Eeva, who works in the Financial Intelligence Centre of Excellence, was impressed by the versatility of data processing in the OP Financial Group. “On a Finnish scale, it is quite rare that the company has such a large unit focusing on data science, which only employs experts who specialise in the field.”

Eeva, who has worked at OP for a year, became interested in the company after an interesting data science event. “I went to the event to listen to what OP is doing in the field of data science and I became convinced,” she says. “Then later on when they happened to have an interesting vacancy, and I had also heard positive experiences of OP’s data expertise from an acquaintance of mine, I did not hesitate to apply.”

Eeva has a diverse background: before her current career path, she has worked as an architect, production manager, and data science consultant, among other things. “I strongly feel that data, analytics, and AI are my field of expertise. Because of my studies, I already had existing expertise in the subject, so it was sensible for me to start focusing entirely on data science,” says Eeva.  

The experts in the financial intelligence work closely in OP’s various tribes, and the unit has a variety of data-utilising projects underway, whose themes can range from financial Crime Prevention to chatbot development, home price estimates, or insurance pricing. At OP, working with data is strongly connected to business operations, so the effects are more concrete than in many other companies. Eeva is currently working on a project in marketing automation and real-time targeting, which aims to provide customers with an even better customer experience.

“What I like about working at OP is that there is so much going on and I can take part in many things. The aim here is to constantly break new ground. AI and machine learning are at the centre of everything that we do,” says Eeva.

Development in the Centre of Excellence is continuous

A Data Scientist requires a wide range of skills. Skills in mathematics, statistics, and machine learning are necessary as they help to understand the operating logic of algorithms. The skills and programming skills of a data engineer are also useful to import and combine the necessary data from a variety of source systems into the form required by analytics use cases.

“Business understanding, inter-personal and communication skills help to better understand and identify potential applications of data and analytics, and to communicate the results and benefits to stakeholders. However, you don’t have to be an expert in everything straight away, as OP has excellent opportunities to develop your skills along the way,” says Eeva.

Eeva has utilised the study opportunities of OP’s Software Academy in the form of Design & Product Thinking and AWS Certified Developer study modules, for example. “In addition to these, our own Financial Intelligence Centre of Excellence organises workshops once a month where we can learn about a changing topic together.”

The versatility of work is inspiring – “The team can solve even the most challenging problems together”

Eeva considers the best part of her work to be the truly extensive impact it has. “At OP, we can be a part of the implementation of large and significant projects. There are also extensive opportunities to utilise your own expertise and pursue subjects that interest you. Compared to the world of consultancy, the business connection, outlook, and time horizon are significantly more extensive. You can be involved in the project throughout its entire life cycle, in which case the results of the work will also become more concretely visible.” 

When Eeva started at OP, she was surprised by the diversity in expertise within Financial Intelligence. “On a Finnish scale, it is quite rare that a company has such a large unit focusing on data science, which only employs experts who specialise in the field. If you can’t find help for your problems here, I don’t know where else you could go!” she says and laughs.

Eeva gets a sense of meaning from small successes. “You don’t necessarily get them every day or not even every week, but I’m always happy when things start moving forward and the results start to show after all the effort we have put in. Working as a team, it’s nice to see how the team can solve even the most challenging problems together. The end result of a project is often much more than the sum of its parts,” says Eeva.