Adelaide University Internships - Jordana Izquierdo
Welcome Jordana!
Jordana Izquierdo has joined our Data Analytics Team for her Adelaide University SET (Sciences, Engineering and Technology) Internship for Data Science for trimester 2, 2023 9 May 2023 - 4 August 2023.
She completed 217.50 hours towards her internship, interns have a choice of mode and she attended either onsite 50% and remotely 50% with SAcommunity at the Connecting Up Office, a division of Infoxchange, for 22.5 hours a week for 12 weeks over 3 days (~8.5 hours, 8.5 hrs, and 5.5 hrs each week) towards her internship requirements.
Personal Biography
Jordana is a Master of Data Science candidate at the University of Adelaide with a background in Industrial Engineering. With over four years of experience as a senior consultant at Ernest & Young, she has conducted fraud investigations for over 16 projects in diverse industries across Latin America. Jordana is interested in data analysis and using Python, Rstudio, SQL, Tableau, and Power BI.
Jordana is eager to gain work experience in Australia and immerse herself in the Australian culture. She aims to build strong connections with the South Australian community by accepting an internship position at Connecting Up a service of Infoxchange which allows her to expand her professional network and give back to the community.
Looking ahead, Jordana aims to continue her passion for data analysis and data science by working in the mining or insurance industry in South Australia. She is eager to engage with professionals worldwide to share her knowledge, experiences and ideas related to data science. She welcomes opportunities to connect, collaborate, and use her expertise to provide insights and drive impactful decisions in business.
Data Analytics Team Members: Volunteers Stathis Avramis - Data Analytics Team Lead, Intern Jordana Izquierdo, and Volunteer Camille Sze Pui Ko
Work Experience - Council Statistics Project
Jordana has been working in the Data Analytics Team with daily one-on-one assistance from Team Lead Stathis Avramis on the Council Statistics project in order to help Jordana with each step in the documented process. These reports utilise the SAcommunity dataset, Google Analytics, and Python to prepare the data exports. Power BI and Canva to present community services operating within the council area and provide an indication of service demand to assist with council decision-making, awareness or research.
Jordana's focus has been on providing data analytics reports on community services operating in the District Council of Karoonda East Murray, a regional town in the heart of South Australia’s Mallee region, the smallest dataset in SAcommunity with only 9 records listed to create a report for the Financial Years 2020-2021 and 2021-2022, with the idea that when understood and finished Jordana can potentially move onto expanding these or other report areas or create report summaries to indicate trends, with many of the other datasets with hundreds of listings. Jordana's final data analytics reports checked by the Data Lead will when completed, be found >>here https://sacommunity.org/karoondaeastmurray.
Data Analytics relies on data accuracy for insightful reporting and as a result of the small size of community services within the council, as with all data analytics interns, the idea for Jordana was that she was to source, re-check and clean the data records for her council dataset, improving the SAcommunity database and service listings. Like all interns, Jordana was to download and check her council dataset on the database, against Google Analytics statistics, the assigned indexing categories, councils, electorates, group listings and recent updates in order that she can later utilise Power BI to present this data with help from Stathis, the Data Analytics Lead working next to her.
The Karoonda dataset being so small, with nine records listed in the council area, Jordana was assisted by the SAcommunity coordinator in identifying key personnel and helped in making contact with this relevant council staff member in order to introduce her data report and to include records of other community service organisations operating in the area in the database for future reference.
This aim of this activity was to create a relationship with the council, and with ongoing assistance from the coordinator and council staff who investigated the services in the area, allowed an increase in the number of community service listings to 20 services offered in the area, and with approval from the council staff member who collated information about the service along with her coordinator's help in checking the information content for each service listing, Jordana was able to email the council for checking and approval to add each of these community service listings into the SAcommunity database. This task improves the quality of the data and allows it to be used for future data reports and/or data mapping projects for example.
Telephone Techniques Training: Interns Jordana Izquierdo and Jay Tayiana practicing their telephone scripts
Telephone Techniques
The existing SAcommunity Karoonda East Murray dataset is limited, which limits the data insights generated. Jordana has searched for and checked community services available in this council across the SAcommunity dataset, and across the Karoonda council and tourism websites in order to verify, identify and expand the records listed on SAcommunity, to represent services operating in this council more accurately.
Telephone Techniques training, information and practice (as above) with fellow interns is used to assist this process, as Jordana searches for, contacts and calls these organisations in her council dataset by phone and email, to confirm details and update the service information within the dataset.
These actions improve the accuracy, reliability and completeness of the dataset, and an opportunity to practice customer service skills needed. These are useful when Jordana is assisted by the Coordinator to identify and contact a key council stakeholder to introduce her data reports to in the future, presenting 'data stories' for services in the area. It is critically important to understand the services (the data) when explaining the data reports to councils, particularly such a small dataset as Karoonda.
Volunteer Stathis Avramis - Data Analytics Team Lead assisting Intern Jordana Izquierdo. Stathis volunteers his time every Tuesday and Wednesday onsite to assist the Data Analytics Team members
Training and Development
Jordana has been provided with access to the Connecting Up Digital Learning platform, a training and development online learning platform. She has the opportunity to understand more about data analytics in the not-for-profit sector, through training sessions presented by subject-matter experts in a selection of relevant live webinars and recorded webinars, workshops and webcons.
Relevant weekly webinars, workshops and webcons selected by Jordana for her internship include:
Data Analytics relies on data accuracy for insightful reporting and as a result of the small size of community services within the council, as with all data analytics interns, the idea for Jordana was that she was to source, re-check and clean the data records for her council dataset, improving the SAcommunity database and service listings. Like all interns, Jordana was to download and check her council dataset on the database, against Google Analytics statistics, the assigned indexing categories, councils, electorates, group listings and recent updates in order that she can later utilise Power BI to present this data with help from Stathis, the Data Analytics Lead working next to her.
The Karoonda dataset being so small, with nine records listed in the council area, Jordana was assisted by the SAcommunity coordinator in identifying key personnel and helped in making contact with this relevant council staff member in order to introduce her data report and to include records of other community service organisations operating in the area in the database for future reference.
This aim of this activity was to create a relationship with the council, and with ongoing assistance from the coordinator and council staff who investigated the services in the area, allowed an increase in the number of community service listings to 20 services offered in the area, and with approval from the council staff member who collated information about the service along with her coordinator's help in checking the information content for each service listing, Jordana was able to email the council for checking and approval to add each of these community service listings into the SAcommunity database. This task improves the quality of the data and allows it to be used for future data reports and/or data mapping projects for example.
Telephone Techniques Training: Interns Jordana Izquierdo and Jay Tayiana practicing their telephone scripts
Telephone Techniques
The existing SAcommunity Karoonda East Murray dataset is limited, which limits the data insights generated. Jordana has searched for and checked community services available in this council across the SAcommunity dataset, and across the Karoonda council and tourism websites in order to verify, identify and expand the records listed on SAcommunity, to represent services operating in this council more accurately.
Telephone Techniques training, information and practice (as above) with fellow interns is used to assist this process, as Jordana searches for, contacts and calls these organisations in her council dataset by phone and email, to confirm details and update the service information within the dataset.
These actions improve the accuracy, reliability and completeness of the dataset, and an opportunity to practice customer service skills needed. These are useful when Jordana is assisted by the Coordinator to identify and contact a key council stakeholder to introduce her data reports to in the future, presenting 'data stories' for services in the area. It is critically important to understand the services (the data) when explaining the data reports to councils, particularly such a small dataset as Karoonda.
Volunteer Stathis Avramis - Data Analytics Team Lead assisting Intern Jordana Izquierdo. Stathis volunteers his time every Tuesday and Wednesday onsite to assist the Data Analytics Team members
Training and Development
Jordana has been provided with access to the Connecting Up Digital Learning platform, a training and development online learning platform. She has the opportunity to understand more about data analytics in the not-for-profit sector, through training sessions presented by subject-matter experts in a selection of relevant live webinars and recorded webinars, workshops and webcons.
Relevant weekly webinars, workshops and webcons selected by Jordana for her internship include:
Concepts: Data and Community Information (Collection, Organisation, Control and Use)
I enjoyed the webinar. I strength my knowledge about Canva, a design tool, to effectively communicate and achieve goals in the social impact sector. I review topics related to how to utilize Canva's suite of tools for managing branding, marketing, pitching, and storytelling. I also liked the showcase examples from other not-for-profit organizations.
I liked watching the webinar as it includes several topics to showcase the features and capabilities of Microsoft 365. I strength my knowledge about syncing a document library, how users can ensure their files are up to date and accessible on both the cloud and their local PC. I also learnt about the different icons in Windows Explorer, representing cloud and local files, the default cloud storage and the importance of syncing relevant files.
I strength my knowledge of Microsoft Excel thanks to this webinar. This webinar offers a valuable opportunity to learn easy tips and tricks for enhancing database management skills. It shows how to set up, use, and extract information from databases on Excel. I also learnt how to leverage standard Excel functions to streamline the workflow and save time that would otherwise be spent on manual work. Additionally, regardless of where the database is stored, I learnt how to extract it into Excel and utilize its features.
I strength my knowledge of reporting data thanks to this webinar. This webinar focuses on the role of digital technologies in enabling modern not-for-profit organizations to operate effectively during the COVID-19 pandemic. It also emphasizes the importance of utilizing data and cost-effective business intelligence tools to achieve various objectives, including measuring and understanding service activities and outcomes, meeting funder key performance indicators (KPIs), and enhancing the impact of organizational activities.
I strength my knowledge of data literacy thanks to this webinar. This webinar provides information to help community organizations to understand the importance of establishing data foundations. It also covers topics such as the benefits of robust data foundations, common issues faced by community organizations, and tips to improve data management.
I really enjoyed this webinar. I learnt the foundations of using Google Analytics to measure performance and to extract insights from data. I also learnt what Google Analytics is effective at measuring and how it should inform decision-making.
Week 7: Decisions with data - Sam Headberry, Senior Consultant at Infoxchange
I also enjoyed this webinar as it was very informative. This webinar addresses the increasing need for non-profit organizations to effectively manage their data to demonstrate impact and to make informed decisions. It highlights Microsoft's Power BI as a valuable tool for generating insights and trends in service provision. I learnt that, regardless of their size, community organizations understand the value of Power BI. The webinar provides guidance on utilizing dashboard generator tool and covers topics such as an introduction to Power BI, its benefits for community-based organizations, accessing different data sources, linking data to Power BI, creating visualizations, developing a dashboard, and the advantages of using Power BI over other visualization tools.
Week 8: Generating Insights from Google Analytics - Tim Brack, Digital Marketing Lead at Leafcutters
I strength my knowledge about Google Analytics as this webinar provides an overview of Google Analytics and its role in measuring and evaluating performance. I learnt how to use Google Analytics to get insights from data and take informed decision-making. I also learnt about creating custom reports, tracking traffic on Google analytics, calculating conversions through campaign tagging, monitoring website interactions beyond pageviews, and cleaning data for easier analysis.
I learnt about the increasing need for non-profit organizations to effectively manage their data to demonstrate their impact and make informed decisions as the webinar emphasizes the importance of accessing insights and business intelligence from internal and external data sources for service provision and securing funding opportunities. I found interesting information in this webinar as it covers topics such as an introduction to Power BI, its benefits for community-based organizations, accessing different data sources, linking data to Power BI, creating visualizations, developing a dashboard, and the advantages of using Power BI over other visualization tools.
I learnt about the benefits of implementing database cleaning and maintenance practices for businesses. By following these best practices, organizations can enhance retention and response rates, decrease the volume of returned mail, and ensure efficient communication. I also learn about how to provide valuable insights into evaluating data, restoring database functionality, maximizing donor retention and appeal response rates, and optimizing data resources.
Week 11: Data driven decision making: Interpreting organisation data to drive and deliver high performance
I learnt how social organizations face the challenge of planning for an uncertain future. This webinar aims to guide social organizations in reforming and improving their operations to be resilient and effective. I also learnt about how to use data to inform strategy and improve performance, providing frameworks, case studies, and practical insights.
I learnt about the importance of preventing data disasters as this webinar provides information about the threats faced by nonprofit organizations (NFPs), why they are targeted, and how to effectively address these threats. I also learnt about data leakage and theft, emphasizing the importance of knowledge and awareness in preventing and handling such incidents within an NFP setting.
Mentor Meeting: Xavier Goldie, Senior Data Analyst, Infoxchange, Melbourne Office
Mentor Meeting
Mentor meetings with a selected staff member from Infoxchange provide a one-off opportunity for mentees to gain professional development advice and guidance, to discuss their education and career possibilities as well as gather insights into pathways and connections.
On the 30th of May 2023, Jordana met her self-chosen mentor Xavier Goldie, Infoxchange Senior Data Analyst. Xavier provides Infoxchange Ask Izzy Data insights and Stories examining the changing demands from vulnerable people for support services across Australia, including housing, food, health and more. The SAcommunity database is combining with Infoxchange's Service Directory which powers Ask Izzy.
Mentor Meeting Takeaways with Xavier, Senior Data Analyst, Infoxchange:
1) What are the key technical skills that employers typically look for in data analysts?
The key technical skills needed in data analytics are programming and statistics. Some of the most in-demand programming languages include Python and R. Additionally, an understanding of databases such SQL is a must.
In addition, Geographic Weighted Regressions (GWR) and spatial analysis-regression analysis are good skills for data analysts to develop in order to produce meaningful outcomes.
2) What are some emerging trends or areas of growth within the data analytics field I should be aware of?
Data analysts should also have a good knowledge and understanding of cloud computing. Cloud computing refers to the delivery of computing resources, such as servers, storage, databases, and software applications, over the internet. Cloud platforms like Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (GCP) have gained significant popularity and are widely used by organizations for hosting and managing their data.
3) What are the key soft skills that employers generally look for in data analysts?
It is also important to develop soft skills and some of the key soft skills demonstrated by professionals in the data analysis field include: a) Being a good communicator b) Being able to adapt easily c) Being flexible
4) What are the key abilities of a senior data analyst?
Senior data analysts should trust their teams and have a clear understanding of their own weaknesses. A senior data analyst also should foster autonomy, delegate, and encourage self-direction for their team members.
Image: National Volunteer Week held from Monday 15 to Sunday 21 May 2023
Image: Data Analytics Team - New Team Building Tim Tam Slam with Volunteers Camille Sze Pui Ko, Grace Hong Hong (background) Jordana Izquierdo and Neil Anubhav Dattagupta
Image: Data Analytics Team - New Team Building Tim Tam Slam with Volunteers Camille Sze Pui Ko, Grace Hong Hong (background) Jordana Izquierdo and Neil Anubhav Dattagupta
Interns: Sarthak Jain and Jordana Izquierdo, with Infoxchange CEO, David Spriggs, Melbourne Office
People & Culture
At the Infoxchange Adelaide EOFY celebration lunch, I had the amazing opportunity to talk with David Spriggs, CEO of Infoxchange. It was a lovely and inspirational conversation where we discussed my studies and the working environment in Australia. He shared with me his experience as a computer science professional, his career switch to the not-for-profit sector, and we also talked about the challenges involved in living and studying in a foreign country.
Jordana also attended the People & Culture Team's Day of Cultural Diversity shared lunch along with intern Nada Soldo and various other shared lunches, celebrations, team and staff meetings.
Image: Monthly Connecting Up staff meeting held on 23 May 2023
From Right to Left: Pankaj Chhalotre, Head of Connecting Up, Cameron Brown, Web Developer, Stathis Avramis, Volunteer Data Analytics Lead, Jordana Izquierdo, Data Analytics Intern, Wing Yi Wong, Media & Communications Intern, Nada Soldo, Media & Communications Intern, Chloe Le, Marketing Coordinator, Tina Vuong, Customer Engagement Manager, Rex Porter, Volunteer Information Management, Eric Jenkins, Account Manager, Rob Kalka, Business Development Manager, Sarah Rayner-Fry, Customer Support Coordinator (Online): Sam Lloyd, Marketing Lead Infoxchange, Grant Smyth, Communications Manager, Ciara Flynn, Digital Events Manager.
Image: People and Culture hybrid meeting held May 2023
Image: The Australian Digital Inclusion Index 2023 Launch attended by Pankaj Chhalotre, Head of Connecting Up, Infoxchange with Intern Jordana Izquierdo, Volunteers Govinda Gurung and Camille Sze Pui Ko
Infoxchange staff were invited in-person to the 2023 Australian Digital Inclusion Index Launch attended by staff members Pankaj Chhalotre, Head of Connecting Up and Catherine McIntyre, Community information and Volunteer Coordinator with the invitation extended to Data Analytics Team Volunteers Camille Sze Pui Ko, Govinda Gurung and Intern Jordana Izquierdo.
Hosted by Telstra, the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society (ADM+S), RMIT University and Swinburne University of Technology. The launch was to introduce the ADII, find out how Australia is tracking, gain insights for better digital inclusion programs, and view the Index’s new First Nations digital inclusion data.
Presenters included:
- Vicki Brady, CEO, Telstra
- Justine Rowe, Chief Sustainability Officer, Telstra
- Lauren Ganley, Head of First Nations Strategy and Engagement, Telstra
- Distinguished Professor Julian Thomas, Director, ADM+S, RMIT University
- Professor Anthony McCosker, Chief Investigator, ADM+S, Swinburne University of Technology
- Dr Daniel Featherstone, Senior Research Fellow, Mapping the Digital Gap project, ADM+S
- Dr Lyndon Ormond-Parker, Principal Research Fellow - Digital Inclusion and Engagement in Indigenous Communities, ADM+S
- Ross Womersley, Chief Executive Officer, South Australian Council of Social Service
Digital Inclusion Index https://www.digitalinclusionindex.org.au/
Mapping the Digital Gap https://www.admscentre.org.au/mapping-the-digital-gap/
Image: Intern Grace Hong Hong, Volunteer Flavia, Intern Jordana Izquierdo, Volunteer Stathis Avramis, Volunteer Frank Xiufeng Shi, Volunteer Camille Sui Pui Ko, Volunteer Neil Anubhav Dattagupta
