Bigger wins!

John Elder chairs America’s most experienced Data Science consultancy. Founded in 1995, Elder Research has offices in Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, and Washington DC. Dr. Elder co-authored 3 award-winning books on analytics, was a discoverer of ensemble methods, chairs international conferences, and is a popular keynote speaker. John is occasionally an Adjunct Professor of Systems Engineering at the University of Virginia.

Dr. Andrew Fast leads the research and development of advanced data mining algorithms at Elder Research, the nation's leading data mining consultancy. ERI was founded in 1995 and has offices in Charlottesville VA and Washington DC,(www.elderresearch.com). ERI focuses on Federal, commercial, investment, and security applications of advanced analytics, including stock selection, image recognition, biometrics, process optimization, cross-selling, drug efficacy, credit scoring, risk management, and fraud detection.

Dr. Fast graduated Magna Cum Laude from Bethel University and earned Master's and Ph.D. degrees in Computer Science from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. There, his research focused on causal data mining and mining complex relational data such as social networks. At ERI, Andrew leads the development of new tools and algorithms for data and text mining for applications of capabilities assessment, fraud detection, and national security.

Dr. Fast has published on an array of applications including detecting securities fraud using the social network among brokers, and understanding the structure of criminal and violent groups. Other publications cover modeling peer-to-peer music file sharing networks, understanding how collective classification works, and predicting playoff success of NFL head coaches (work featured on ESPN.com). With John Elder and other co-authors, Andrew has written a book on Practical Text Mining that was awarded the prose Award for Computing and Information Science in 2012.

Bill Franks is the Director of the Center for Statistics and Analytical Research at Kennesaw State University. He is also Chief Analytics Officer for The International Institute For Analytics (IIA) and serves on several corporate advisory boards. Franks is also the author of the books Winning The Room, Taming The Big Data Tidal Wave, The Analytics Revolution, and 97 Things About Ethics Everyone In Data Science Should Know. He is a sought after speaker and frequent blogger who has over the years been ranked a top global big data influencer, a top global artificial intelligence and big data influencer, a top AI influencer, and was an inaugural inductee into the Analytics Hall of Fame. His work, including several years as Chief Analytics Officer for Teradata (NYSE: TDC), has spanned clients in a variety of industries for companies ranging in size from Fortune 100 companies to small non-profit organizations.  You can learn more at http://www.bill-franks.com.

Isaiah Goodall is the program chair of Predictive Analytics World for Government and also leads business development and sales for Elder Research, a leading data science consulting firm. Isaiah's passion is helping clients figure out how they can improve their analytics capability to deliver value to their organization and solve business problems.

In his previous role at Elder Research, Isaiah led business development for five years in the Arlington, VA office and helped secure analytics projects at several Fortune 500 corporations and US Federal government agencies. In 2011, he was the founding program chair of Predictive Analytics World for Government, the leading vendor-neutral predictive analytics conference in Washington, DC.

Prior to his current role Elder Research, Isaiah led business development for Manas Development Group, an emerging market consulting firm in Washington, DC, and was part of the founding team of RelayFoods.com, an online grocery startup company based in Charlottesville, Virginia. Isaiah received his B.S. in Management from Virginia Tech in 2007, summa cum laude, with a focus in Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Technology. 

Hudson Hollister founded HData to help data companies build the relationships, strategies, and understanding they need to deploy their technologies to transform business and governance.

Hudson is a securities lawyer, former regulator, former Congressional investigator, and trade association executive. He has invested his career in applying technological innovations to make regulation, government, and law work better.

Hudson founded the Data Coalition and served as its first executive director. The Data Coalition is the world's largest open data trade association. Its nearly fifty member companies work together to advocate for policy reforms to adopt common data structures across government management and compliance reporting. The Data Coalition has successfully passed multiple data reforms in Congress.

Hudson also founded the Data Foundation, a research nonprofit which works to define an open and standardized future for our society's data. The Data Foundation has published market-leading research in the potential of technology to deliver better government management, create public transparency, and automate compliance tasks. The Foundation also works with government agencies to educate civil servants on how to use government data to solve problems. The Foundation hosts Data Transparency, the largest annual open data conference in the United States.

Hudson has written legislation, testified before Congress, and served as a board member and advisor to diverse startup companies and nonprofit organizations. He received the Federal 100 Award in 2015 and 2019.

Data Mining Analyst Kris Hoover joined Elder Research in 2012. He works at the Washington D.C. office using advanced fraud detection techniques and other analytical tools. Kris recently graduated from North Carolina State University with a M.S. in Analytics. He also earned a B.S. in Statistics with a minor in Mathematics while at North Carolina State University. During college he spent time working on two research projects. The first project dealt with pH levels in North Carolina rivers and the other utilized advanced data mining techniques to identify disease causing polymorphisms in the human genome.

Bryan Jones, Owner and Principal Consultant of Strategy First Analytics, is a former Elder Research and federal government employee with over 33 years of experience successfully managing and leading programs and people. Bryan’s focus is to translate the value of analytics and develop an analytics business strategy for government agencies and commercial business operations.

Bryan was the Deputy Assistant Inspector General for the US Postal Service’s Office of Inspector General where he developed their first data analytics unit.  This is where he discovered his passion: the combining of business knowledge with the technology and science of data mining to help transform the way government does business.

Under Bryan's leadership the data analytics team grew from 6 employees to 40, from an annual budget of $0 to over $3.5 million, and was elevated from a small support group to directly supporting executive leadership.

With Return on Investment of over 10-fold and with analytics driving strategic planning at USPS OIG, many other government agencies benchmarked Bryan’s work and now use his blueprint to build their own capabilities or to improve their analytics operations in ways that are measurable and transformational.

Bryan’s education is as diverse as his career with his latest studies in leadership and management coming from the Lincoln Leadership Institute and the University of Mary Washington.

Jason Miller is an executive editor and reporter with Federal News Network—an all-news multi-media organization focused specifically on covering the federal government and its contractors.

As executive editor, Jason directs the news coverage of the station and works with reporters to ensure a broad range of coverage of technology, procurement, finance and human resources.

As a reporter, Jason focuses mainly on technology and procurement issues, including cybersecurity, cloud, mobile computing and acquisition policies and programs. Jason hosts the weekly Ask the CIO program where he interviews large and small agency CIOs about their priorities and challenges.

Before coming to FederalNewsRadio in March 2008, he worked at Government Computer News for six years and Federal Computer Week for one year. He covered governmentwide technology issues that focused on people, policy and programs. These include the Bush administration’s e-government initiatives, federal enterprise architecture, cybersecurity and HSPD-12.

From 1998 to 2001, Jason covered small business and minority-owned business contracting issues as the editor of Set-Aside Alert newsletter.

Jason has won several awards during his career, including the SBA’s regional Small Business Journalist of the Year in 2000, and a first place in story telling by the Virginia Press Association in 1997.

Jason lives in Arlington, Va., with his wife, Lita, and two children, Talia, 18, and Elias, 17.

Gerhard enjoys predictive analytics and data mining, especially related to the areas of Fraud Detection, Financial Risk Management, and Health Care outcomes using various analytical methods, working with people, leading change, and timely management of complex projects. His work experience spans both private and government sectors including international experience.

Gerhard is coauthor of the popular book “Mining Your Own Business”. The book targets executives and senior managers who desire to evolve their organizations with better data driven decisions. The book is designed to have dual purpose as an introduction to the subject of data science and as a useful reference for specific, daily guidance. 

Gerhard previously taught at Georgetown University as an adjunct faculty member in the Math and Statistics Master’s degree program. He has also been an instructor for the three-day SAS Business Knowledge Series course "Data Mining: Principles and Best Practices" and an invited speaker at domestic and international conferences.

Gerhard currently serves on the Institute for Advanced Analytics Advisory Board and George Washington University’s Advisory Board for the Business Analytics graduate program. He was named to the NC State Computer Science Department’s “Hall of Fame” in its inaugural year.  

Daniel Porter is the cofounder of BlueLabs, a Washington DC based analytics, data and technology company whose clients include political campaigns, nonprofits and corporations.

Prior to founding BlueLabs, Daniel was Director of Statistical Modeling for the 2012 Obama reelection campaign. His team developed individual level statistical models that were used throughout the campaign for fundraising, media buying and state strategy. These models served two primary purposes: to pinpoint which voters were most likely to take an action or hold a belief (i.e. support the President or turn out to vote) as well as to measure the influence a campaign contact had on an individual's likelihood to take such actions or change their beliefs. Combined, these measures helped the campaign optimize their targeting to maximize their return on investment.

Analyst Sarah Will graduated cum laude from The College of William & Mary in 2010 with a B.S. in Mathematics and a minor in Linguistics. She joined ERI in 2011 in the Washington, D.C. office, where she does work involving fraud detection, data visualization, and text analysis. She previously worked as a Mathematical Statistician for the U.S. Census Bureau. In her free time, she enjoys playing the piano, making jewelry, and is on a recreational floor hockey team. She hopes her knowledge of dead languages (Latin, Old English, and Biblical Hebrew) will come in handy in the near future.

David C. Williams was sworn in as the second independent Inspector General (IG) for the U.S. Postal Service on August 20, 2003. Williams is responsible for a staff of more than 1,100 employees -- located in major offices nationwide - that conducts independent audits and investigations for the largest civilian federal agency that has $67 billion in annual revenues, a workforce of 671,687 employees and contractors and nearly 32,528 facilities.

The office is under the general supervision of the nine Postal Service governors and is not subject to any other Postal Service supervision.

In his last position, Williams served as the Deputy Assistant Administrator for Aviation Operations at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) from August 2002 until August 2003, where he managed the Aviation Inspection Program at federalized airports.

Williams has served as IG for five federal agencies. He was first appointed by President George Bush to serve as IG for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission from 1989 to 1996. President William Clinton next appointed him IG for the Social Security Administration from 1996 to 1998, and then as IG for of the Department of the Treasury in 1998. In 1999, President Clinton named him as the first IG for Tax Administration of the Department of Treasury, where he directed a staff of 1,050 to detect fraud, waste and abuse. In 2001 President George W. Bush named Williams the Acting IG for HUD, while he was also serving at the Department of the Treasury.

Williams served in the U.S. Army Military Intelligence and began his civilian federal career as a special agent with the U.S. Secret Service. Moving up the career ladder, he served as Director of Operations in the Office of Labor Racketeering at the Department of Labor; the President's Commission on Organized Crime; and as Director of the Office of Special Investigations at the U.S. General Accounting Office. Williams is the recipient of the U.S. Bronze Star and the Vietnamese Medal of Honor for service in Vietnam.

A native of Illinois, Williams graduated from Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, Ill., and received his Advanced Degree in Education and a Masters in Education from the University of Illinois in Champaign, Ill. He also attended the U.S. Military Intelligence Academy, the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center and the U.S. Secret Service Training Academy.