"Life is all about decisions and progression, and my life is a reflection of it."
Nadia Ashraf is a single mother who immigrated to Germany from Pakistan after being married off straight after her graduation. She did not speak a word of German, when she set a goal to make a successful business career for herself. She started her long and remarkable journey of pursuing her dream to work with new-generation artificial intelligence "IT" technologies and revolutionize business data analytics field as a financial analyst while completing her 2nd master's degree in Big Data and Business Analytics.
Pursuing such an intellectually challenging career as AI based data analytics, transitioning to the IT sector from finance in a foreign language, foreign country, and foreign culture is tough. Statistically, only about 5% of expats starting their professional journeys abroad manage to get to the top of their industries. Language barriers, different market requirements, new corporate culture's unspoken rules requiring one to constantly read between the lines. All of this often makes already complicated objectives seem nearly unreachable. But not for Nadia, she is now managing big data for huge corporate clients.
Big data is crucial and fuels innovation, growth, and job creation. Corporations are increasingly recognizing the value of data-driven decision-making and their growing need to hire exceptional professionals who effectively analyze and interpret large datasets.
As a leading specialist in business data analytics project management, agile methodologies, SCRUM framework, and the latest AI-based analytical tools, Nadia collaborated on the implementation of a major Robotic Process Automation (RPA) software project with a 1,000,000 EUR budget at Samsung Semiconductor company, which helped to reduce 15% of overhead costs and expenses. She has also developed and implemented all essential quality assurance procedures and established testing standards for multi-million dollar international corporations.
Nadia turned her dreams into action and demonstrated that everything is possible if you are truly committed and ready to put in super-human efforts to grow throughout your lifetime. She successfully managed to use her unique combination of experience as a financial analyst, agile methodologies and big data skills obtained during her master's program, along with her impressive interpersonal skills like resilience, inner drive, and awareness of responsibility to become one of the most brilliant big data & business analytics experts in Germany.
Nadia always managed to meet obstacles with a smile, stay strong, dedicated, inspired, and inspiring. "This journey has made me self-aware, strong, and independent," shares Nadia during her interview. "This self-awareness is my achievement, and I'd like to pass it down to my daughter, to raise her as a resilient woman as well."
While achieving outstanding success and becoming one of the most sought-after business data analytics specialists in Germany, Nadia is also a remarkable mentor who helps many aspiring analysts take their careers on a new level.
Nadia's strength and positive attitude is not only inspiring but a real-life demonstration of the power to make a positive change, by putting in effort, hard work, embracing challenges, and believing in oneself. "Even the most daunting challenges," adds Nadia, "can be overcome with determination, passion, and commitment to making the world a better place."
