My CV / Portfolio

Experience

Founder & Chief Instructor

FERVENT | October 2012 – Present

• Established Fervent (formerly “VB Excellence”) to deliver exceptional learning experiences to a global audience of over 23,000+ students from 164 countries (as of 31 Jul 2022) while being run semi-automatically
• Leveraged insights from large panel consumer datasets to drive content decisions that help consistently achieve unrivalled engagement on highly-technical concepts ( 48 hours of engagement per day)
• Conceptualised, designed, developed, and published 10 finance and investing courses on highly-technical concepts totalling 70 hours of HD video content and a large arsenal of learning resources, with average course ratings of 4.5 out of 5 (based on 3,500+ reviews) without influencing ratings
  Courses include (but aren’t limited to): Data Driven Investing, Investment Analysis & Portfolio Management (with Python, and with Excel / Google Sheets), Stock Valuation, Bond Valuation, and Investment Appraisal.
• Led small teams of freelancers on ad-hoc and continuous projects and earned a reputation for clear and thorough business requirements and prompt feedback in keeping with agile philosophies
• Consistently made data-driven decisions across business areas including course topic selection, updates vs. new course decisions, landing page copywriting, optimising PPC campaigns, etc
• Created a barrage of systems (e.g., SOPs, checklists, guides, internal training) to ensure the business runs sustainably on “auto-pilot” whilst minimising reliance on myself and reducing the impact of staff turnover

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Independent Assessor, SME (Data Analyst, Data Science / AI Track)

ACCELERATE PEOPLE | February 2022 – Present

• Act as a Subject Matter Expert (SME) on Data Analytics, Data Science, Statistics, and AI within the Data Assessors Team of Accelerate People (a VC-backed, Ofqual Accredited, End Point Assessment (EPA) organisation)
• Assessing and evaluating Data Apprentices across the UK in a fair and unbiased manner whilst delivering assessments in a learner-centric, customised, flexible manner
• Designed and developed bespoke technical solutions to aid the organisation in taking a data-driven approach to capacity planning, forecasting, and management
• Actively participate in the design and development of standardizing best practices for service delivery, including interpretation of Assessment Plans that inform assessment design
• Co-wrote and co-developed assessment methods for the Level 7 Artificial Intelligence (AI) Data Specialist Apprenticeship Standard
• Mentor assessors and aid with their operational readiness and ongoing professional development

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Research Fellow, Finance and Econometrics

WARWICK BUSINESS SCHOOL, UK | October 2017 – October 2020

• Managed large scale research projects working independently and collaboratively, building “full stack” data pipelines and research workflows from scratch, leveraging the power of automation, machine learning, and open-source data
• Created scalable “long-short” trading strategies utilising Big Data (N 15m) in both structured (numeric) and unstructured (text) forms
• Performed rigorous statistical analysis while drawing on theories and synthesising existing literature with own core hypotheses and underlying research questions
• Developed a custom measure of “trust” at the company and aggregate (macro) levels from scratch by applying Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques
• Statistically validated the underlying hypotheses by relying on a battery of robust statistical and econometric techniques including machine learning applications in supervised (regression) and unsupervised (LDA / Topic Modelling) settings
• Developed compelling student-centric learning experiences and delivering outstanding educational outcomes for students by creating engaging lesson content, challenging and empowering students to think critically
• Realised that “formal” academia wouldn’t make a good fit with my core values

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Freelance Consultant

Various Clients | January 2012 – Present

• Empirically evaluated the validity and feasibility of portfolio strategies involving the Altman Z-score bankruptcy prediction model for a London based equity research firm.
• Delivered SEO optimised web copy and blog articles for a variety of businesses within Financial Services, e-Commerce, and Services (legal, consulting) industries.
• Modelled financial forecasts (P&L, Balance Sheet, CFS) for early stage startups.
• Implemented robust PPC campaigns on Google Ads (formerly Adwords), earning up to 30x RoAS.

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Technical Skills