Jingyi Qiao - Data Consultant
Meet Jingyi Qiao, Data Consultant at Sopra Steria Benelux. Jingyi joined Sopra Steria in the beginning of 2022 as part of her apprenticeship at KU Leuven. She studied Industrial Engineer, among other Masters and Post Graduate Programs, and now combines knowledge and expertise from all studies to create value in her job. Jingyi believes that “if you want to find your potential and have an opportunity to develop it, you should join Sopra Steria”.
What does a Data Consultant do?
In my current project, I am working on data visualisation. I use tools such as PowerBI, and Tableau to create dashboards for both internal and external use. Last year, we initiated the Green Up Sustainability project internally at Sopra Steria Benelux. We analysed our data of fleet and energy consumption and translated it into a dashboard that made it easy and simple to understand our carbon footprint and the environmental impact of Benelux entities. This project offers a potential solution to identify transformation levers to reduce environmental impact, and make data-driven decision possible and easy. Besides, I am working with two clients, and I support them in creating their dashboard and skilling up their teams on BI topics.
As a Data Consultant, it is important to listen to people and try to understand what they need, so we can offer them a suitable solution. I communicate frequently with my clients to check if the dashboard is tailored to their needs and requirements. Also, we check if we can provide potential improvements and look for best practices to incorporate. We are not just selling the product, we are trying to bring our experience and skills to clients and build good relationships with them.
I work closely together with Business Analysts, and I believe they are an important part of our team since they know a lot about the client's business and can help me create workshops that are specifically designed to meet their needs. And for the BI part, I also collaborate with Data Administrators and Data Engineers. They help clean and structure the data in a way that makes it easy for me to analyse and present it to the client. This allows me to focus on creating clear and informative reports that show the client how they can use their data to make better decisions. I really enjoy operating and bridging the technical and functional aspects of projects.
Can you explain a bit more what projects you work on?
I am working with 2 clients. The first client had a lot of data they wanted to analyse, but they struggled to find a qualified profile to help them build and skill up on business intelligence solutions. So, they hired us to provide our expertise. This client is also interested in our Green Up Sustainability project, so we created a similar dashboard for them that helps them track their carbon footprint and identify ways adapted to their business and organisation specificities. It was a standard process for us since we already had the knowledge and experience necessary to help them. By combining what we have internally with their requirements, we were able to deliver results that make their lives easier and have a positive impact on their business.
The second client in Luxemburg is an industrial company and we created some dashboards for them for their daily production. They were using a lot of Excel sheets, which were not efficient. We created dashboards for them that made it easier to see their performance, analyse and draw conclusions from their data. It was a good improvement for them, and they found it much more user-friendly than their previous solution.
I feel that all these projects have had a positive impact on our clients. It is rewarding to see that our work is making a difference in their daily operations and sometimes on a larger scale.
Fun fact
If Jingyi could switch jobs for one day with someone else at Sopra Steria, she would like to try a job in HR, because she is curious about what kind of profiles we hire, and she would like to try her best to encourage people to join Sopra Steria.
Why did you start working at Sopra Steria?
I met 2 HR Recruiters at a forum. I didn’t know Sopra Steria at that time, but they introduced what Sopra Steria does and what projects they work on, and it really attracted me. Then I got in touch with a Director at Sopra Steria, and he explained Sopra Steria’s projects more in detail and it was exactly what I was looking for. Once I joined, I immediately liked it here; I love working with people with diverse backgrounds on projects in different sectors.
What can you say about Sopra Steria’s culture?
Sopra Steria is a very international company, especially in Belgium, so I immediately think of the word diversity. I would also mention the words collaborative, respect, and support. I get support from my proximity manager, my team members, and also from people that I don’t know super well. We for example can ask questions in an online Community and people from other Sopra Steria countries will answer. We have a lot of people with great skills and potential so it is easy to find people who will know exactly what you are talking about.
I really enjoy working in my current role because I feel like I have a lot of flexibility and support. My manager gives me the freedom to structure my work in a way that makes sense for me, without micromanaging or requiring me to ask for permissions on everything. This allows me to be more productive and focused, and to achieve better results for the organization.
Another thing I appreciate about my role is that I have a lot of say in my personal development. I'm able to choose the subjects that I want to focus on and the skills that I want to develop, which is really empowering. My manager is always available to offer guidance and support, but they trust me to take ownership of my learning and development.
All in all, I feel very supported and valued in my current role. The level of trust and autonomy my manager provides is refreshing, and it makes me feel motivated and engaged in my work.
We combine skills and we bring them together to create value. At Sopra Steria, we see great value in having people with different skills and backgrounds work together.
Fun fact
If Sopra Steria were an animal, Jingyi thinks it would be a dolphin. Dolphins are known for their intelligence and their close-knit social structure, relying on one another for support and protection, just like we do at Sopra Steria. Additionally, dolphins have a unique way of communicating with one another through sounds and body language, which makes them different from other animals. Jingyi sees a similarity here with the field of IT and consulting, which is always changing and requires a special set of skills and knowledge to communicate with technology and other people effectively.