Alexander James Smith
Group Head of Data Platforms - Compliance and Financial Crime Risk @HSBC
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WORK HISTORY
Group Head of Data Platforms - Compliance and Financial Crime Risk @HSBC
GB
Leader of the data function for Compliance and Financial Crime (FC) globally within HSBC. • Team headcount of up to 34 FTEs (comprised of 6 senior product owners and their sub-teams). Oversight and prioritisation (as part of wider FC Product Management function) of the data budget of approximately $15m. • Business and product owner of the central data enablers for most Compliance and Financial Crime initiatives. Responsible for requirements, strategy, business architecture, prioritisation and deployment (in collaboration with IT) for these capabilities, with a hands-on design role for some, including:1. The Common Data Model (CDM): Central data architecture and refined data assets deployed across most FC applications and use cases, including flagship investigation/detection capabilities (Dynamic Risk Assessment machine learning pipeline/DRA and Global Social Network Analytics/GSNA). Final signoff of data/feature design for these assets, balancing Data Platforms team expertise, stakeholder requirements and source system input.2. Compliance/FC Data Refineries: Both Data Lake (Hadoop) and Cloud (GCP) based, the core data/feature engineering framework for Compliance and FC, ingesting and curating datasets per day on average. Entitlements Engine and Data Privacy/Security/Retention Controls: Automated access control for users supporting over data access permutations across the Refinery and CDM datasets.4. Data Lake Infrastructure and Governance: Anticipation and response to risks relating to the data estate and its downstream applications and governing user/system interactions with the environment. Data Integrity/Quality Controls, and Dashboards: Monitoring and presentation for all core FC processes.In addition to these products, I play an active role in the design and development (coding some myself) of new capabilities, including machine learning models to augment our existing capabilities and dependent projects.
EDUCATION
University of Cambridge
BA/MEng, Chemical Engineering
SKILLS
ABOUT ALEXANDER JAMES SMITH
I am a leading subject matter expert within HSBC on data and its application to fincrime analytics, investigations and detection models. I speak frequently to audiences (internal and external) on this subject. In my role as the Global Head of Data Platforms, I lead a team of around 30 people responsible for the design and product ownership of novel solutions relating to data and analytics within the function globally. I previously established and led the Data Solutions innovation function within this team. The team’s remit is broad, covering ownership and enablement of products and workstreams relating to- Data product and strategy- Solution and data architecture- Data design and feature engineering- Data science and analytics (primarily, not exclusively, for Anti Money Laundering use cases)- Data governance, quality, integrity and security- Regulating the data environment and the users (approximately who depend on it- Oversight of all data pipelines for Compliance and Financial Crime Risk- Ownership of the data infrastructure (primarily Hadoop and GCP based) used to support the Compliance and Crime Risk core data assetsThe team has grown to become a critical enabler of most Compliance and Financial Crime Risk (FCR) projects and applications through a combination of the products we own and the projects we drive. Alongside our core products, we lead a number of data innovation projects, including the coding and deployment of machine learning models to optimise our data assets and their application to fincrime. I maintain an active technical involvement in this work, primarily coding in python and SQL and familiar with Hadoop and GCP platforms (using hive and BigQuery respectively alongside associated tools). Key products I have designed and owned since the team\'s inception include the design and implementation the FCR/Compliance Common Data Model; a unified data architecture and feature store for financial crime risk analytics, detection and investigation across all jurisdictions in which the bank operates. The team have played a leading role in HSBC\'s industry leading fincrime initiatives including the Dynamic Risk Assessment (DRA), piloting the first deployment of Google\'s AML AI products and Global Social Network Analytics (GSNA).(I may not always be available to respond to messages on LinkedIn but will try to review them periodically).
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