Daniel Wood

About Daniel Wood

In the 90\'s, I grew up in rural Appalachia with no running water or electricity.Today, I have a PhD in Mathematics and an MBA. In my decade-long career, I have worked in many different industries and across many different roles. I\'ve worked in higher education, epidemiology, mortgage, adtech, and human resources. I have been an educator, a researcher, a quantitative analyst, an auction expert, a data scientist, a student, a mentor, a manager and a leader. I have worked at both Facebook and Amazon. I am a lifelong learner with a growth mindset. I do my best work when I am enabling others to do their best work. In my current role, I use economics, behavioral science, statistics, and machine learning to proactively identify mechanisms and process improvements which simultaneously improve Amazon and the lives, wellbeing, and the value of work to Amazonians.

Experience

1. Senior Applied Scientist

   Amazon

   Dec 2022 — Present · Seattle, WA, US

   Built HR Chatbots using LLMs (Large Language Models) to improve employee experience across Amazon, using Amazon Bedrock, Anthropic Claude models, and a custom-built LLM-as-a-judge framework calibrated with human evaluation to monitor performance. Led 3 large machine learning projects which produce insights on bias in performance evaluation affecting all organizations within Amazon, producing insights which are used by of leaders each month and affecting a population of over 400k corporate employees. Directed science efforts in the launch of a new internal talent movement product, which includes a LinkedIn-like job recommendation system, implemented experimentation infrastructure and ran A/B tests showing 15% improvement in CTR. Created team processes and mechanisms to improve operational excellence, including operational readiness and security reviews, reducing time of new model deployment from 2 weeks to under a day.

Education

• The University of Texas at Arlington

  Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Mathematics

  2012 — 2015

• Questrom School of Business, Boston University

  Master of Business Administration - MBA

• L.D. Bell High School

  High School Diploma

  2004 — 2007

• The University of Texas at Arlington

  Bachelor's Degree, Mathematics

  2007 — 2012

Skills

• Strength & Conditioning
• Applied Mathematics
• Sql
• Teamwork
• C++
• C#
• Scala
• University Teaching
• R
• Information Technology
• Java
• Teaching
• Higher Education
• Transact-Sql (T-Sql)
• Python
• Latex
• Statistics
• Power Bi
• Time Series Analysis
• Matlab
• Microsoft Excel
• Powerpoint
• Data Science
• Numerical Analysis
• Public Speaking
• C
• Microsoft Office
• Computer Proficiency
• Mathematics
• Machine Learning
• Microsoft Powerpoint
• Vba
• Guitar Playing
• Differential Equations
• Research
• Microsoft Azure
• Mathematica
• Critical Thinking
• Sas