A day with our adessi: Mustafa

I am currently on an assignment at ABN Amro in the Marketing Planning & Data Analytics team as a data scientist for 4 days a week. For the first 6 months there, I was on a challenging project related to interest compensation for loan customers. Currently, I am on a project concerning the physical branches of the bank.

Today, my day starts early at 7.30 am, when it is already rush hour at our home to get the little ones (two ladies) ready for childcare. As they get older, their hair also gets longer which thus takes up significantly more time during our morning ritual. There were times when we could 'just wake up' at 8.15 am.

After dropping off the kids, and partially regaining my freedom, I am in my first meeting with a cup of coffee at 9 am. There, together with some data engineers, I discuss an existing customer selection for sending communications. We discuss missing data columns/sources and the next steps to achieve an error-free selection. Yesterday, I spent hours searching for this missing data, fully convinced that it was not available. The data engineer was able to pinpoint them within 5 minutes in our data lake.

Following the discussion, I adjust the selection made in python & SQL- and shoot it towards the marketing automation tool (Selligent). Since this process takes several hours, in the meantime I get in the car towards the ABN office on Gustav Mahlerlaan. Ideal for a traffic jam-free drive to surely one of the most beautiful locations I have been to with a client.

Once arrived at the office, and after a table football wins against some colleagues, I go over the content of the selection again with a direct data colleague. In doing so, we look specifically at the features, joins & exclusions throughout the selection. This colleague will go through and approve the entire selection himself later in the week: for each communication and related selection, we use a 4-eye principle for quality assurance.

From the marketing automation tool, the communication belonging to the project is delivered to the relevant customers via the message box in the mobile and internet banking environment or via old-fashioned direct mail.

In the afternoon, I have a session with the project's stakeholders to finalize the details. This is mainly a meeting to highlight existing agreements regarding selection and communication.

At the end of the day, we go for drinks with colleagues at a café around the corner for a colleague's farewell. I don't make it too late myself because I still have to visit my parents-in-law to pick up the children. Once I get there, a plate of Afghan food is already waiting for me, which I can't refuse and eat effortlessly (even though I wasn't hungry). After about an hour, I head towards the car with the ladies. As I look at them I think to myself that their hair was as chaotic as my day, maybe I should get up at 7.00 am tomorrow after all ??