"},{"ID":5491,"user_firstname":"Maria","user_lastname":"Jordan","nickname":"Maria Jordan","user_nicename":"mariajordan","display_name":"Maria Jordan","user_email":"mjordan@esri.com","user_url":"","user_registered":"2018-03-02 00:17:11","user_description":"Maria Jordan is a senior product marketer at Esri specializing in ArcGIS products and apps designed to improve community engagement, communication, collaboration, and data sharing. She has been at Esri for 20+ years in a variety of marketing roles and is focused on creating practical resources that convey best practices and customer successes to help organizations achieve their goals.","user_avatar":"
"}],"short_description":"Bill Parker and Travis Peterson, with Pacific Gas and Electric, share how they are driving collaboration across teams with Hub.","flexible_content":[{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"Conversations about the power of collaborative communities<\/em><\/p>\n Bill Parker and Travis Peterson, both GIS Supervisors with Pacific Gas and Electric, share how they are driving collaboration across teams, departments and lines of business with GIS.<\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":" Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) is a utility company that provides natural gas and electrical service to millions of customers across northern and central California. With 6,700+ miles of natural gas distribution lines, 18,000+ miles of electric distribution lines, and nearly continuous upgrades and maintenance projects, it’s no surprise that an army of highly trained specialists supports PG&E’s mission every day. What is surprising is how quickly these teams are embracing GIS as a way to collaborate with one another to be more efficient and reduce impacts on customers.<\/p>\n At first glance, Bill Parker and Travis Peterson are typical GIS Supervisors. They both manage teams that collect, store, analyze, and visualize data (electric for Bill and gas for Travis). They both build web applications and automations to keep data flowing around their teams and stakeholders. They both believe in the power of GIS to help people do their work and understand the impact that it makes. What makes them unique is that they both have experienced GIS across a wide range of industries and use cases. Bill’s journey started as an archeologist in college, whereas Travis’s started in the US Marine Corps surveying and analyzing data. Both transitioned into the private sector, dabbled in technology startups, and eventually found their way into PG&E. Travis summarizes his previous experience as having “seen GIS through a few lenses” which has helped him understand what his coworkers across the gas business need. Similarly, Bill views his time “working as a consultant in environmental” as something that helped him see the differences in what biologists or transportation planners needed from GIS. In both cases, these wide-ranging experiences have helped both men see the wide range of needs that users place on a GIS.<\/p>\n The first major insight that’s clear from Bill and Travis is that their collaboration efforts are based on giving users what they need and what they can actually use (collaboration), not just giving everyone unfettered access to everything (transparency). This is not to say that transparency is bad, but just that in the context of PG&E’s business that it isn’t as valuable as collaboration. Bill highlights the focus on collaborating by focusing on the fact that “there’s sometimes a lot of overlap between the requests that come into [his] electric group and Travis\u2019s gas group.” Take for example the environmental team that needs to know where projects are happening from each side of the business. Both Bill and Travis could simply share the line feature layer that shows the highly detailed work that will happen. That transparency without the subject matter expertise to understand the data isn’t valuable to PG&E staff. What’s more important is to “get these folks all talking and sharing and open those lines of communication” with the help of GIS. That’s collaboration and is why Bill and Travis worked together to build their GeoHub site that uses ArcGIS Hub and ArcGIS Online. It’s a virtual place where base GIS data (streets, boundaries, imagery) can be found and where a more guided use of GIS can be curated.<\/p>\n The GeoHub is an internal-only Hub where Bill and Travis’s teams can collaborate with staff through data, applications, and guided experiences. Through GeoHub, the GIS teams can:<\/p>\n The site can do all of this because it relies on high quality metadata which does more than just describe what a specific piece of content is. This metadata and the narratives built around it help staff to be more confident about when to self-serve and when not to.<\/p>\n Bill and Travis are continually monitoring the site and how it’s being used to evaluate what content needs to be added or removed. The goal is to create a useful framework for collaboration, not just a site that continually grows without any pruning. Users are encouraged to share their data, applications, and insights back to Bill and Travis through the GeoHub to help make it more useful over time. This helps to balance the goals of both GIS teams with the goals and evolving needs of the staff that they serve. As the site evolves, this deliberate maintenance will help shape this collaboration initiative within PG&E into an effort that supports the company’s core mission.<\/p>\n If you are interested in learning more about ArcGIS Hub<\/a> \u2013 a no-code solution from Esri for creating websites (“sites”) that support stakeholder collaboration and engagement \u2013 you can follow this podcast series, read these<\/a> blog articles, view examples from the ArcGIS Hub community in the Hub Gallery<\/a>, or watch these instructional videos<\/a>.<\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":" Bill Parker, Travis Peterson and Pacific Gas and Electric leverage ArcGIS Hub to share GIS data to staff, allowing them to self-serve data that is curated to their role, and explain in which situations to contact a GIS professional. Inspired by this episode of Engagement Matters, and want a portal to centralize GIS data for your organization? These great ArcGIS Hub resources will help you learn best practices for collaboration.<\/p>\n Episode 1: Engaging Volunteers for a Cause <\/a><\/p>\n Episode 2: Equity for Improved Engagement<\/a><\/p>\n Episode 3: Building Engaging User Experiences<\/a><\/p>\n Episode 4: Fostering Collaboration Among Members<\/a><\/p>\n Episode 5: Engaging Residents with GIS<\/a><\/p>\n Episode 6: Collaborating to Improve Communities with GIS<\/a><\/p>\n\u00a0Episode 7<\/h4>\n
Watch this episode<\/a>\u00a0now, and check out the rest of the episodes in our\u00a0playlist.<\/a><\/strong><\/h3>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":{"ID":2960724,"id":2960724,"title":"Screenshot 2026-03-18 125727","filename":"Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","filesize":446033,"url":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","link":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/products\/arcgis-hub\/constituent-engagement\/engaging-volunteers-for-a-cause\/screenshot-2026-03-18-125727","alt":"Carousel of Engagement Matters videos","author":"372152","description":"","caption":"Engagement takes many forms, so be sure to explore how all of the organizations featured are engaging their communities.","name":"screenshot-2026-03-18-125727","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":2311092,"date":"2026-03-18 19:58:35","modified":"2026-03-18 22:26:07","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/png","type":"image","subtype":"png","icon":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1388,"height":303,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727-213x200.png","thumbnail-width":213,"thumbnail-height":200,"medium":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","medium-width":464,"medium-height":101,"medium_large":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":168,"large":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","large-width":1388,"large-height":303,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","1536x1536-width":1388,"1536x1536-height":303,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","2048x2048-width":1388,"2048x2048-height":303,"card_image":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727-826x180.png","card_image-width":826,"card_image-height":180,"wide_image":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screenshot-2026-03-18-125727.png","wide_image-width":1388,"wide_image-height":303}},"image_position":"center","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":"https:\/\/mediaspace.esri.com\/playlist\/dedicated\/238049132\/1_8bb9br05\/1_gqgvpir4"},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"
Background<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Different perspectives drive the need to collaborate<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Transparency isn’t always the way, but collaboration always is<\/strong><\/h3>\n
The GeoHub supports collaboration and communicates the vision<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Learn More<\/strong><\/h3>\n
ArcGIS Hub Resources<\/strong><\/h3>\n
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Check out the rest of the blogs in our Engagement Matters: Practitioner Perspectives series<\/strong><\/h3>\n