Ben Needham Email & Phone Number

Cambridge, United Kingdom

Vertex Intelligent Data Ltd is a data consultancy company specialising in Data Warehousing, Data Migrations and Reporting to provide complete solutions to both the public and private sector. Vertex utilises expertise in Microsoft SQL Server's full BI Suite (SSMS, SSAS, SSIS, SSRS), Power BI, SAP's Business Objects and other tools to bring data to life and drive results. While our niche is in Adults’ and Children’s Social Care, we have also enjoyed successful projects in a number of industries.

My position at Kirklees Council was two-pronged. Firstly, a colleague and I spent 2 months delving into the inner workings of Children's Social Care at the authority. We produced a comprehensive report, outlining areas for improvement to ensure the council gets the most out of the LiquidLogic software it's invested in. The report was well-received and is currently being actioned under our supervision.Meanwhile, we worked on the reporting project and were responsible for producing wide-reaching datasets for the report writers to use as a data source. We covered all aspects of Children's Social Care to ensure the dashboards created represent the entire system.

I brought a team of four (including myself) to Dudley to overhaul the Business Intelligence space for both Adults' and Children's Social care, following the acquisition of the Liquidlogic case management system.Together, we built a new structure in the Data Warehouse to encompass the breadth of Social Care including Contacts, Assessments, Services, Looked After Children, Children in Need and much more. The approach was to produce key pots of data, which the in-house team could then use (after our departure) to pull together reporting solutions.Initially we presented the data in SQL Server Reporting Services, before a gradual migration to Power BI. The reporting including Activity, Performance, Productivity, Finance, Statutory and Data Quality breakdowns.Our relationship continues with low level support and maintenance.

Having worked with Oldham three years ago, I was asked back to help overhaul their current reporting structure. I assisted with a number of bespoke report requests, overcoming numerous process issues to produce reports in a timely fashion utilising Business Objects against the Mosaic system for Children's Social Care. I also supported the council during a recent Ofsted inspection.Alongside my urgent report developments, I am advocated a move away from Business Objects in favour of producing a wider-reaching, centrally defined Data Warehouse and reporting from either SSRS or Power BI.

A colleague and I worked with Worcestershire County Council in their Adult Social Care department to develop a bespoke SALT return from scratch against Liquidlogic's LAS system. This build featured the pulling in of data from other systems, data matching and several complex code calculations. Alongside this, we supported the team in the build of a new suite of reports to supplement their recent go-live with the new system.

At Durham I worked to develop a suite of critical dashboards and performance reports, drawing from the bank of code I’ve developed using LiquidLogic in the past. Working in Children’s Social Care, I was able to implement 20 key dashboards with drillthroughs to analyse the data, before moving on to a scorecard of 100 measures to accurately measure performance. I’ve also trained a number of local staff in the use of SQL Server and LiquidLogic to ensure that their custom builds can be maintained in-house.

At Thurrock, I converted around 200 Business Objects reports against the LiquidLogic provided universe while they went through a transition from using the application database to the Data Warehouse.Following that, I produced Annex A Lists 1-9 using freehand code and presented it in SSRS reports. I also created a number of supporting activity reports for stakeholders.

This was a brief contract role in Children's Social Care to review the Annex A build against the Mosaic system. I looked over the codes, optimising as I worked through them, then tested the outputs to ensure completeness and handed over. Once these reports were completed, I helped kick off the build of a Data Warehouse before the contract completed.

My work with Shropshire was around the Adult Social Care deployment of LiquidLogic (LAS); specifically reports. Working with vague specifications, I was able to produce all critical reports for Go Live, before moving to a custom production of SALT.

Norwich, United Kingdom

This role involved requirement gathering with key stakeholders across both Adults and Children's Social Care (as well as Finance) and developing a reporting solution from scratch to provide crucial information for running services.We produced a large number of key datasets as views and created dashboards according to requirements, covering activity, statutory returns and productivity.A broad range of technology was used across the project, including MS SQL Server (SSMS, SSRS), Business Objects and Power BI.

Suffolk contacted me to assist them with their Social Care system provider migration from CareFirst to LiquidLogic. I was initially involved in the migration and nightly load of a custom, local Data Warehouse (in Microsoft SQL Server), specially designed to be used for reporting. I produced key ‘pots’ of data in datasets to provide “one version of the truth” for report writers to pull code from. Following this I ran a series of training courses in the use of SQL Server Reporting Services, before assisting in the reports build myself.

I worked at Waltham Forest on a short term project assisting with the conversion of their legacy Frameworki Business Objects reports to their new Mosaic system. Completed reports spanned across Children's Social Care and Adults Social Care and included Annex A and other complex reports. I created a new universe to house the new reports and handed over my completed reports and structure to the BAU team at the end of March 2018.

At Oldham Council, my work in Adult's and Children's Social Care was to develop Business Objects reports and universes against Frameworki and Mosaic during the upgrade to the latter.The role consists of two core projects: 1) The from-scratch development of BO reports on an ad-hoc basis having worked with the requester to understand requirements. 2) The rebuild of approximately 100 reports as the social care system changes from Frameworki to Mosaic, including full documentation, back ups and scheduling.The reporting on finance and social care activity often requires updates to the universes, complex queries, variables, alerters and various other advanced Business Objects development. Upon creation of the reports, I then give feedback to the business on changes.I also use SQL Developer on a daily basis for quick pivots and data extracts.

My role at Hampshire consisted of many varying data components around SWIFT AIS including report writing, complex ETL work, data warehousing and universe design using Business Objects, SQL Server and PL/SQL Developer.Alongside the day-to-day, I developed multiple template reports and identified key definitions in order to ease consistency when providing reports and data in future.Having taken over from a long standing permanent staff member, I also reviewed the role and documented the key processes and tasks ready for a skills transfer to other members of the team in the long term.

I built from scratch, using SQL Server and Adobe Dreamweaver, an innovative strategy and performance system encompassing strategic planning, key performance indicators and tracking. I built a mobile version of the application enabling users to manage their day to day interactions, provide project feedback and monitoring Key Performance Indicators. I collected the business requirements, designed and architected the application and worked with our team to develop and test the new system.Alongside management and development of the software, I also developed bespoke SSRS reports for clients on a near-daily basis. I worked closely with finance and operations teams to identify data quality rules and required reporting outputs and built a suite of reports to detail errors in dashboards, drill downs, breakdowns and supported these with operational report PI’s. I also supported a number of Ignite’s local authority clients with the production and maintenance of SSRS reports including statutory returns, finance and activity data.

I held a short-term contract in Northamptonshire County Council’s Adult Social Care department. I built ETL processes using SSIS to extract data from their source system (CareFirst) and miscellaneous spreadsheets, perform calculations and pivots on the data and then load it into a Data Warehouse. I built a SQL Server warehouse to hold financial records and TSQL procedures to validate and aggregate data. Following this I developed, in SSRS, a suite of over 200 reports on statutory returns, performance indicators and general activity which are used by the council’s Adult Social Care department in a report sharing interface.

At Clearwater, I was responsible for the development process, from start to finish, of all web-based solutions offered to our local authority clients. I lead a small team utilising SQL Server tools including SSMS, SSIS and SSRS, as well as Adobe Dreamweaver, Business Objects and other software to take a design from paper to screen.We offer solutions aimed at improving strategic planning, risk analysis and the complete management of key performance indicators. As well as this, we create bespoke data warehouse solutions, complete with front end interfaces designed to suit the client's needs.As development manager, I gained experience in ETL processes, software development, needs analysis gathering, training, as well as proficiency in the tools listed above.

Nottingham, United Kingdom

I held a contract as a Project Technical Lead at Nottinghamshire County Council’s Adult Social Care department for a year, working with data primarily in SQL Server and Oracle, leading a team of four developers. Having worked extensively with the source system (Frameworki) to identify matches with the data warehouse, I created an ETL package which processed in excess of 100 million rows of data collected from a range of sources including Oracle, SQL Server, Flat Files and SAP BI systems every day. I also processed data transformations to work around inconsistencies and data quality issues having worked with the business to identify where these problems were. I wrote delta scripts to load only the changes (updates, inserts and deletes), which cut processing speeds dramatically.

Milton Keynes

Education record

Education record