Career Opportunities at Sanlam

Responsible for utilising data science to deliver value to our clients and business. This includes providing statistical analysis, forecasting, predictive modelling, simulation, machine learning and optimisation to discover trends, opportunities and threats. Findings should be shared regularly with business users in a collaborative fashion. Remains current with developments in data science technology and methodologies. Must have proficiency in ML language e.g. R, Python or Julia. Must be proficiency in SQL. Requires moderate supervision.

Key Result Areas

Data Preparation

• Assess the effectiveness and accuracy of new data sources and data gathering techniques
• Extend the company’s data with third party sources of information when required
• Enhancing data collection procedures to include information that is relevant for building analytic systems
• Processing, cleansing and verifying the integrity of data used for analysis
• Identify valuable data sources and automate collection processes
• Undertake pre-processing of structured and unstructured data

Analysis and Model Building

• Mine and analyse data to drive optimisation and improvement of product development, marketing techniques and business strategies
• Analyse large amounts of information to discover trends and patterns
• Select features, building and optimising classifiers using machine learning techniques
• Use predictive modelling to increase and optimise customer experiences, revenue generation & targeting and other business outcomes
• Develop custom data models and algorithms to apply to data sets
• Combine models through ensemble modelling
• Develop company A/B testing framework and test model quality

Stakeholder Engagement

• Present information using data visualisation techniques
• Propose solutions and strategies to business challenges

Implement and Monitor

• Coordinate with different functional teams to implement models and monitor outcomes
• Develop processes and tools to monitor and analyse model performance and data accuracy

Team Effectiveness

• Collaborate with engineering and product development team

What will make you successful in this role?

Qualifications

• Honours or Masters in Statistics, Actuarial Science, Computer Science or another quantitative field would be advantageous.

Knowledge And Experience

• 1-2 years of experience managing data sets and building statistical models
• Proven experience as a Data Scientist

Familiar With The Following Software/tools

• Experience querying databases and using statistical computer languages when managing data: R, Python, SQL, etc.
• Knowledge and experience in statistical and data mining techniques: GLM/Regression, Random Forest, Boosting, Trees, text mining, recommender systems etc.
• Experience creating and using advanced machine learning algorithms and statistics: regression, simulation, scenario analysis, modelling, clustering, decision trees, neural networks, etc.
• Experience with distributed data/computing tools: Map/Reduce, Hadoop, Hive, Spark, MySQL, etc.
• Experience visualising/presenting data for stakeholder use.

Experience

• Strong problem solving skills with an emphasis on product development.
• Experience using statistical computer languages (R, Python, etc.) to manipulate data and draw insights from large data sets.
• Knowledge of a variety of machine learning techniques (clustering, decision tree learning, artificial neural networks, etc.) and their real-world advantages/drawbacks.
• Knowledge of advanced statistical techniques and concepts (regression, properties of distributions, statistical tests and proper usage, etc.) and experience with applications.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills for coordinating across teams.
• A drive to learn and master new technologies and techniques.

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• Liaising with regulators
• Training of employees on compliance and new legislation
• Formulation and maintenance of procedure manuals
• Incorporating new legislation into existing structure
• Determine Statutory and Management requirements applicable to different business areas
• Formulating and implementing Risk Management Plans
• Drawing up and implementing policies and procedures on FICA, FAIS, Financial Markets Act etc.
• Monitoring compliance and adherence with rules, regulation, policies, procedures and limits
• Interact with Group Companies

What will make you successful in this role?

• Experience within Private Wealth Industry
• High level of accuracy
• Have a high and broad level of FAIS experience and knowledge
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills
• Have a solutions based approach when interpreting regulation

Qualification And Experience

• B Com (Law) or equivalent
• Must be a registered and FSCA Compliance Officer
• In the possession of all appropriate SAIFM Compliance certification
• 3 - 5 years compliance related experience in the financial services industry

Knowledge And Skills

• Working knowledge and application experience of Financial Markets Legislation would be an advantage
• Sound decision and judgment making under pressure
• Excellent negotiation skills and diplomacy
• Operate at both a detailed and strategic level
• Excellent verbal and communication skills
• Ability to operate as a team leader or in a support role, depending on the activity
• Computer literate in MS Office and JSE BDA system knowledge essential

Personal qualities

• Strong analytical and logical thinking skills
• Excellent communication and presentation skills
• Good report writing skills
• Strong administrative and organizational skills
• Ability to act independently as well as part of a team
• Pro-active approach and a lateral thinker
• Ability to operate within a high performance environment
• Strong attention to detail
• Confident and analytical

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• Work closely with development team to design and implement SQL solutions and integrations for business applications.
• Adhere to coding standards, change control, and SQL best practices.
• Performs problem resolution and root cause analysis along with recommending and implementing preventative techniques.
• Review and interpret ongoing business and technical requirements

What will make you successful in this role?

• Your SQL Knowledge
• Programming experience
• Data Warehousing knowledge

Qualification And Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science or Diploma in IT preferred or equivalent combination of education, training and experience.
• Experience in the financial services industry
• Minimum 5+ years of practical experience with SQL Server (e.g. 2008, 2012, 2014).
• Minimum 5+ years scripting, tuning, debugging, troubleshooting and other advanced SQL concepts

Knowledge And Skills

• Expert knowledge of
• SQL Server Management Studio
• SQL Server Integration Services
• Knowledge of SQL Server administrative tools including SQL Server Profiler, SQL Server Agent would be beneficial but not required
• Expert Transact- SQL skills and the ability to create complex queries, stored procedures, user-defined functions, views, and other database objects.

Personal qualities

• Strong numerical orientation
• Highly organized with a high level of customer focus
• Accurate and detail orientated
• Critical and analytical capability
• Ability to perform well under pressure and show maturity, confidence and resilience
• Excellent listening, communication and interpersonal skills
• Pro-Active approach to work, clients, problem solving
• Learning agility and curiosity
• Assertive
• Passionate ownership for results

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Responsible for the timely and effective response to IT user queries and problems through the receipt and logging of problems and the co-ordination of rapid and appropriate responses for basic problem resolution for new and existing systems, and provides basic telephonic training on these systems when required. Escalates more complex problems but may manage the incident to completion. Identifies interim and long term solutions and provides regular updates to the Senior Problem Analyst. Participates in internal forums and work groups to contribute to the methodology and standards.

What will make you successful in this role?

• Deliver a first line support service via the Service Desk by logging Incidents and service Requests received telephonically and via e-mail.
• Offering technical advice to end users. This will include working as part of a team, in order to share knowledge and work together to increase performance standards.
• Actively troubleshoot to identify, assess, record, resolve and / or escalate incidents and service requests ensuring they are handled within the agreed SLA, according to the agreed processes and in a professional and customer sensitive manner.
• Deliver an after hour standby first line support service to end users. This is a Service that is delivered by the Service Desk team on a rotational basis
• Providing daily feedback to end users on outstanding active calls
• Manage a variety of tasks and activities which may require adjustments to priorities in order to satisfy business needs.
• Work within defined deadlines as part of a team and on an individual basis ensuring assigned work is effectively managed.
• Any task given to ensure great service delivery