Speaker – Maja Ferle

DATA_FAIR, a Data Engineering and Data Science Conference

16 February, 202430 October, 2024 by Maja FerleNo Comments

I spent an incredible day at the DATA_FAIR, a conference dedicated to fostering an inclusive environment for knowledge exchange, networking and upskilling in data engineering and data science. It was a day packed with learning from my peers, meeting new like-minded individuals and exchanging experiences. The focus of the conference was on practical applications of data engineering technologies, current and emerging trends in ML and AI, followed by a round-table discussion about ethical data engineering. My contribution to the conference was to speak about "The Role of a Data Engineer in a Data Mesh Architecture". I explained the traditional data warehousing architecture, the challenges of this architecture that include long time to delivery, low flexibility, and dependence on the IT department for implementation. Because the ability to use data for decision-making is critical to company success, companies should empower their employees with easy access to the data they need. According to Zhamak Dehghani, the founder of Data Mesh, we must start thinking outside...

Workshop: Agile planning in practice (Together in Excellence 2020 conference)

11 June, 202030 October, 2024 by Maja FerleNo Comments

One of the myths about agile is that in agile there is no planning. This myth probably stems from comparison with waterfall approaches, where detailed up-front planning is the norm. In agile, there is still a need to plan over a long period of time, commit to a completion date, plan resources, and align the product to a strategic vision. But instead of detailed planning at the beginning, agile planning is spread throughout the entire development process, and it involves all team members, not just one individual who is the designated project manager. Agile planning and estimation breaks down development into small units which can deliver value to a customer. Teams plan for what they can accomplish to satisfy a customer in a short period of time. Some examples of agile planning are during daily standups, during sprint planning meetings and during release planning. In this workshop, delivered at the Together in Excellence 2020 conference, we covered topics related to agile planning...

Case study: Business Process Modeling as a basis for defining Key Performance Indicators

20 April, 201930 October, 2024 by Maja FerleNo Comments

I recently completed a project where we modeled business processes for the Surveying and Mapping Authority in Slovenia and I co-authored and presented a paper about it at the Slovenian Society Informatika annual conference in April 2019. Some of the main benefits of this project that we outlined in the paper were: Business process modeling was performed for future business processes which coerced us to think in detail about how we want to perform activities in a more streamlined, consistent and fully automated way in the future. The completed business process models were used as input to derive specifications for a new information system that will be built to support the new processes. Business process modeling included identifying activities and assigning actors to these activities as well as estimations of expected time spent performing each activity. This in turn was used as input for defining a new leaner and more efficient organizational structure of the Surveying and Mapping Authority. Key...

How GDPR affects project management

30 April, 201830 October, 2024 by Maja FerleNo Comments

The new general EU Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will become a binding law at end of May this year. The aim of the regulation is to establish greater control over the handling of personal data. As project managers, we must be aware that personal data may also be handled within projects, especially with respect to project communication and documentation as well as other areas that may be impacted. To comply with GDPR, we must be more conscious of personal data handling in project management via a more strategic and systematic approach to collecting and storing data. Informing and collecting consent from individuals about the collection and processing of their personal data may also be required where applicable by the regulation. I co-authored the paper Project management and GDPR that was presented at the Slovenian Society Informatika annual conference in April 2018. In the paper, we state that in addition to process and awareness, project managers must also ensure that the project management software...

IDC Big Data & Business Analytics Forum 2014

11 February, 201430 October, 2024 by Maja FerleNo Comments

Dealing with today’s huge amounts of data requires analytics. IDC’s recent Big Data and Business Analytics forum was all about connecting data and analytics. The organizers of the event addressed questions such as: what are the forces behind the explosion within the digital universe? Technology has certainly helped, by driving down the cost of creating, capturing, managing, and storing information to a sixth of what it was in 2005. The real impetus, nonetheless, is financial. Since 2005, investments in the digital universe among enterprises have expanded some 50% to $4 trillion – money spent on hardware, software, services, and staff, ultimately, to generate revenue. I was one of the speakers at the event. My presentation Quick results in the conversion of large amounts of data into business information was about agile approaches in the implementation of solutions for data analysis, business solutions in real time and predicting the likelihood of business events. The magazine MonitorPro wrote about me in the February 2014...