IGARSS 2026 Preview: Proactive Tips on Entering the Private Sector Geospatial Job Market

By Kevin P. Corbley

Proactive Tips to Enter the Private Sector Geospatial Job Market

Perseverance and networking were two keys that helped Grace Braver land a paid position as a Solutions Engineer in the Esri Summer Internship in Washington, D.C. Having completed her Master’s program at East Tennessee State University (ETSU) in May 2026, Braver will describe her journey into the workforce at this year’s IGARSS Conference.

The “Geospatial Workforce 2030: Industry Demand, Leadership Perspectives, and the Next Generation of Talent” panel will be held at 11 am EDT on Tuesday, August 11, at IGARSS.

Esri internships are incredibly competitive, and the announcements for the coming year are usually released the previous August or September. Interviews happen quickly, and slots are filled for the summer by yearend. Unfortunately, Braver didn’t even hear about the program until she attended the 2026 Esri Federal Conference in February while still working on her Masters in Geospatial Analysis at ETSU.

“I was talking to the Esri National Government team at the conference and was really interested in their work,” she said. “They were interested in hiring me as a Solutions Engineer, but the only open positions were for mid-career level people, so I didn’t meet their hiring qualifications.”

Braver didn’t give up, however. As an experienced speaker at numerous geospatial conferences during her educational career, she knew the value of staying in touch with her network. Later in the spring, Braver touched base with one of her Esri contacts on the government team. Serendipitously, one incoming summer interns had withdrawn to take full-time job offer. Esri asked if Braver was still interested.

She was, and submitted her resume directly to her contact as well as through the official Esri HR portal.

“Resume formats are really important right now – regarding the visualization of information and how it’s presented,” she advises current job seekers.

After an interview process, Braver was hired for the summer program and is now based in Esri’s Vienna, Va., office outside of Washington, D.C. The internships are often springboards to full-time jobs.

More Job Hunting Tips

The Workforce 2030 Panel at IGARSS will present research findings on the geospatial profession’s need for young people to have strong AI skills when they leave university to enter the working world. And Braver is no stranger to AI. At East Tennessee, her graduate research focused on applying machine learning and remote sensing to model post-Hurricane Helene landslide susceptibility in Tennessee, combining AI, GIS, and environmental data to support geohazard assessment.

In college, Braver took the same proactive approach to her research that she did in her networking. Her professors were there to support her interests, but Braver stresses that she went out of her way to find and learn new machine learning software tools that could be applied in her research.

“My favorite thing to do is learn different types of software that solve different problems, and understand how they work and why they work,” Braver explained.

In addition to taking the initiative to learn more than just what was on the course syllabus, Braver recommends students work on their communications skills before entering the workforce.

“[My interviewers] were really interested in how well I could communicate my research to others,” she added.

For attendees of the Workforce 2030 panel at IGARSS 2026, Braver promises they will come away from her portion of the discussion learning at least these three things:

• The biggest surprises and frustrations facing new graduates seeking geospatial employment,
•  Ideas for training while still in school that will help students prepare for the transition to the professional realm, and
•  How to build a network and be proactive in contacting prospective employer companies.

The Workforce panel is part of the IGARSS 2026 Technology Industry Education (TIE) agenda. Find more details at IGARSS 2026 || Washington, D.C. || 9 – 14 August 2026 .