Francisco Yirá
Data Scientist and Economist
About Me
Data scientist with background in economics and high proficiency in R programming. Skilled in applying machine learning techniques to optimise business outcomes in retail and marketing/CRM, as well as conducting statistical modelling and causal inference to answer business questions.
Experienced in automating processes and reports. Also proficient in Python for data analysis and model training. Passionate about leveraging data to enable data-driven decision making and to solve complex problems with social impact. Enthusiastic about learning new skills and sharing knowledge with others.
Interests
- Causal Inference and Experimentation
- Machine Learning
- Data Visualisation and Dashboards
- Scripting and Automation
- MLOps
Degrees
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Applied A.I. Solutions Development Postgraduate Diploma, 2024
George Brown College
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Diploma in Econometrics, 2020-2021
University of Chile
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Diploma in Big Data, 2017-2018
Pontifical Catholic University of Chile
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BSc in Economics, 2010-2015
University of Chile
Skills
R
Python
SQL
Data visualisation
Causal Inference and Experimentation
Machine Learning
Effective communication with stakeholders
Amazon Web Services
Git-based collaboration
Portfolio
Personal projects, blog posts, publications and talks
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Work Experience
Data Scientist
- Used Apache Airflow to develop an analytical asset that triggered proactive retention initiatives when a significant drop in transaction frequency was detected.
- Proposed and implemented an experimentation framework for A/B testing best practices.
- Trained predictive machine learning models using AWS cloud infrastructure (SageMaker, Athena and Glue) and PySpark.
- Evaluated the causal impact of referral campaigns using Matching when the use of randomised control groups was not feasible.
Data Scientist
- Used interpretable modeling techniques and unsupervised learning to guide the prioritisation of network infrastructure deployments. The resulting insights were made available to stakeholders via interactive reports, using packages such as flexdashboard and plotly.
- Trained predictive models with the ML framework H2O to better target potential customers through call centre campaigns.
- Performed impact evaluations of network investments using A/B testing, differences in differences, and matching.
Data Scientist
- Developed data transformation processes and implemented machine learning models that allowed the deployment of a personalized marketing strategy for the company’s most important local brand. This included the development of churn models and clustering on transactional data.
- Led the development of an internal R package aimed at streamlining processes and accelerating deliveries in our area (find out more here).
- Led the impact evaluation of the personalised marketing project by designing, implementing, and supervising A/B tests, in close collaboration with the CRM Ops team. This included devising solutions for increasing statistical power in contexts of small treatment effects.
- Introduced the use of version control and unit tests to the team.
Data Analyst
- Gave answers to business questions from Walmart merchants and the marketing team by integrating multiple data sources with R and SQL, and by applying statistical modelling, econometrics and data visualisation techniques.
- Automated ad-hoc reports by using parametrised R Markdown documents.
- Improved the impact evaluation of key company decisions by incorporating causal inference methodologies in otherwise descriptive analyses.
Paid Projects
Work done as a contractor
Optimisation of digital advertising budgets through statistical modelling
Optimised budget allocation and estimated Return-of-investment metrics for digital advertising channels by performing Marketing Mix Modelling with Meta’s ‘
Robyn’ R package.
Data collection for a survey of higher education institutions
Developed R scripts to automatically create custom forms for each higher education institution, and then consolidated the filled forms into a single, ready-to-use Stata dataset by using Python scripts.
Power BI Dashboards development
- Developed R scripts to automatically consolidate data from multiple CRM sources.
- Developed dashboards in Power BI on top of that data to enable analysis and monitoring of business metrics (conversion KPIs, customer acquisition cost, etc).
Formal Education
Degrees
Diploma in Applied Econometrics
10-month program covering experimental design, causal inference with observational data and time series analysis.
Diploma in Big Data
144-hour program covering the fundamentals of machine learning, recommender systems, Hadoop, parallel computing and graph theory.
BSc in Economics
Graduated with distinction. 5-year program.
Additional education and certifications
Completed the Big Data with PySpark track, covering Apache Spark mastery using the PySpark Python API. The track included courses on PySpark basics, data cleaning, feature engineering, machine learning, and building recommendation engines.
See certificate
Earned an industry-recognized credential that validates foundational understanding of AWS Cloud concepts, services, and terminology. Demonstrated knowledge of cloud economics, security, architecture, and support models.
See certificate
30-hour specialisation on DevOps concepts and practices in the AWS Cloud. Learned how to use AWS services and tools for Continuous Integration and Delivery, serverless deployment, and monitoring and logging.
See certificate
4-hour course on hierarchical and mixed effects models in R with the
See certificate
lmer package. Learned how to fit and compare random effects models for nested and longitudinal data.Contact Me
Let’s talk!