Pete Duncan is a Business Analyst for Edinburgh First at The University of Edinburgh

He is an experienced Senior Manager who specialises in strategic and tactical planning. His skillset includes system integration, change management, and operational efficiency. Pete’s current role is ‘Business Analyst’ in the Commercial Accommodation, Conference, and Events team at the University of Edinburgh. This follows over 20 years’ experience in operational roles with Tour Operations in the Tourism sector.

Pete’s journey with data

A self-proclaimed data enthusiast, Pete has been keeping a close eye on Scotland’s data scene for years and, in 2020, attended a DDI Data Skills for Work event to further his understanding.

The same year, he tuned into our TORCH team’s live webinar with TravelTech for Scotland, ‘Breaking up with Spreadsheets’, which supported his decision to approach us for advice and support in undertaking his review of his (then employer) Mercat Tours’ operations and supporting systems.

Following detailed data strategy conversations with TORCH Senior Solutions Architects, and follow-up conversations with members of the TORCH Supplier Network, Pete was inspired to further develop his knowledge and data skills. He has since completed a two day introduction to Python for Data Analysis course, a Power BI course at Napier University, and enrolled in Napier’s Data Processing and Management programme. For those interested in similar courses, we recomend you take a look at the Data Skills for Work Skills Portal

Data learns from Pete Duncan

• The term ‘data’ can be daunting and it’s easy to assume you need to be an expert in coding languages to get into data, but that’s simply not true.
• I like to think of it as ‘business information’ rather than ‘data’, as it keeps me focussed on the reason I love working with data (and that is ultimately to improve the customer experience).

We asked Pete about his thoughts around current and future demand for data skills, alongside his thinking around the potential for upskilling and retraining to address data skills gaps in the workforce

“Data is not going away and, therefore, the need for data skills is not going away.

Even if you don’t think you work currently with data, you probably do. I have found that, even with Excel, there is so much functionality that the majority of business users don’t know about (or use) that simple training can make a huge difference to productivity or efficiency. From there it’s really a sliding scale of how much more you want to learn and in which direction you want to take your learning.”

Other Links

Case Study: How Mercat used the pandemic to improve customer experience
Connect: Follow Pete on LinkedIn

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