

we don’t think as a garden,

we don’t think holistically,

we don’t think of the relationships
that are in our lives,

that are affecting our lives.

And as a result, we’re careless,

we’re polluting the environment,
we’re messing it up.

I mean, on steroids,

I mean, the world is really in trouble
at this particular point.

I mean we have the crisis of COVID,

but my God, COVID is just a little wave.

What’s coming behind us
is the climate change issue,

which is not so easy to fix.

There’s no vaccine that’s simply applied.

And then behind that,
there’s the loss of biodiversity

and behind that,

it’s sort of unraveling
what has taken billions of years

to be able to put together.

And so, as human beings,

my sense is we’ve got to be
more responsive to take care of our place.

SR: It’s transformation
with science and design

as opposed to transformation

brought on or foisted on us
by rapid tech change.

It sounds very deliberate.

JD: It’s very deliberate.

Again, when I was a student,

I got the vision or thought

that we could actually do
environmental planning

and design and development better
by thinking holistically.

Bringing all the factors together.

And when I launched Esri,

we were starting to do projects better

because we could integrate
all of the factors

into the design projects.

Then as we started building systems,

they were first small, focused systems
for a particular department,

like an engineering department in a city

or a planning department,

or a forest management organization

or an oil company.

They could do their work better
by considering all the factors.

Then –

And that transformed the way
projects were done,

and it transformed human activities
in these different departments.

From there, we started to move on

to the idea of transforming
entire organizations.

This meant entire enterprises.

So from projects to systems
to organizational transformation

where you could actually
have organizations by intention

look at all the factors.

And we have so many examples of this.

And now, there’s a fourth phase
that we’re very engaged in.

Those three phases involve
certain kinds of technology innovation,

but the fourth phase is resting on the web

with web services,

and its intention is not to transform
simply one organization at a time

or one project at a time,

it’s to transform society

so that we can raise the bar
with geographic consciousness

and geographic knowledge

to see what our human
footprint is causing.

And this is so transformational,

because people don’t want to mess up,

they want to know what to do

and they want to put the foot down
in the right location,

they don’t want to mess up
wetlands by intention,

they want to design with nature.

SR: So you’re talking about what you call
a geospatial nervous system.

JD: Yes, building
a geospatial nervous system

will allow us to guide
society in such a way.

And in a way, it’s not
somebody guiding others,

it’s not like that at all.

It’s like the internet itself.

It’s an interconnected network
of serving knowledge,

sharing knowledge,

and using each other’s knowledge.

That is, multidisciplinary knowledge,

different kinds of science knowledge

to be able to see and understand

before action.

All we’re doing is building tools

that interconnect different
organizations' information.

And independent actors
running in independent organizations

all around the world

are building something I like to call
this geospatial infrastructure.

And they’re layering it on top of the web.

It’s like one agency is serving
their information

and another one is able to use it
with their own information

and therefore make better decisions,

make more sustainable decisions.

Now, they’re still all independent actors.

I mean, there’s no control,
there’s no orders from headquarters.

What this is is a fabric
that’s emerging very rapidly.

Let me give a practical example.

The Pacific Gas and Electric corporation,

a very large organization
here in California,

one of the largest utilities in the world,

is sharing their outage
and utility information over the web

with the State of California fire people

and emergency management people,

so that they can act better
and vice versa.

So they’re sharing and collaborating
through geographic information

in whole new ways.

And the FEMA, the large federal
emergency management organization

is sharing their emergency
management information

with states and cities

who are overlaying
their data on FEMA data,

which is overlaying on top
of NOAA’s information on the weather

and the tracking of satellites, and so on.

So this web-based, internet-based system

is allowing the fusion of information
from many different actors.

And independently,

these actors are able to more
holistically solve their problems.

SR: Do you think we can overcome
these challenges?

JD: Today, both because
of our increased consumption patterns

and the overpopulation of the planet,

we’re in severe trouble.

So what we can do is, I think,

minimize the impact of population,

we can optimize the work that we do,

we can save energy,

we can do all of these various things.

And I have a very positive
feeling about the future.

This is what drives me day and night.

I mean, I have had that vision
for over 50 years

that we must do this.

It’s not a question of the outcomes,

it’s the only way that I can think of
to create a sustainable future.

We must apply our best science,

we must apply our best design
and critical thinking,

we must apply our best systems theories,

we must apply our best technologies,

in concert,

to be able to address the great challenges
that we are all facing.

And Esri, as an organization,

has always been and will always be
all about bringing those forces together

to be able to support
organizations independently

doing their work
in this more holistic way.

That’s the big vision.

SR: So what advice or guidance

would you give to a young
entrepreneur today

who, sort of, wants to use
tech and science

to, you know, if not save the world,

transform the world or improve the world,

because obviously, that’s where
a lot of the hope and the potential is.

So as someone who has been doing this
for quite some time now,

what would your advice be
to someone like that?

JD: Well, there’s so many
different opportunities

to be able to work
and contribute in the world.

I was very lucky with parents
who were servants

and they taught me
to be in service to others.

This was a great value gift.

When I went to Harvard,

there was also a philosophy there
to be in public service,

to be able to focus your life,
to be able to give back.

And Harvard has been a huge contributor
to those in public sector.

In the UK, Oxford and Cambridge
had that same kind of philosophy

of growing the next generation
that’s in public service.

So I think service is one of the elements.

The second one is really being
about staying focused on your vision.

For me, my vision was this idea
of bringing systems theories

and science and technology together

to be able to do better problem-solving.

First with design
and now whole organizations

and society in general.

That didn’t just happen,

it was thoughtful time spent
by myself and with my wife

to think about what
we should with our life.

And we were really lucky.

We found this great thing
that we were passionate about.

We thought and visualized,

“Yes, this is really something
we could actually do.”

We had no idea where it would go,

but at least we picked
a segment of our interest

to be able to follow this passion
and we lucked out.

And we didn’t sell out, we lucked out.

We were very fortunate to live
very modestly for several decades

to build up this organization

and stay focused on our purpose.

So my suggestion is,
find something that you really love,

that you really can contribute to,

that really supports your idealism,

and don’t sell out for money
or venture capital

or borrow money,

none of that actually winds up
in being able to retain your idealism.

SR: So I think there is so much happening

on the intersection of tech
and life science right now

that is so exciting,

but also at this intersection
that you’re talking about as well,

and very much, I think,

will be part of the solutions
for us going forward.

JD: I think that this big step
of Web GIS that we’re into right now

will happen over the next few years.

And it’s, in some ways, just in time.

Like the UN has organized their SDGs,

these global sustainability issues,

into this Web GIS platform.

We’re building a system which is bottom-up
and country by country,

that allows all the SDG reporting
to be able to tell the world,

like they did with COVID,

what’s happening
with the other 290 indicators.

Whether it’s, you know, women in politics

or whether it’s loss of forests
or water quality,

this is a big deal.

So it isn’t just organizations anymore.

We’re starting to see
unifiers, integrators

of the individual systems
into this system of systems,

which I think can talk to the world
and transform the world.

This is essential

if we are going to evolve
to a society that’s sustainable.

SR: Great.

I think that is a perfect place to stop.

Thank you so much.

This was really wonderful.

I’m really, really glad
that we got to do this.