Disa Ramadhina, winner of the Best Dissertation Award 2021, shares her experiences and insights about participating in the CDRC Masters Dissertation Scheme.

What attracted you to working on a project in partnership with the Consumer Data Research Centre (CDRC?)?

Prior to studying the MSc Business Analytics program at UCL, I studied Psychology at King’s College London, so I’ve always been interested in the topic of consumer behaviour. Therefore, applying to a project in partnership with the CDRC was a natural next step.

I came across the CDRC – a centre which leads engagement between industry and academia – through the MSc Business Analytics Program Director, David Alderton. I was particularly drawn to the project topic by Entain. I was unfamiliar with the company at first, until I realised they owned the big-betting brands Ladbrokes and Coral. Having been in London for four years, I’ve definitely come across their betting shops while walking around the city.

What problem or need was investigated through the student consulting project?

The pandemic-driven changes in consumer behaviour led to the hypothesis that, during lockdown, a lot of Entain’s new online customers have a retail background – meaning that they are retail customers who may have migrated online due to retail shop closures in the UK.

With methods of classification, we can predict whether an online customer has a retail background; and we found demographical and behavioural differences between groups of online customers with and without a retail background. While the findings of the project can be turned into strategic customer segmentation to generate higher revenue, it can also be used to analyse the differences in manifestations of problem gambling between the customer groups to create a more sustainable customer base. More on the project is available in my abstract.

How do you think the skills that you learned on the MSc Business Analytics program helped you support Entain?

The project was dependent on the use of programming tools which I had no prior knowledge in before the course. Particularly, the modules Statistical Foundations of Business Analytics, Marketing Analytics, Programming and Predictive Analytics helped me support Entain throughout the project as it taught me to utilise R and Python to analyse data, and to train machine learning models. Not only that, but the way the course organisers dealt with the pandemic and structured the online learning taught me soft skills which helped me adjust to the ways of online working. This was particularly useful while conducting the project during the pandemic, and with the fact that the Entain team was based in Gibraltar while I was based in London.

Can you tell us a little about winning the best dissertation award?

After completing the project, I was notified by the CDRC that I was shortlisted for the 2021 cohort’s top three dissertations. I was invited to present my project alongside other shortlisted candidates, which was followed by a virtual prizegiving ceremony. Winning the best dissertation award was very rewarding, and I would like to share two lessons that I have learned:

1. Projects come in different shapes and forms

Having the opportunity to watch other candidates’ presentations of their projects gave me insights into what other students worked on for months, which were completely different to my project. This showed me that dissertation projects encompass a broad range of topics, which made me appreciate the scale at which analytics could be applied into.

2. The importance of communication skills

I learned that having communication skills is critical in dissertation projects. I thought, how do I present my results such that they are meaningful to the audience? Whether it be academics or business’ stakeholders, no matter how good the analyses are or how complex the methodology is, the project must be communicated well for others to appreciate it as much as you do.

When did you graduate and what have you been doing since you graduated?

I would like to give special thanks to the Entain Gaming team – Piotr Smolinski, Joana Georgieva, and William Collins – for guidance and mentorship throughout the project; to the CDRC for the opportunity to work on the Masters’ Dissertation Scheme; and to David Alderton for the support from UCL as a Program Director and Personal Tutor.

A record number of students from UK universities applied to the Masters Dissertation Scheme (MDS) this year. Of more than 80 applications, a total of 20 students were selected to partner with 15 organisations for their 2021 Masters dissertations. 

Real-world data was used across a range of issues to produce innovative research in areas from loyalty card and gambling harm data to housing, social media, health, retail, transport, construction and the justice system.

Abstracts for each dissertation can be found on the Project Archive page.  Five students have also recorded videos, talking about their experiences of the Scheme.

The range of subject areas covered gives the MDS a broad appeal and applications were received from students studying across numerous diverse disciplines, ranging from Business Analytics to Sustainable Urbanism, and Spatial Data Science to Logistics and Supply Chain Management. Applications also came from a wide range of UK universities including Bristol, City, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, Loughborough, Nottingham, Oxford, UCL and Westminster. 

Congratulations to all of this year’s students, and special thanks to the sponsors and academics who supported the 2021 Scheme.  

For enquiries about the Masters Dissertation Scheme, or to discuss next year’s Scheme, please email info@cdrc.ac.uk  

Background to the CDRC Masters Dissertation Scheme 

In 2012, ESRC funding allowed for the establishment of the first MDS. Following its success, the MDS has continued to be funded annually, with ESRC funding used alongside business co-funding to sponsor Masters degree dissertations that address business horizon-scanning topics.

Proposals from business sponsors are sought during the first term of Masters courses and are posted on the CDRC website. Any interested Masters students studying at a UK institution are invited to apply for proposals from February 2022 (second term of the Masters). Dissertations are conducted by postgraduate students and are co-supervised by academics and business analysts from the sponsoring organisation.

Although funded initially on an ad-hoc basis, and subsequently subject to short term renewals of CDRC funding (such as under the World Class Labs’ funding stream), the Scheme has proven remarkably successful, with a total of 76 dissertations completed with external organisations to 2020 and a further 20 dissertations completed in this year’s very successful annual round (2020-2021 intake). 

Our LinkedIn network brings together a network of 90 students, sponsors and academics who have been involved in the Scheme over the past years. CDRC alumni and friends are invited to join here: www.linkedin.com/in/cdrc-alumni-group-1613a31ba/.  

Past MDS alumni work in a range of sectors worldwide, including retail, banking, hospitality, logistics and academia.