Day: January 17, 2021

Dr. Neha Gupta holds a PhD in the Data Science (2014-2018) awarded by the University of Warwick, Coventry, UK. In her PhD research she applied data mining, geospatial analysis, and statistical Big Data techniques to understand sentiment behind the social media (Twitter) data. Her research work tries to uncover the behavioral traits of people as perceived through social media channels. Before pursuing her PhD program, she worked as an IT professional in variety of software development and test management roles building bespoke software for multinational companies (Bharti Telecom group, LG Soft, India, TEOCO and Avon Cosmetics) across India and the UK.
Coming from an academic family and inspired by her father, who was a Professor in an Indian University, she wanted to explore a possibility of pursing an academic career. Therefore, to follow her aspiration she took a career break to take up PhD studies in Big Data in the UK. She did couple of Data Science consultancy roles at HSBC UK and UCAS alongside her PhD since she was always passionate to explore the application aspect of research. In the process of doing her PhD she became an applied researcher that not only expanded her software development experience with interdisciplinary data science skills but also opened new dimension of possibilities that exists in academia. She was able to perceive the challenges as well as opportunities available in Universities with a mature outlook. During her PhD studies she found her passion in teaching due to which she obtained Teaching Qualification required for higher education sector in the UK and got awarded with Associate Fellow of Higher Education Academy. Soon after her PhD she worked as a Teaching Associate at Warwick Business School which she recognizes as a very rewarding experience. Therefore, she continues to explore similar teaching opportunities in higher education where she could teach and share her knowledge alongside her applied research work in corporate sector. Currently, she works as a R&D Data Scientist in AGCO Corporation, Stoneleigh, UK where she is applying her research experience and cutting-edge data science knowledge to evaluate business forecasting models to predict supply chain demand trends. In this webinar, Neha talk to us about both her transitions: from several years of work in IT industry to academia and back. Why did she choose to do a PhD and how she value that experience? What are the challenges she faced as a mature PhD student in academia and how she blended her industrial experience and networking skills with research knowledge to manage the expectations of PhD program? She shares with us how she realized that research intensive academic publication path was not for her and that she would rather be suitable for either a teaching-based role in academia or in an applied R & D focused role in corporate sector. She shares with us how her PhD journey has been transforming and self-realizing experience for her and how connecting and sharing ideas with people, networking has helped her to create positive experiences in her life and career journey.