Simon Warde - Data & Analytics Consultant, Apposita

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Work Background

AppositaData & Analytics Consultant

Sep. 2010Winchester, England, United KingdomSince founding Apposita in 2010, I have worked with clients in a number of industries, primarily large financial services firms. At the same time, I have worked with a number of small companies to solve their very specific IT challenges. The majority of my clients are London-based but I've had the good fortune to travel to Amsterdam and across the UK in the course of my engagements. A recent client was Brewin Dolphin, a FTSE 250 wealth management company. Over four and a half years I helped Brewin grow its data & analytics capability from modest beginnings to a full featured data warehouse and modern interactive analytics front end. I introduced a number of new analytics technologies and approaches to Brewin and grew the team from 1 developer to more than 10, including assisting with hiring a permanent team lead to take the initiative forward indefinitely. I worked with Brewin to drive the migration of its platform to Azure and to provision self-service analytics across the business. Previously I have engaged with large commercial insurers with Lloyd's syndicates - Amlin and Talbot Underwriting; retail insurers and brokers - LV= and Heath Lambert; Principality Building Society; and Virgin Mobile, among others. I collaborate with each client to solve its particular challenges. I have provided design and implementation expertise in disciplines including: - Solution architecture - Data modelling (Kimball and 3NF) - Requirements gathering - Data analysis and data mapping - Cloud data solutions using a wide range of the Azure data engineering tools - On-premises data solutions using the full Microsoft SQL Server BI stack, Oracle Database and IBM's Netezza MPP platform - Reporting solutions using Power BI and SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) - Master data solutions using Microsoft's Master Data Services

The Listening CompanyBI Platform Developer

Feb. 2009 - Sep. 2010London, England, United KingdomAfter losing my previous job without any notice, I was pleased and surprised to have two job offers a week later. I chose the BI Platform Developer role at The Listening Company, a contact centre outsourcing company later acquired by Serco. This was a greenfield project to create a reporting platform based on data from TLC's proprietary contact management system EpiCentre and the Alcatel telephony system. I was responsible for the strategy, design and build. I created an ETL application to collect, transform and merge data from the telephony switches, which out-performed the one sold by the vendor and saved the company thousands of pounds in licensing costs. It was still in use 5 years later when TLC launched a new call centre for the first time in years. Incorporating the new centre in the reporting system required the addition of a single row to a configuration table. Although I'd worked with them before, this system was where I *really* learnt SQL Server Analysis Services and SQL Server Reporting Services. We pushed SSRS to its limits and I learnt many of the techniques I came to rely on in later deliveries. The real revelation, though, was having my "penny drop" moment with Analysis Services, and MDX in particular. I'm convinced that everyone who works with SSAS Multi-Dimensional to any significant degree has a similar experience: baffled by SSAS; breakthrough moment when you think you've understood it; disappointing realisation that you haven't; real breakthrough moment. After that point, I fell in love with MDX and its astonishing utility in analytics applications. As well as implementing the data back-end, I provided SSAS and SSRS training and mentoring to existing reporting staff who had until that point produced their reporting in Excel. I also provided advice on SQL Server and SSIS best-practice to members of the database team.

Trinity Street DirectSenior SQL Developer

Jul. 2008 - Feb. 2009London, England, United KingdomBy 2008, I found myself in my early 30s, with a young family and having only worked for one company in my career. In search of a change of scene, some new experiences and a more UK-based role (and a pay rise!), I joined Trinity Street Direct, an internet start-up building websites for the music industry, in July 2008 as Senior SQL Developer on its new e-Commerce platform. I gained invaluable experience in designing, building and performance tuning transactional databases, as well as exposure to the crazy world of internet start-ups and working in the music industry. I have never since had to ask a member of Kasabian to turn the music down so I could concentrate at work. Nor have I subsequently had to go to work in shorts and flip flops during the summer and two jumpers, a coat and gloves in the winter because the office didn't have heating or air con. Sadly the VC withdrew in mid-February 2009, the company was immediately bankrupt and we were all made redundant without warning and with immediate effect one Friday afternoon. The final never-since-repeated experience was being told "it's against the law to take any of the equipment with you" before being aggressively escorted from the building by specially drafted in bouncers from a nearby club.

SynovateClient Database Architect

Jun. 1999 - Dec. 2008London, England, United KingdomI left Synovate (since acquired by Ipsos MORI) as Client Database Architect. I had overall responsibility for the client data architectures used by teams in the UK, US, Australia, South Africa and Norway. My time was split between the London and Chicago offices, where I developed a platform-agnostic unified model for storing and reporting from market research data across the business which is still used to this day. I also developed an ETL application in SSIS for Ford that brought in files daily from more than 20 countries, each in a different layout and supplied in formats ranging from Excel to IBM EBCDIC. The application implemented hundreds of data cleaning rules that were applied to varying combinations of sources. It remains the most complicated ETL application I've been involved with. I had begun my journey with Sample Surveys, an independent UK market research company that was later acquired by Synovate, as a telephone interviewer in the mid-late 90s. Moving through supervisory and management roles in the telephone centre, I took my first data role in the Data Processing team in 1999. I cut my programming teeth producing survey scripts and printed tabulations using proprietary 3GLs running on a DEC Alpha Server. Clients included Barclays, Sky, Orange, O2, Transport for London and Royal Mail. Later I taught myself C# and database development with SQL Server and worked closely with the nascent .Net development team to pioneer and champion the web-based delivery of survey results within Sample Surveys. In 2002, Sample Surveys was acquired by Synovate, a global market research agency built through acquisition, that quickly had more than 60 offices in over 40 markets. I began working with the new SQL Server BI stack when it was released in 2005 and soon became the SME for those tools within the organisation, before becoming one of the few technical employees to report directly to the global leadership team in the Client Database Architect role in 2007.