Industry & Alumni Talk 2021
By Chin Rui Qi
Master of Science in Accounting (Data and Analytics) (MSA), 2020 Intake
At this year’s annual MSA Industry Talk, we were honored to have MSA alumni from Visa’s Revenue Operations Data Analytics team share with us their experience and data tools that they have built for Visa Finance. The speakers were Lim Hui Jia (MSA Class of 2020), Ryan Guo, Wendy You (both Class of 2021), and Piya Sial. I also shared my perspective of what it was like being first an intern, and then a contractor with the team.
Visa facilitates electronic fund transfers throughout the world, most commonly through Visa-branded credit cards and debit cards. The company provides transactions between financial institutions, consumers, merchants, and banks. The event was held on WebEx due to the tightening of Covid-19 restriction measures. Using the online platform allowed close to a hundred students and alumni to attend the industry talk.
Platforms used to create Automation Tools
The talk was a huge success and many students found it useful and insightful. The team covered use cases of Python with accounting datasets for finance analytics and illustrated the use of Power Query, SharePoint, and Microsoft’s Power Platform (comprising of PowerAutomate, PowerApps, and PowerBI) in data tools that the team created.
Automated Solutions to Manual Processes
The team shared how they coded Python scripts to aggregate and clean large datasets, with further tests built to test for accuracy and completeness. These tests are proxies for business rules and help to check for anomalies in client data. The resultant data was then fed into Power BI to create dashboards for the users. Users can then easily identify potential issues, carrying out investigations and management reviews.
With the help of PowerApps and PowerAutomate, the team was able to build forms to collect data right from the source and achieve full automation of updating users on their request status’. By building in certain validation checks, the team can ensure that the data collected is complete and of the correct data type. Hosting the data on SharePoint also gave the team the ability to control the access rights of different users helping with data governance. They also shared how learning agility was imperative to starting a career in finance data analytics.
Data analytics journey with MSA programme and Visa
I was privileged to get the opportunity to intern with the team and observe firsthand how the team has made use of the knowledge attained in MSA in their daily work. I was exposed to many of the tools shared during the talk and was even given the chance to work on some tools of my own using Power Query and Power BI. Despite having no prior experience working on these platforms, having basic data knowledge taught in MSA and with the support of the team, I was able to quickly pick up these new automation platforms.
I gained valuable insights into the working world such as the importance of flexibility and learning agility. Schools can do their best to impart knowledge, but it is on the students to continuously have a curious and open mind to new ideas and improve themselves. Working with the team has shown me the enthusiasm that they have to new platforms and opportunities for them to push themselves to the next level. I believe that MSA has equipped us with the basic skills required and it is now for us to take it a step further and add to what we have learned through experiences at work. With an open mind and a positive learning attitude, I am sure we will all excel in the workforce.
These are some excerpts of the feedback from attendees:
“The Visa alumni talk provided good exposure for us to see how data analytics skills are applied to solve real-life problems in the actual workplace. It allowed us to see Visa’s approach in revenue analysis and how we can draw different insights from data. It also inspired us for our Capstone project this term and allow us to provide alternative solutions to our clients.” – He Shuai, MSA 2020
“The Visa industry talk is a very practical one! We learnt about Power Query from excel which is similar to python and a powerful tool to do EDA with. Looking forward to more exposure to these advanced skills and tools.” – Wang Rui Zhi, MSA 2020
“The Visa industry talk was useful for me as exposure to practical issues and solutions. This greatly complements what I learn from the classroom. Looking forward to more industry talks!” – Julian Choo, MPA 2021
“It was an insightful talk by our fellow alumni where I saw the real-world applications of what we learnt in school from python, data management to accounting information systems. They showed us how the skills we learnt can be integrated with our domain knowledge to transform a large corporation’s assurance process. What we learnt in MSA is only a sampler and the basics. To achieve what we saw at the talk, we need to keep honing our skills through application. Hence, we need to always have learning agility!” – Goh Li Jie, MSA 2020
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