In Data School training we develop our management and leadership skills through managing the rest of our cohort with a client project. In my case, I was managing the other 7 members of my cohort working with a top 6 Premier League club's academy.
OVERVIEW
We were working with their youth academy teams data - running since the start of this year, as they have only started recording their data from matches through RedZone analysis where it is then coded through Sportcode. The Stakeholder, who was head of performance analysis, wanted to analyse how progressive his players were and trends over past games and weekly periods to see if they are improving.
We included metrics outcome as successful or unsuccessful - but unsuccessful is not seen at the club as 'failure', as it shows at a young age their intent to play progressively. Playing progressively is defined by 'zones' based on where the players play.
From this, they wanted to visualise trends based on 6-12 week periods, to see how players are developing - as this is what they are focusing on, in training with the players individually.
DELIVERABLES
5x Tableau dashboards
- 4x Dashboards based on player positions
- 1x Overview player Dashboard (general)
1x Tableau Prep workflow
IMPACT OF OUR WORK
The dashboards allow the client to view specific players and how they have progressed/regressed over a range of metrics, in dynamic time periods. They can also be compared on their overall influence on games and how players compare to other players.
SUCCESSES
The client was happy with the work done which is by far the best success. The dashboards contained the functionality and analysis they requested with a consistency in look and feel throughout.
An additional success would be managing to put all dashboards into the same workbook - making the presentation flow feel a lot smoother, using a navigation page to change through each individual dashboard.
PERSONAL REFLECTIONS
I really enjoyed the experience of working in a management role and felt comfortable in doing so. Being able to solely focus on helping and organising my team whilst flipping between different contexts, depending on metrics relative to position, was really fun and taught me a lot.
Looking forwards to get the opportunity to work in a management role again some time in the near future.
SKILLS GAINED
Further confidence in producing deliverables within a strict time-frame
Organisational skills - especially managing 7 other people and keeping in the loop with their progress
LESSONS LEARNED
Having a solid plan for the week is extremely important in keeping up outcomes/deliverables within a schedule. This is especially important if the time-frame is small (which these DS training projects typically are), and you have multiple other projects running throughout the week.
Data Dictionary is always helpful especially for those who don't follow football (in this case).