Business Analytics Forum #BAF 3 – 4th July 2019

After the success of our first forum & second forum we were very excited to announce our third forum which was held on Thursday 4th July 2019!

It was exciting to out grow our old venue choice due to attendee size! The third forum was held at a larger venue The Mowbray, Sheffield S3 8EN owned by the same company as previous – we knew it was going to be good – and it was better!

 

 

See below summary of the day!

Agenda and Summary of Talks:

1pm – Registration & Networking Lunch (locally sourced ‘Yorkshire Nibbles’ buffet)

with refreshments of tea, coffee & a wide range of herbal teas along with biscuits for dipping! And a locally sourced ‘Yorkshire Nibbles’ buffet lunch.

 

2.15pm – Introduction – Chris Booker, Sales & Marketing Director from DeeperThanBlue

We explained that we wanted to provide a forum; where people could come along and find out how analytics can be used to add value to their business. The forum aim is to be an excellent networking and knowledge sharing opportunity, with meetings every four months, including featuring guest speakers, industry experts and hands on sessions.

There was a short round of introductions by all attendees, where everyone shared information about their current role and their interests in the forum, and an interesting fact about themselves. We found that we had enough musicians to form a band, enough cyclists to have a race, and even a few pétanque players.

 

2.45pm – First Talk – “Watson Data Studio” by Simon Harrison, Head of Analytics from

DeeperThanBlue Analytics 

Simon presented an overview of the IBM Watson Data Studio software, showing the range of capabilities from dashboarding, predictive analytics, machine learning and artificial intelligence, and how the software can be used as a great learning platform to develop skills and knowledge.

Simon also presented a walk-through of how the software can be used to analyse customer behaviour patterns in a customer loyalty dataset.

Click here to view the slides from this talk! Showing a step by step walkthrough of how to use IBM Watson Data Studio to perform driver analysis.

 

3.15pm – Second Talk – “Data Warehousing” by David Simm from Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust

David presented an insight into the work that had been done to build the data warehouse for the trust, and how it has delivered self-service reporting, and set them on the path to becoming ‘paper lite’.

David talked about the methodologies employed, and showed examples of the cubes. As well as explaining the technology stack of SQL server as the data platform, with SSRS supporting the need for paginated reporting and the use of PowerBI as the Business Intelligence and Dashboarding tool.

 

3.45pm – 15 min break with refreshments

Short break for refreshments, further networking and discussions.

 

4pm – Third Talk – “AI” by John McNamara, Senior Inventor and Innovation Centre Technologist Lead from IBM 

John gave a really engaging presentation explaining how artificial intelligence is well placed to support people and used the term ‘Augmented Intelligence’.

He also shared details of a great free resource called ‘Node Red’, to allow people with little to no coding skills to explore AI solutions.

John went on to demonstrate some excellent projects that showed how the use of these technologies can be used to provide some real human benefits e.g. Hack Dementia project and using AI to advance the performance of an artificial limb.

 

4.30pm – Fourth Talk – “agile with a small ‘a’: building an agile analytics team” by Asheeka Hyde, Analytics Manager – Programme Lead from Walgreens Boots Alliance

Asheeka shared her journey in analytics from gaining a strong grounding in analytics with Capital One, through to working with tangible analytics in the world of retail with Boots. She also talked about building teams in Jaguar Land Rover and culminating in establishing the UK as the global base for analytics within Walgreens Boots Alliance.

She talked about the team approach to problem solving with an excellent definition of agile.

Move Quickly (Define and Build) and Easily (Automate and Diffuse).

She also talked about the need to ensure that teams have a good balance of skills and knowledge, and the constant strive for knowledge diversity.

 

5pm – 7pm – Open networking in a relaxed welcoming atmosphere, including outside terrace!

Get the latest updates by following our social channels:

Want to know what happened at the other #BAF events?

#BAF1

#BAF2

Including:

– Delegate reviews

– Presentation slides

– Detailed summary

– Video to understand our ‘See, Plan, Predict’ Analytics concept

Or please contact us on the form below if you’d like to know anything specific.