We recently sat down with Shreyank who has been promoted to the role of Fellow at the Good Data Institute to hear about his background and involvement with GDI! Shreyank studied for a bachelor of engineering at the University of Auckland, followed by a Master of Professional Studies in Data Science. As a data scientist, he has had considerable experience in the field, including building machine learning models to analyse large datasets. He is currently a data scientist at Dexibit, a software company that predicts and analyses visitor behaviour to visitor attractions to drive efficient growth. As a valued member of the GDI network, we are thrilled to promote Shreyank to the role of Fellow! Congratulations Shreyank!
Tell us a little about your background. Where did you grow up and what did you want to do when you grew up?
My family moved to New Zealand from India when I was just eight months old and I grew up in Hamilton, New Zealand. I moved to Auckland when I was 18 and studied a Bachelor of Engineering at the University of Auckland, followed by a Masters of Professional Studies in Data Science.
When I was growing up I was mostly obsessed with things like cartoons and video games and so naturally the first career I remember myself wanting to have was that of a video game developer.
Where do you currently work and what does your role involve on a day to day basis?
Currently, I’m working as a Data Scientist at an Auckland based startup named Dexibit. As a company we are responsible for providing analytics and forecasting products for various visitor attractions around the world.
On a day to day basis, my role consists of a mixture of ensuring the data science arm of our product is running smoothly, training and improving forecasting models and automating tasks to achieve better efficiency.
How did you hear about the Good Data Institute and what made you interested in getting involved?
I heard of GDI through LinkedIn and personally knew a number of members who were already involved with the organisation.
I wanted to apply the skills I was learning outside my full time job towards helping NFPs and also was eager to work on a few different data related challenges to those I would normally face at work.
Tell us a little bit about your experiences at GDI so far! What types of projects have you worked on and what have you found most rewarding about them?
At GDI so far I have been involved with two projects, these have been at Progressive Shopper and Inclusive America.
For Progressive Shopper they wanted a way to collect various information on organisations from across the globe and measure how that organisation stood on a number of social issues. We helped facilitate the extraction, processing and storing of this data.
Inclusive America was about measuring the diversity at the White House and this project consisted of automating the retrieval of information about newly nominated positions at the Biden Administration for the Inclusive America team to analyse and report.
It’s been rewarding to know that the work that we are doing is impacting real people in a positive way and that we are hopefully contributing to make the world a better place.
What are you most excited about as you move into the Fellow role going forward? What types of NFPs and causes interest you most?
I’ve enjoyed working closely with GDI so far and as I move into the Fellow role I’m looking forward to helping the organisation in a greater way. I’m also looking forward to the opportunity of leading more projects and working closely with the amazing team of volunteers that we have.
Personally I find NFPs related to solving environmental and social issues the most interesting.
Lastly, what are your favourite hobbies? What’s your favourite way to spend a day off?
During the winter season I love going skiing! Otherwise I’ll be in the gym trying to keep fit as well as being out socialising and checking out the newest spots in town to grab a bite.