Headline Partner

Simon Prinn, Director of Data Science and Analytics, Walgreens Boots Alliance

Describe your career to date

I started my career in analytics at Stockport Council, my report on poverty made local news, prompting a fundamental shift in service provision. Joining Boots in 1998, I became one of the first Advantage Card Analysts and now lead 70+ Analytics specialists. I moved across analytics and IT teams, establishing a Centre of Excellence within Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA), landing analytics across 17 countries. I leveraged IT experience to build strong Data Engineering, Data Science, and Business Intelligence capabilities, creating and productionising high-quality analytics products. As a founder member of the International Data Office (IDO), I was promoted to Director of Data Science and Analytics (DS&A). DS&A make substantial commercial and strategic contributions to WBA. Through CRM personalisation models, we support delivery of significant incremental sales, and generate substantial revenue selling our analytics capability to suppliers.

My remit includes responsibility for data literacy and analytics adoption across the organisation. This year, I was thrilled to become a Fellow of the British Computing Society in recognition of the developments I had been involved with.

I continue to promote analytics inside and outside WBA. DS&A continue to support DataIQ, and I returned as a judge in the Culture category, and DS&A won a joint award in the Data for Good Category.

Engagement with a range of universities continues. In 2023, I spoke at numerous conferences including CDO Exchange and Marketing Society, discussing personalisation in healthcare, and leading teams in a changing environment.

Data literacy is a key enabler of the value and impact from data. How are you approaching this within your organisation?

In 2023, to boost data literacy, I focused on building links between the new Data Office to the areas I directly or indirectly partner with – Marketing, Digital, Opticians, Properties, while also delivering Data Science capability to other areas including Logistics. This includes representation on the leadership teams of each function, leading to a significant increase in recognition of the value of data and analytics to business processes. Many opportunities have been identified far more quickly this way. All of this has been in the context of continued evolution of the Boots organisation structure as it adapts to a post-coronavirus retail landscape and becoming more independent within WBA.

Another approach has been the empowerment of analysts at all stages in their careers, hosting sixth formers and interns, and pioneering the use of apprenticeships (L4 and L7) with Cambridge Spark, initially within the Data Office, but now extending other functions. The successful Data Science Guild, Google Analytics, and 1,000 strong PowerBI Communities have been extended across the international business. Through collaboration with augmentation partners, DS&A flexes to meet increased demand, while also helping us to develop analytics capability in the business units. Senior colleagues are encouraged to build networks with DataIQ and other organisations. We now have an ethos which shares our knowledge without barriers and insists that our partners do the same.

DS&A culture focusses on outcomes, building relationships with our business colleagues so that we are trusted to lead the way with data.

What stage has your organisation reached on its data maturity journey?

Boots has a long history of recognising the value of data in developing its offer to customers. It was one of the first organisations to install an EPOS system, and in 1995, began development of the Advantage Card loyalty scheme. For 25 years, I have been part of the process of developing the analytics using this data. In this time, there have been dramatic developments in the way data can be used including CRM, location, space and range optimisation, price and promotion and digital retail.

Although we are a large, traditional organisation, with some deeply embedded legacy platforms, we are a long way along the maturity journey, with data across a wide range of domains held in the cloud. We have established a Data Office and built teams in the necessary disciplines including Data Science, Analytics, Data Engineering, and Governance.

We have initiated a range of approaches to fostering a data culture across the organisation, including guilds, communities, links with schools, universities, and the utilisation of apprenticeships.

We have evolved from provision of insight, to be being embedded in value adding processes, and to external professional data services, building an ever-higher profile and recognition of the value and importance of data. We are not only commercial in our mindset; we collaborate with universities and the NHS to support health initiatives, most notably during the pandemic.

Looking to the future, with a growing proportion of our business being on-line, we are building data products including recommendation engines, chat-bots, and other optimisation capabilities which will be productionised.

Simon Prinn
has been included in:

100 Brands 2021 (EMEA)
100 Brands 2022 (EMEA)
100 Brands 2023 (EMEA)
100 Brands 2024 (EMEA)

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