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Customer Story

VodafoneZiggo Upskills Data-Savvy Employees to Become Data Engineers

Xebia partners with the telecommunication company to upskill its professionals and fill critical data engineering positions.
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Related Services
Python, AWS, Spark, Kafka, Scala, Kubernetes, Docker

Industry
Telecommunications

Company
Xebia Academy

VodafoneZiggo is a collaboration between Vodafone Group Plc and Liberty Global Plc that started in 2016. It provides its clients in the Netherlands with various services ranging from SIM deals to Internet and TV packages.  

VodafoneZiggo cares deeply about its clients and employees, offering the latter unlimited training opportunities through an on-demand platform and in-person courses.  
Why
VodafoneZiggo needed to balance the number of internal data engineers with that of external professionals to ensure the continuity of long-term projects.
What
VodafoneZiggo partnered with Xebia to upskill some of their data professionals to become data engineers to help fill these crucial vacancies.
How
By combining its existing data engineer learning track with new tailored material, Xebia created a one-year Custom Learning Journey to turn selected VodafoneZiggo professionals into data engineers.

The Need for Internal Talent 

VodafoneZiggo’s data engineering team has been key to the company’s data-driven decisions over the past few years. Some of the team members were internal, but many were external consultants or temporary specialists. In the long run, VodafoneZiggo desired a more stable team with a higher number of internal professionals. This would ensure the continuity of long-term projects and clarify their cost.  

While they could have hired new professionals to fill these vacancies, two factors made this challenging:

  1. Data engineers are currently in high demand, so it’s challenging to find professionals who fit the company’s needs. 
  2. VodafoneZiggo highly values culture fit, which is something that current employees already have.  

These two factors suggested an alternative solution: upskilling data-savvy professionals at VodafoneZiggo to become data engineers. This is where Xebia came in.  
Xebia partnered with VodafoneZiggo to design a specialized masterclass program focused on Big Data Engineering. The program was tailored to develop our internal talent in data and AI, ensuring that participants could immediately start contributing to our data solutions. As they continue to gain more experience, their impact within the company will only grow. 
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Philippe Theunen Manager Data & AI

Building a Custom Learning Journey

VodafoneZiggo contacted Xebia Academy’s Business Developers to develop a Custom Learning Journey together. In the past, the two companies had collaborated to deliver trainings on Machine Learning, analytics translation, and, more recently, Generative AI.  

First, VodafoneZiggo professionals outlined the requirements and responsibilities of data engineers at the company. Then, they met with Xebia’s team to outline a learning journey to guarantee these results.  

Together, they created a 40-day Custom Learning Journey that combined Xebia’s public courses, special corporate material, and tailored content just for VodafoneZiggo.  

“Xebia's flexibility in adjusting the training based on our evolving needs was key to aligning the program with our strategic goals. ”

Philippe Theunen, Manager Data & AI at VodafoneZiggo

The Details of the Program

The Custom Learning Journey consisted of four extensive modules, one per quarter. These modules were divided into courses about Machine Learning Operations (MLOps), Spark fundamentals, architecting on AWS, and many more.   

Each training session combined theory with practical exercises and hackathons in VodafoneZiggo’s own environment. Between sessions, participants met with an assigned mentor who coached them on their daily learning activities on the job. 

Six data professionals started the program to become data engineers. They all completed it successfully, reinforcing VodafoneZiggo’s data engineering department.   

Since there was still space in the classroom for other people to upskill, VodafoneZiggo employees made the most of this. Many other professionals joined sessions throughout the year to upskill in a few data areas. This allowed the spread of data literacy throughout the company, increasing collective knowledge and facilitating collaboration between all professionals. Additionally, since many of the extra participants came from different teams, they brought a lot of business knowledge with them, which enhanced the collaborative learning experience.

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