[Case study 6]Data scientist who obtained a Masters in Business Analytics from the National University of Singapore. Taka

シンガポールで就職起業した21人(日英表記)

<Profile>Graduated with a Masters in Computer Science from Tsukuba University and then worked as an engineer at an American firm in Japan. Obtained a Masters of Science in Business Analytics from the National University of Singapore. Worked as a data scientist in Singapore after graduation and is currently at one of the largest ride-hailing companies in Southeast Asia.

[Case 6]
It's interesting to see people of different backgrounds and education tackle a single problem together
Data scientist who obtained a Masters in Business Analytics from the National
University of Singapore
Taka

Please tell us about your career so far <1>

After I completed my Masters in Japan, I worked at a foreign IT firm for about 8 years as a systems engineer. I would be involved in the presales engineering, project management aspect of implementation and upgrading of systems for clients. After that I left my job and pursued a Masters of Science in Business Analytics (MSBA) program at the National University of Singapore.

In Singapore it's common for interns to be offered full-time roles. When I was pursuing my MSBA I worked as an intern at a French insurer for about 6 months doing data science projects. You have to apply for internships like you would for a full-time job by sending your resume in, going through interviews etc. In the interviews they ask you about your job experience and also technical questions. Following that you also have coding tests. Upon successfully completing all of these you get the offer.

Through my internship, I learned how to apply what I'd learned during the course in actual business use cases. When I was a student in Japan I liked math and computing and I'd always wanted to be able to apply them in my job. Through the internship I was extremely fortunate that I was able to analyze data and also use my programming skills in a business setting.
While it was a little challenging being in an environment where there were no other Japanese colleagues I was thankful that even as an intern it was possible to be integrated into the company as though I was a full-time employee.

I officially resigned from my former firm in Japan and was hoping to get an offer from the insurer that I was interning at. However, just before my internship ended, the company was undergoing a huge restructuring exercise and unfortunately I was unable to get an offer. I had to look elsewhere for employment.