Data Strategist at Volkswagen Group South Africa

Type of Position:

Based in Sandton, the position is responsible to provide a holistic view of the organization’s use of data by interpreting all of its current usage and providing a future oriented, strategic plan as well as translating the requirements of executives, managers into concrete data-driven initiatives and specific actions.

Job Description and Responsibilities

• As the expert on latest technology trends & products in the space of (big) data, analytics, ad-tech, machine learning and AI, be a thought-partner for managers and executives by bridging market trends to their specific challenges, dynamics, limitations & ambitions.
• Guide the organization from the maze of technical jargon towards a good understanding of opportunities, threats and actions plans
• Host workshops, brainstorms and sessions with business teams and executives on data-related topics and projects in order to Develop strategic roadmaps, project outlines and detailed action plans
• Manage external vendors and partner technologies to serve the strategic needs of the NSO in terms of data and potential opportunities in either managing VWSA’s data or looking for new business opportunities regarding data.
• Lead all NSO data projects, this will include working with data scientists, business analysts, project leads and business stakeholders
• Be the business owner for dta and lead all projects relating to the use, interpretation and application of the data strategy within the NSO.
• Be involved in every digital project and be the lead for how the NSO uses and interprets data. Look at the NSO’s use of data holistically in order to develop a strategy that is compliant, organized and governed to maximize opportunities for the organization commercially as well as for the benefit of our customers.
• Liaise with VWSA Legal department in matters relating to POPIA, and stipulations from VWAG and AUDI AG regarding the use of data/agreements as an importer and the contract management relating to data
• Link to VWFS and Brand CRM to identify opportunities to increase loyalty rates for all brands. For example understanding churn and re-purchase cycles and identifying trends by way of segmentation analysis to improve loyalty percentage rates.
• Ensure our data is structured and maintained in the best way possible regarding our customers. Look for opportunities to have the most relevant and richest database of our customers
• Monitor and lead NSO projects that have data related component i.e. Salesforce data management, Single Sign On, ecommerce data compliance
• Data management in the areas of: Service customer cleansing & ownership verification, Job card analytics, Marketing consent POPIA, Group Retail portal and de-identification of customer data
• Work on finding opportunities along with VW IT in optimizing our business and finding new business opportunities with regards to data.
• Responsible for unscrambling the data function as new products and services are implemented and transforming data into insights that inform strategy and decision making to support profitable growth
• Data mapping of whole NSO data processes (POPIA requirement)
• Create and implement policies for effective data management
• Formulate techniques for quality data collection to ensure adequacy, accuracy and legitimacy of data
• Establish rules and procedures for data sharing with upper management, external stakeholders etc.
• Support others in the daily use of data systems and ensure adherence to legal and company standards

Education and Experience

• A recognised Bachelor’s Degree in Business or Engineering in the field of Computer Science, Information Systems or Information Technology – with a major subject in Data
• Minimum 5 years’ experience gained in Information Systems and/or digital business management and/or data strategy 
• Business intelligence, data science, analytics, Power BI, data laws, POPIA, data structure experience required
• Proven track record of at least 5 years applied data strategy.  
• Skills, Attributes & Other requirements

ESSENTIAL:

• Applied data strategy skills in complex environments to support customer facing and/ or corporate processes.
• Strong customer orientation, understanding of customer needs
• Exceptional communication skills
• Strong analytical skills, structured and interdisciplinary way of thinking and working
• Strategic thinking with equally effective execution planning, judgement, and an agile mind-set
• Experienced in unlocking the value of technology incl. data, analytics, AI, cloud, data ethics
• Technical leadership experience to be able to define the data technology roadmap against the business roadmap as part of a cross functional team 
• Ability to convey complex technical terms to a non-technical audience
• Experience in working with big data, how to grow it so that it adds value to the customer experience and the business’s