GAMMA Associate Director, Data Science in Financial Institutions

Location:

Milan

Geography:

Europe & The Middle East

Capabilities:

Big data & advanced analytics

Industries:

Financial institutions

Who We Are

Boston Consulting Group partners with leaders in business and society to tackle their most important challenges and capture their greatest opportunities. BCG was the pioneer in business strategy when it was founded in 1963. Today, we work closely with clients to embrace a transformational approach aimed at benefiting all stakeholders—empowering organizations to grow, build sustainable competitive advantage, and drive positive societal impact.

Our diverse, global teams bring deep industry and functional expertise and a range of perspectives that question the status quo and spark change. BCG delivers solutions through leading-edge management consulting, technology and design, and corporate and digital ventures. We work in a uniquely collaborative model across the firm and throughout all levels of the client organization, fueled by the goal of helping our clients thrive and enabling them to make the world a better place.

Practice Area Profile

Boston Consulting Group partners with leaders in business and society to tackle their most important challenges and capture their greatest opportunities. BCG was the pioneer in business strategy when it was founded in 1963. Today, we help clients with total transformation-inspiring complex change, enabling organizations to grow, building competitive advantage, and driving bottom-line impact.

Given the technical specialization needed for this role, it will be housed within BCG X, BCG’s cutting-edge group of computer science, statistics, AI and machine learning experts with deep industry expertise. These teams own the full analytics and product development value-chain end to end: framing new business challenges, building fact-bases, designing innovative algorithms, creating scale through designing tools and apps, and training colleagues and clients in new solutions. While housed within BCG X, This role will partner closely with our BCG Tech Capital commercial due diligence consulting teams to drive insights across integrated commercial and product diligences with close alignment with our Principal Investors and Private Equity Practice.

What You'll Do

Are you interested in pursuing a successful career in a top strategic consulting firm? Would you like to interact with a global network and make the difference? Your skills and motivation are what we are looking for!

BCG Milan is currently looking for a Senior Professional to join our BCG Gamma Hub.


POSITION PROFILE

We are seeking a strong candidate with significant advanced analytics experience preferably into Financial Institutions field, to fill an exciting senior position within BCG Gamma. The Associate Director is expected to be recognized knowledgeable in data science and will manage a team of data scientists to build innovative new products and analytics solutions. He/she will show they can frame problems in a way that analytics team members can then execute to drive impact and results. Exceptional candidates will also show strong curiosity, going beyond the immediate case requirements to understand the fundamental drivers of advantage and look for clues that may change the basis of competition.

Associate Director will be involved in all aspects of advanced analytics, from helping to create relevant products and service offerings by working with priority global Practice Areas, to leading and executing analytics work and continuing to expand the analytical foundation and competitive value proposition. Strong candidates will be a thought leader in analytics methodologies and technologies – they will be instrumental members of the team for designing and building new products mainly in Financial Institutions area.

In client contexts, the Associate Director will need to provide senior analytics project management oversight for large-scale efforts, including managing of external relationships and project budgets / timelines. At the client site, he/she will be responsible for a large portion of client relationship management for the analytics effort. He/she will also need to interact with client counterparts day- to-day to ensure expectations are aligned and that in-progress analysis and findings are tested. Where findings are controversial, a key role is to socialize the analysis and findings so that clients and members of the wider BCG team have the time to ask questions and identify issues prior to the formal presentation of findings.

Providing mentoring to analytics team members on both a formal and informal basis is also part of the role. Feedback and suggestions for development can occur at any time during a project. That said, each project starts with a formal identification of analytics team member development needs and an action plan for achieving them. Progress against this plan should be checked on a regular basis with specific, actionable feedback provided at frequent, regular intervals.

What You'll Bring (Experience & Qualifications)

  • 10+ years of relevant professional experience in the Financial Institutions field, providing advanced analytics solutions. A consulting background will be considered a plus.
  • PhD or advanced degree required in a field linked to business analytics, statistics or geo- statistics, operations research, geography, applied mathematics, computer science, engineering, or related field
  • Fluency in Italian and in English is required
  • Looking for individuals with deep technical and data science expertise, acute strategic and analytical skills, ability to lead and persuade, drive and energy, and desire to work in a project-based environment on strategic issues.
  • Strong record of professional accomplishment and leadership.
  • Demonstrated ability to lead and manage projects and teams.
  • Proven ability to drive topics and make a commercial impact in the Financial Institutions field
  • Experience in core analytics methodologies: Strong expertise in core Data Science techniques, in Statistics, Machine Learning (supervised/unsupervised)/predictive modelling, optimization. Expertise on deep neural networks, NLP, image analytics, spatial analysis is a plus.

KEY COMPETENCIES:


Deep Technical and Data Science Expertise: The successful candidate will have a strong expertise in applying advanced analytics to a variety of business situations focussing on Financial Institutions. They will efficiently and effectively advise multiple teams on the best path to uncovering critical insights for clients and deliver impactful analytical solutions.

  • Experience in core analytics methodologies: Strong expertise in core Data Science techniques, in Statistics, Machine Learning (supervised/unsupervised)/predictive modelling, optimization. Expertise on deep neural networks, NLP, image analytics, spatial analysis is a plus.
  • Familiarity with technical & IT tools and analytics SW development: Knowledge of relevant programming languages (e.g., R/Python) and analytical libraries, Data access tools (e.g., SQL, Hadoop/Hive, Spark) and Visualization (e.g., Tableau, Dash). Understanding of modern IT landscape (containerization, and Public Cloud providers, …) and best practices in SW development in analytics (code versioning, agile…). Experience in integrating analytical solutions in Corporate IT environments is a strong plus.
  • Experience in applied analytics in Financial Institutions: Outstanding experience building analytical solutions in the Financial industry, e.g.: Pricing, Customer value maximisation, Churn management, Cross/up-selling & Next best action, Operational effectiveness & automation, Branch network optimization. Cross-industry experience is a strong plus.

Analytical and Conceptual thinking: A successful candidate will be able to conceptualize business problems and drive frameworks for analysis that consultants can then follow. Principals will produce leading edge business models and must be able to work in a hypothesis-based environment where inductive rather than deductive thinking is the norm. Strong business focus with experience with 80/20 approaches.

Engagement Management and Team Leadership: The successful candidate will have demonstrated ability to manage engagements, client relationships, provide “thought leadership” to teams, and ultimately be responsible for the quality of engagements. They must lead project teams in the design and development of innovative long-term business strategies for clients that maximize shareholder value. This individual will supervise junior consultants as engagements are executed, but must have the ability to “do the work” as well. Strong presence, strong collaborator and leadership skills and ability to operate effectively in a matrix organization are a must.

Client Relationship Management: The successful candidate will have a business focus and a solid track record of developing strong client relationships with large organizations. The candidate with have a demonstrated ability to communicate effectively and professionally with clients, delivering impactful solutions and presenting work in a concise and thoughtful manner, while demonstrating technical expertise (fluency in English is required). Also, begin deepening those relationships to think longer-term about growing BCG’s presence at these existing clients.

Analytics Innovation: Must be an autonomous self-starter with a passion for analytics and problem solving. He/she will help build new Analytics service offerings that grow our portfolio of products and will captures proprietary content as well as analytics insights to the knowledge infrastructure. The candidate will support the creation of proposal/selling documents and provide perspective on relevant Analytics value propositions.

Personnel Development: The successful candidate will have demonstrated ability to guide consultants in their consulting skill sets, motivate them, and build the company’s foundation for future growth. This will take place in both formal and ad-hoc settings.


WORK ENVIRONMENT:

  • Fast-paced, intellectually intense, service-oriented environment
  • Position is located in Italy Gamma Hub in Milan, but there will be plenty of chances for international exposure
  • Willingness to travel

Date Posted:

23-Dec-2020

Boston Consulting Group is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity / expression, national origin, disability, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected under national, provincial, or local law, where applicable, and those with criminal histories will be considered in a manner consistent with applicable state and local laws.
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