In just two years Rockborne has taken the data industry by storm with its ability to identify and upskill the next generation of data talent. Formed in response to the data industry’s dire need for more talent and improved skills, Rockborne developed a unique training approach to provide a new level of skills that can be applied in diverse ways in real-world business examples.
“Strong breadth of proposition, great to see a strong focus on soft skills.” – Judges’ comment
With the experience drawn from sister company Harnham Recruitment, Rockborne had immediately identified the exact skills the industry desperately needed. The team started small, training cohorts of 15-20 individuals every few months, but demand for data and analytics talent soon saw training capacity grow by 400%. The training provided is accessible to all over a three-part 13 and three-week training programme which is consistently updated with new curriculum subjects and content. The first 13 weeks focus on fundamental data skills including data engineering, analytics and science. The final three weeks are customised to fit the specific business needs and requirements of the roles the graduates will be performing.
The training facility, in Wimbledon, London, has been designed exclusively to train the next generation of data professionals. The facility includes four training rooms, a vast breakout space and extra desks for further study.
As one participant explained: “Between SQL and Excel, Tableau and PowerBI data wizzes were born and suddenly our graphs were no longer just the standard, but business-ready with interactive dashboards displaying data in consumable and less mundane ways. We had teaching on Python with libraries such as Pandas, machine learning with PySpark using orchestrated containers with the industry standards such as Docker and Kubernetes, launching virtual machines on cloud web services looking at end-to-end pipelines using web scraping with selenium to collate data and then, after all the training, a trip to Big Data London.”
Rockborne focuses on nurturing potential talent into fully trained data professionals with a high degree of retention for the industry. The training covers everything from custom software, mentoring, industry accreditations or personal development and it is constantly being expanded as the industry demands. The core concept is that data should be accessible to all and the elements of elitism within data and analytics need to be removed through training and education.
