Glenor Pitters: Co-Founder of DMTI Spatial
We are privileged to present Glenor Pitters to our readers, the co-founder of DMTI Spatial. We will be speaking with her about DMTI and being a female in the industry.
GoGeomatics Canada: Glenor, welcome to GoGeomatics and thank you for taking the time to speak with us. I understand that prior to your current career, you practiced law. Can you give us some background as to how and why you changed careers?
Glenor Pitters: Certainly. Prior to getting in to the Geomatics business I practiced commercial litigation in Toronto. While it was an interesting career, I found I was not fulfilled as a lawyer. Though I was interested in the prospect of being an entrepreneur in technology, it took me a while to make the move. However, when the opportunity arose, I took it.
GoGeomatics Canada: During your time with DigiMap Data Services, you had many contributions. How did your role assist in a map-based company?
Glenor Pitters: When I joined DigiMap, it was a start-up. As a result I was involved in all aspects of the business. I was involved in marketing, sales, administration, finance, HR and product training. It was a great opportunity to learn about running a business from the ground up. As a small company, everything I did had a direct impact of the results and it was very fulfilling to be able to positively impact so many aspects of the business.
GoGeomatics Canada: You co-founded DMTI Spatial in 1994 with John Fisher. How did this partnership come about?
Glenor Pitters: John was a co-founder of DigiMap and when he sold his interest in that company we decided to form a new company. We started Desktop Mapping Technologies which later became DMTI Spatial.
GoGeomatics Canada: With the twenty year anniversary approaching for DMTI Spatial, how has your business had to evolve to keep on the edge of technology over the past 19 years?
Glenor Pitters: As a technology company, you have to be constantly evolving to keep ahead of the market. As a result, we are constantly innovating, developing new processes and products to take advantage of technological advancements and to meet the evolving needs of our customer base. One of these innovations has been our industry-leading platform, Location Hub. As market demands grow, we’re constantly updating this software to incorporate new capabilities to help keep our customers at the forefront of their sectors.
GoGeomatics Canada: DMTI Spatial helps with a number of fields, including Finance and Insurance, Telecommunications, Government and Marketing. How do you convince prospective clients that location-based software is the answer.
Glenor Pitters: Location connects almost all information and is fundamental to many business processes throughout all of these verticals. When a prospective client sees how location-based software can have a positive impact on their bottom line by driving net new sales, reducing risk or increasing operational efficiency, then they understand the business value. We have countless of real-world examples we can point to. In the insurance vertical, we’ve helped a number of customers better measure risk and detect fraud at the beginning of their business processes. This helps save potentially millions of dollars down the road. We’ve helped large banks use location to increase the automation within their mortgage application processes, reducing the time it takes to provide a decision to the customer and the costs associated with more manual intervention. With marketers, we help them run campaigns with increased accuracy and precision, leading them to the exact customers and prospects that will allow them to be most profitable. We also just signed a large deal with the federal government to provide multiple ministries with geospatial data. This goes to help everything from coordinating the G20 summit to keeping our schools safe.
GoGeomatics Canada: What have been some obstacles you have had to overcome with regards to being a woman of power throughout your career?
Glenor Pitters: I don’t know that I would describe it as having to overcome obstacles but in the past, certainly, I have felt that I have had to prove myself more that would be required of a man in my position. As a result, it forced me to work that much harder. In the end, after almost two decades, I can see that it has contributed tremendously to my success.
GoGeomatics Canada: What roles and responsibilities do you now hold at DMTI Spatial?
Glenor Pitters: I am currently Chief Operating Officer at DMTI. In that position I am responsible for all aspects of the day to day operations of the business. It’s a superb position to be in because it allows me to use all the experience I have accumulated over the years building a company from the ground up.
We would like to thank Glenor for providing us and our readers with a look into her career.
