FAQ

Someone who would enjoy listening to and understanding a decision-maker’s problem, identifying quantifiable relationships, using data to estimate these relationships, developing models of dynamic behaviour and decision-making, using mathematical tools to assist in optimizing trade-off decisions, and presenting recommendations to an audience of decision-makers with diverse backgrounds.

Teamwork skills are important because projects are featured in many of our sophomore classes: willingness to carry a fair share of the workload, ability to express opinions without alienating others, willingness to accept consensus decisions, willingness to take responsibility for tasks, timely attendance at team meetings, willingness to lead or contribute to discussions, ability to deliver work against a deadline.

Calculus and linear algebra are foundational courses for ESD.

Facility with Microsoft Excel and a scripting language like Python is also assumed.

We are able to engage ESD seniors in our Term 4-5 courses, provided they scored well in those classes and have good mentorship skills. Our faculty welcomes the opportunity to have UTOPs participate.

Several faculty members engage students in UROP. Prof. Jackson has a large group of students engaged in developing educational course materials to enhance the ESD curriculum. Check the UROP listings each semester to see what is available or contact a professor directly.

It is not just banking where this question is relevant. Personalized data is available in large quantities in every area of business, government, and social enterprise. This creates the opportunity to engineer mass customization solutions and great user experiences but it also opens the door to insidious manipulation. These are hot topics within the SUTD community and you can expect ethics modules in your engineering courses and full HASS courses where you can clarify your boundaries and strengthen your personal resolve.

Yes, but your career progression depends on the industry, company, and activity. For example, in a consulting company, you might expect to follow the path of “analyst-consultant-partner,” in a business you might follow “analyst-manager-director,” in an engineering firm you might follow “engineer-leader-manager-director,” and so on.

Fundamentally, you will graduate with an analytical mindset when dealing with problems of business and operations, supplemented by the SUTD orientation toward design. You will be experienced in working with clients and presenting your technical ideas effectively and persuasively. You will be skilled at transforming data into models and using those models to influence major decisions.

These days, you don’t need to go to university to pick up the tools of data analytics: there are books, MOOCS, and online materials if you are willing to teach yourself. Similarly, every university will have courses enabling you to pick up these tools. Your facility with these tools will depend more on your personal interest and drive than on which program you attend. That said, our class sizes are small, our faculty passionate, our courses technically deep, and our students entrepreneurial. This is a good place to be.

The term 4 course, Data and Business Analytics, is unique to SUTD combining topics from database management, data analytics, process analysis, and business planning. Its signature feature is an industry-sponsored project so you also receive training in project management, oral presentations, and writing an executive summary.