Land surveyors can spend as much time reading legislation, bylaws, and engineering documents as we spend in front of an instrument in the field or calculating coordinates for a subdivision. We are mathematicians, historians, project managers, advocates, engineers, and even chainsaw operators!

Land surveyors start as employees, and move up to partnership in a firm or to ownership of their own enterprise if they wish. Some wind up working for government, private corporations, or public enterprise.

Building smart processes to streamline the workflow can make the work easier and the results more reliable, which keeps my head above water and my clients happy.

People sometimes are under the impression that finding their property corners should cost as much as changing their oil or blowing out their sprinklers. What they don't realize is that land surveyors are required to stand behind their work for the rest of their lives.

When I got my commission, other land surveyors told me to ask for advice from my peers when I was struggling with something.

The most difficult days have been the ones I've had to spend correcting a mistake. We're all human, and we make errors in spite of the pains we take not to. It's important to take ownership of the situation and to work to make it right.

I think that people can get caught up in the "gee-whiz" technology of surveying, which is constantly changing, and forget about the legal aspects and the professional responsibility that surveyors bear - something that hasn't changed much at all in hundreds of years.