Spotlight interview with Data Analytics Engineer — Richie Wong
Tell me about yourself
Hey, I’m Richie! My current role is a Data Analytics Engineer (DAE) based in the London Office here at Checkout.com and I’m in the Business Intelligence team specialised in the Commercial domain. I always find projects stimulating with an element of problem solving, for example finding ways that we can improve the experience using Looker and ensuring the performance can be optimised!
I’ve worked in a variety of roles since graduating with an engineering degree, including tunnel engineering, financial planning, and in the fintech space! Each experience has been a fantastic learning opportunity, enabling me to gain hands-on expertise with the ‘modern data stack’ tools like Snowflake, Looker, dbt, git, TeamCity, and Airflow. I gained essential knowledge in the development of scalable and maintainable data products!
Tech Stack:
What do Data Analytics Engineers do at Checkout.com?
Data Analytics Engineers at Checkout.com are responsible for providing stakeholders with the data they need to gain analytical or strategic insight to make data informed decisions on a self-serve basis. This is achieved by applying software engineering best practices such as CI/CD and version control, with the aim of building infrastructure that is scalable, accurate and easily maintainable.
Our day-to-day responsibilities require creating, maintaining and enhancing our data products by partnering with our stakeholders. Analytics Engineers is a new role at Checkout.com and in the data world!
Can you name a few examples of projects you or your team has worked on?
A more recent example of a project I’ve worked on with the Integrated Platforms team is where I built data models to report for our merchants that have processed split payments. This is Checkout.com’s newest major product offering. I was in charge of leading design sessions with other DAEs and the Product Manager, as well as brainstorming new solutions to our design difficulties. It was a fantastic collective effort to cover topics from many perspectives.
Another example is the impact we make at Checkout.com, where the customer success team utilises our business service platform, Looker, to determine why our merchant’s payment acceptance rate has changed. A 1% variation in acceptance rate might equal millions of dollars in difference in payment processed for a single merchant! The infrastructure established by the BI-team enables customer success teams to tell our merchants so they may understand why.
Can you describe your experience at Checkout.com?
I had a great onboarding experience at Checkout.com, where I felt welcomed and was given the time and support to learn the tools and payment industry. And everyone from other teams that I have interacted with are super supportive!
The BI team consists of a mix of Analytics Engineers, Data Product Managers, and Engineering Managers. The culture in the BI team is both open and transparent, making it great for learning. For instance, we have always been encouraged to provide feedback and management is open to listening for suggestions that can improve our workflow. I have had different managers in my time in Checkout.com and they have all provided honest and constructive feedback for my career development.
On a final note, from my experience, everyone in the BI team is super excited about the Checkout.com journey. I’m thrilled at the different opportunities — from continuously learning about the payment industry to seeing our team improve our capabilities and support Checkout.com’s growth!
