Derick Jose
Vice President - Analytics Solutions
MindTree
Derick Jose is a member of:
The Journey : Early days to How i got here
I was initially working for Fujitsu in Pune and then moved to US for 6
years where I worked predominantly in Telecom sector. I then joined
MindTree initially as a part of DW group with BI Solutions, then moved
on to pre-sales and consulting along the way.
Decisions that mattered
There were a couple of important ones in hindsight. The first important
decision I took was to relocate from US to India in 1999 time frame.
Those were days when the market was at its peak and people were
wondering if I had made the right decision.What triggered that move was a
powerful statement I saw in Fast Company magazine which read as
"Instead of people moving to where the work is, in the next coming years
work will move to where the people are". It really hit me hard that the
shift would happen and I wanted to ride the wave by relocating to
India. As I began my search for India based organizations, I found
Subrotos articles where his points of view resonated with me and I
applied to MindTree and have been with them for the last 11 years.
The
second major decision I took was to move from BI to Analytics. Over a
period of time the needs of the customer started changing and I
completely exited BI and started diving deep into advanced analytics
with a lot of focus on solutions for CPG /Retail and Banking. It was a
nice move from selling to the IT/CIO organization to selling business
solutions to the CMO/CXO organization as the rhythm is completely
different
The turning points
The first major inflection point in my career was the shift from US to
India. The Second inflection point happened when we started selling
analytical solutions to business in addition to the IT organization
(DW/BI to Advanced analytics)
Work and Role: Then and now
There are two major differences between my present job and the previous
one. Firstly we are now delivering services primarily to the business
organization but earlier we were primarily servicing the CIO/IT
Organization,also currently most of the time we end up solving problems
which the customer was never aware of or as we call it "fuzzy" but
important issues whereas earlier the problem statement was well defined.
Two years down the line
I am a big-time subscriber of Harvard Professor Vijay Govindarajans
concept of reverse innovation from emerging markets where frugal
solutions conceptualized/designed in emerging markets will change the
game in Advanced markets. I want to be a part of this tectonic shift in
any way in the field of ‘frugal’ and innovative domain based analytical
solutions which are developed in emerging markets and find their way
into advanced markets
What I learnt along the way
There are a couple of important lessons I’ve learnt along the way.
Firstly Compassion/Empathy: Both for your employees and the customer.It
makes a lot of difference when you try to get under the employees skin
and the customers skin. The issues will look completely different when
we wear their lenses. Sometimes the issue may not be resolved in a
manner which is amenable to all parties concerned. But the fact that you
were able to demonstrate empathy for the other side would go a long way
in building trust which is a huge currency with customers and
employees. Secondly Becoming "T"shaped individuals: Having breadth of
knowledge as well as depth in one sliver. Today’s jobs require an
analytics professional to activate both the right brain and left brain.
Right brain skills to creatively shape scenarios from information
assets, left brained skills to run a mathematical model and right
brained skills to interpret and put the insights in business context,
thirdly celebrate mistakes but don’t repeat them: Most of the successes I
encountered were preceded by huge failures. We never learn to cycle
without falling down or learn swimming without drinking water. Why can’t
we create an environment for people to fail so that they learn to get
wings and fly.
Trends to watch out for
The key trends which I am seeing from my vantage point are Increased
spend in Digital analytics as opposed to traditional media spend
analytics, Combination of Engineered platforms and domain solutions is a
force multiplier, Open source analytics–R, Pentaho, Weka etc, Reverse
innovation of domain solutions where solution developed in emerging
market is successfully applied in advanced markets – Areas like trade
promotion analytics and customer scoring models
My advice if you are starting out
Become a "T" shaped individual with breadth of knowledge of business process and statistics.
Books/Websites I recommend
Personally I love IBM red books. I believe they are crisp and to the point.
Last but not the least
BI/DW/Analytics is reaching the tipping point and about to take off in a
big way. It would be a good idea to develop specialist skills and enjoy
the ride.
