Engineering
Surveying / Mapping Technician
Career Area: Engineering
Occupation Group: Civil Engineering Technicians
Salary
Percentile wages tell how much a certain percentage of an overall population in a geographic area or within a given industry or field makes. The percentile wage estimate is the value of a wage below which a certain percent of workers fall.
An example would be the 25th percentile, 25 percent of workers employed in that occupation earn less and 75 percent earn more than the estimated wage value. At the 75th percentile, 75 percent of workers employed in that occupation earn less and 25 percent earn more than the estimated wage value.
A typical Surveying / Mapping Technician earns the following wages (national and state):
State
The average salary in North Carolina for those pursuing this career is $39,708
National
The average salary in the United States for those pursuing this career is $41,993
What Does a Professional in this Career Do?
Works with surveyors and cartographers to gather data and create maps. Visits sites and records survey measurements and descriptive data. Selects data needed to create maps, including photos, aerial photos and satellite information, and helps produce and update maps that show boundaries or topographical information.
Employment Trends
The job demand and job growth statistics shown here were derived from job posts over the past year. Expected job growth projections are extrapolated from year-over-year job post listing history.
Job demand and job growth is expected at the following rates:
| Location | Growth | |
|---|---|---|
| North Carolina | 296 | +15.1% |
| Nationwide | 5818 | +10.6% |
Skills
A professional in this position typically utilizes the following skills in the course of everyday work in this exciting and challenging field:
Baseline Skills
The following are baseline skills every Surveying / Mapping Technician is expected to have in order to experience success in this field:
- Physical Abilities: Physical Abilities, which refers to the ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with the body, arms, and/or legs. These abilities often require strength, endurance, flexibility, balance and coordination.
- Communication Skills: The ability to convey information to another effectively and efficiently.
- Research: Experience performing creative and systematic work to understand a product, market, or customer, either before building a new solution, or to troubleshoot an existing issue
- Detail-Oriented: A detail oriented person is someone who pays attention to the details and can make a conscious effort to understand causes instead of just the effects, and that does this in a second nature type of way.
- Computer Literacy: The ability to use computers and related technology efficiently for work tasks.
Specialized Skills
These skills are specific to working in this career:
- Land Survey: Surveying or land surveying is the technique, profession, and science of determining the terrestrial or three-dimensional position of points and the distances and angles between them.
- Global Positioning System (GPS): The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a space-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Air Force.
- Surveys: A field of applied statistics of human research surveys, survey methodology studies the sampling of individual units from a population and the associated survey data collection techniques, such as questionnaire construction and methods for improving the number and accuracy of responses to surveys. Survey methodology includes instruments or procedures that ask one or more questions that may, or may not, be answered.
- Field Surveys: Collection and gathering of information at the local level by conducting primary surveys is called field survey. The primary surveys are also called field surveys.
- Calculation: A calculation is a deliberate process that transforms one or more inputs into one or more results, with variable change.
Distinguishing Skills
Any Surveying / Mapping Technician that possesses the following skills will stand out against the competition:
- Microstation: MicroStation is a CAD software product for two and three dimensional design and drafting, developed and sold by Bentley Systems.
- Computer Aided Drafting/Design (CAD): Computer-aided design (CAD) is the use of computer systems (or workstations) to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design.
- Civil Engineering: Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including works like roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings.
- Mapping: Graphical representation of a procedure, process, structure, or system that depicts arrangement of and relationships among its different components, and traces flows of energy, goods, information, materials, money, personnel, etc. See also mind mapping.
- Land Development: Working experience of Land Development, which refers to investments making land more usable by humans. For accounting purposes it refers to any variety of projects that increase the value of the property . Most are depreciable, but some land improvements are not able to be depreciated because a useful life cannot be determined. Home building and containment are two of the most common and the oldest types of development.
Education
This career typically requires the following level of education. The numbers presented in the pie charts below were derived from actual job posts over the past year. Not all job postings list education requirements.
.| Education Level | % |
| Bachelor's Degree | 19% |
| Master's Degree | 0% |
| Doctoral Degree | 0% |
Experience
This position typically requires the following level of experience. The numbers presented in the pie charts below were derived from actual job posts over the past year. Not all job postings list experience requirements.
| Experience Required | % |
| 0 to 2 years | 59% |
| 3 to 5 years | 36% |
| 6 to 8 years | 3% |
Many of the programs offered through NC State are designed for working professionals who need additional credentials to enhance existing work experience.
Students who do not have the expected level of experience may wish to look into internship and employment opportunities.
Common Job Titles
It is possible to find work in this field in positions commonly listed as the following job titles:
- Survey Technician
- Survey Instrument Operator
- Instrument Operator
- Party Chief
- Survey Field Technician
Similar Occupations
If you are interested in exploring similar occupations, you may want to research the following job titles:
The wage and employment trend information shown here represents historical data and does not guarantee future conditions. Data is downloaded regularly from Burning Glass Technologies. For more information about how they gather data and what it represents, see Burning Glass Technologies - Frequently Asked Questions.