William Dollins
bill@dollins.net
https://www.linkedin.com/in/billdollins/
Executive Summary
Mr. Dollins an accomplished technology executive with over two decades of leadership experience in geospatial information systems (GIS). He has a proven track record of building and leading high-performing cross-functional teams, managing spatial data infrastructure, and developing strategic GIS initiatives that align with organizational goals. His expertise extends to GIS databases, software, and industry-specific tools, including ArcGIS and open-source geospatial solutions. He possesses excellent communication skills, allowing him to effectively convey complex geographic concepts to senior leadership for informed decision-making and to mentor his reports. His commitment to continuous learning and improvement is demonstrated through his formal education and successful transition from consulting to the software-as-a-service (SaaS) industry..
Key Relevant Accomplishments
- Repeatedly built and led multi-disciplinary teams of GIS analysts, cartographers, software developers, data engineers, and designers at Spatial Networks, Inc. and Zekiah Technologies, Inc.
- Built geospatial data pipeline at Spatial Networks, Inc. to streamline the transformation of field-collected GIS data into analyst-ready data products, reducing processing time by 60% and increasing throughput by 120%
- Developed and implemented the first recurring revenue product for professional services at Spatial Networks, Inc., yielding $1M in new ARR
- Captured and managed a $20M geospatial support services contract at Zekiah Technologies, Inc., leading a complex multi-disciplinary and multi-company team.
- Designed, developed, and deployed GIS applications, data, and systems for multiple public and private sector clients.
- Integrated data from multiple vertical systems, such as ERP, CRM, customer support, billing, and provisioning to provide previously unavailable insights and analysis into company performance and product usage patterns at Spatial Networks, Inc.
EDUCATION
University of Maryland Global Campus Master of Business Administration 2022
University of Maryland Baltimore County Bachelor of Science Information Systems 1992
RECENT RELEVANT PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
Cercana Systems , Jan 2023 – Present
President
- Providing enterprise data architecture and integration support for a private sector broadband infrastructure provider.
- Migrating desktop geospatial processing capabilities to Databricks on Azure.Work includes data design in Databricks and the development of Python notebooks.
- Performing upgrades to ArcGIS, database, applications, and operating systems for monitoring and evaluation systems for Episcopal Relief and Development. Upgrades include system rehosting, application coding, and map development.
- Developed open-source NodeJS application to publish PostgreSQL/PostGIS notifications as webhooks. Designed to raise real-time notifications based on spatial triggers
Spatial Networks Inc./Fulcrum, Feb 2017 – Dec 2022
Chief Information Officer, Jan 2019 – Dec 2022
- Built and led a multi-disciplinary department comprised of four functions: Data Operations, Information Technology, Professional Services, and Marketing Operations for Fulcrum, a mobile GIS SaaS platform
- Lead and mentored staff in the US and Latin America
- Established Data Operations team to facilitate data acquisition and processing for corporate business analytics and product usage patterns. This provided visibility into feature uptake and the ability to segment feature usage by customer characteristics.
- Built data pipeline to acquire data from enterprise data systems (Fulcrum, Salesforce, Stripe, Intercom) into a central Google BigQuery data warehouse
- Analyzed customer usage patterns by geography, including country, state, and sales region.
- Performed migration of billing system to Stripe to better align SaaS billing with product strategy
- Standardized enterprise reporting and analytics with centralized dashboards
- Established event-based data processing for real-time analysis of sales and bookings
- Established Customer Success practice, including selection of initial director-led leadership, staffing of customer success managers, and establishment of processes for transition of the team to the eventual incoming Chief Revenue Officer.
- Led Professional Services, developing Fulcrum’s first managed services product, generating $1M in new annual recurring revenue
- Led high-value information technology and digital transformation projects
- Acquired and maintained SOC2 Type 2 certification for Fulcrum, which was its first independent security validation
- Transitioned company in to fully-remote in four months during COVID shutdown, including full implementation of MDM and zero-touch hardware provisioning for new remote staff, reducing onboarding/offboarding time
Chief Information Officer/Geographic Information Officer, Mar 2018 – Dec 2019
- Led the data acquisition function of Foresight, the company’s geospatial data-as-a-service (DaaS) product.
- Responsible for developing, operating, and innovating the Foresight geospatial data pipeline and the delivery of analyst-ready data products.
- Implemented online delivery of data products using Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards
- Implemented product management within the DaaS product line
- Standardized GIS data and mapping products using a product-management approach
- Developed and documented all geospatial data structures, focusing on usability
- Led the development of branded map products to increase product/company brand identification with customers.
- Implemented geospatial data pipeline with FME, an off-the-shelf, low-code spatial ETL tool to automate scheduled and event-based data processing for Foresight, reducing data processing time by 60% and increasing data throughput by 120%.
- Using computer vision (OpenCV), segmented and classified objects in a historical archive of over 50,000 geolocated street-level photos.
- Led the information technology team
- Responsible for management of corporate hardware inventory and corporate information security.
- Responsible for management of corporate hardware inventory and corporate information security.
Vice President of Engineering and Technology, Feb 2017 – Mar 2018
- Managed team of ten software and data engineers for Fulcrum and Foresight.
- Set engineering priorities in alignment with corporate strategic goals.
- Responsible for staffing the engineering team and supporting the development of product roadmaps for both products.
Zekiah Technologies, Inc., Aug 2001 – Feb 2017
Partner/Senior Vice President
- Responsible for corporate leadership, program management, business development, technical delivery and other strategic decisions with regard to key technologies and services.
- Initiated and managed SeaPort-E task order with $20M ceiling in Dahlgren, Virginia; overseeing staffing, financials and technical execution of multiple delivery orders.
- Developed staffing and hiring plans, hired staff and subcontractors, performed budgeting and cost analysis, led execution of technical tasks across multiple projects with a team of software engineers, GIS analysts, and cartographers.
- Managed contract GIS support team for US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD).
- Contract provided on-site support for the development of critical infrastructure GIS data and cartographic products to be disseminated department-wide and included in the Secretary’s daily briefing
- Developed staffing and hiring plan, interviewed all candidates and made final selections, managed budget, established and reinforced quality standards, coordinated with on-site project manager to ensure team performance, assisted with technical delivery.
- Developed Climascope web mapping application for the World Wildlife Foundation. Used GeoIQ to publish climate model results. Winner of World Bank’s 2012 Apps for Climate Large Organization award.
- Designed high-contrast maps for use by the USMC on mobile devices in bright-light situations.
- Developed data ingest and publication functions with GDAL/OGR, PostGIS, GeoServer, and Voyager in NodeJS for Bureau of Land Management GIS content management system.
- Developed .Net ArcGIS applications to perform resiliency analysis of commercial infrastructure networks for the Mission Assurance Division of the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren, VA
- Implemented geodatabases in SQL Server and PostGIS for US Navy users to manage nationwide infrastructure data sets for rail, highway, electric power, and pipeline infrastructures.
OTHER PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
Booz Allen Hamilton, Mar 1998 – Aug 2001
Associate
- On-site client delivery lead responsible for project management, client interface, business development, and technical delivery for US Navy critical infrastructure protection program.
- Developed a modular GIS application framework to centralize multiple infrastructure network analysis tools into a common environment.
Century Technologies, Jun 1996 – Mar 1998
GIS Application Developer
- Developed GIS data conversion and cartographic automation tools for federal and municipal clients.
Applied Ordnance Technology, Jul 1993 – Jun 1996
GIS Application Developer
- Developed GIS applications, automated data production workflows, and managed data conversion teams.
LEADERSHIP SKILLS & COMPETENCIES
- Strategic Planning
- Team Development and Mentorship
- Change Management
- Business Development
- Program and Project Management
TECHNICAL SKILLS & COMPETENCIES
- Programming/Scripting Languages and Frameworks: .Net, .Net Core, C#, Node, SQL, Python, JavaScript, HTML, CSS
- Data Engineering:
- Cloud Computing:
- Google Cloud Platform (GCP): BigQuery, Cloud Storage, Cloud SQL, Cloud Functions
Amazon Web Services (AWS): PostgreSQL RDS, S3, EC2
- Google Cloud Platform (GCP): BigQuery, Cloud Storage, Cloud SQL, Cloud Functions
- Databases: PostgreSQL/PostGIS, MS SQL Server, SQLite, Oracle
- ETL Tools: FME, Meltona, Mage, AirFlow, GDAL/OGR
- Event Data Streams (CDP): Segment, Rudderstack, Kafka, Microsoft Power Automate
- Visualization & Reporting: Google/Looker Data Studio, PowerBI
- Cloud Computing:
- GIS and Spatial Technologies:
- Open Source: QGIS, GeoServer, PostGIS, GDAL/OGR, Koop, Leaflet, OpenLayers
- Proprietary: Esri ArcGIS (Desktop/Pro, Server, AGOL & APIs, Runtime), FME, ArcPy, ArcObjects
Business/Productivity: Atlassian (Jira, Confluence, Trello), Git/Github, Salesforce, Stripe, Okta , Teams