About Me

Introduction

I'm Alex Maarouf, an experienced manager with a Master's of Science in Economics and Management Science majoring in Quantitative Management Science, a field of study focusing on utilizing Information Systems and Data Science in Management.

MSc. dissertation topic was about developing a specialized software pipeline that automatically generates Quizzes from Syllabus slides, helping teachers utilize AI to save time and effort.

Thesis grade: 1,0 (Highest possible grade)

Career Objectives

I am seeking a full-time position for an analyst role or a Project Management role that focuses on data-driven decision-making, and ideally utilizes my skills and knowledge in the field of Data Science and Business Development and Management.

Skills

Language Skills

• English - Fluent - Bilingual Proficiency
• Arabic - Fluent - Native Speaker
• German - B2 - Limited Working Proficiency

Technical and Software Skills

• Data Collection, Cleaning, Analysis and Visualization
• Data Engineering - Feature Engineering
• Predictive Analytics
• Python for Data Science
• NumPy | Pandas | Matplotlib | Seaborn | Scikit-Learn | XGBoost | TensorFlow | Pytorch | Keras | NLTK
• OpenAI API
• R
• ggplot2 | dplyr | tidyr | readr | caret | xgboost | randomForest | ranger | h2o | tensorflow | keras
• SQL
• Power BI
• Office
• Adobe Photoshop
• Adobe Illustator

Profiles

Experience

Founder and Director

Al Maktaba Al Sagheera LLC, Alexandria, Egypt (Remote)
June 2019 - Oct 2024

B2B retail company for stationery and books. Clients are mainly B2C businesses who seek outsourcing procurement, pricing, logistics, display and sales of stationery and books, especially during back-to-school seasons.

Managerial:

• Directed the company’s growth from serving 13 branches and making 2.8m EGP in revenues per year to serving 28 branches + an independent B2C platform with 13.9m EGP in revenues.
• Developed and overlooked the launch of its own B2C e-commerce platform featuring more than 2500 products. (https://alsagheera.com/)
• Developed and overlooked system migration from paper-based invoicing and inventory system to a cloud-based custom Odoo ERP system.
• Designed an efficient warehouse and logistics system suitable for the company's diverse needs.

Technical:

• Designed and implemented data analytics systems to support procurement, pricing, marketing, and estimation of demand using a pipeline written in Python.
• Designed the complete visual branding kit for the company.
• Conducted managerial accounting and financial management measures for clearer data-driven decision-making.
• Supported the website’s front and back-end development for WordPress in times of need.

Head of Retail

Alexandria Publishing, Alexandria, Egypt
June 2017 - May 2019

Publishing House mainly supplying schools.

(https://alexpublishing.com/)

Project Manager and Part-time Editor

Alexandria Publishing, Alexandria, Egypt
March 2014 - May 2019

• Editorial management of the Egyptian-market version of ILTS' Grammar Club. (http://www.ilts.info/1gc.html)

Operations Management Intern

City Centre Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt

February 2018

Received training for operations management for the entire mall including security, firefighting, hygiene, lighting and traffic flow.

Co-founder

Alson Bookstore, Alexandria, Egypt

February 2013 - February 2014

• Founded a small bookstore with a unique business model in the heart of Alexandria.
• Responsible for retail, inventory and financial management.
• Produced a series of IGCSE/GCE test preparation booklets, which were sold in-store and throughout private local educational centers.

Education

Master’s of Economics and Management Science

Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany
Oct 2019 - Jan 2025

Field of study: Quantitative Management Science, Chair of Information Systems.

Dissertation topic: AI for Quiz Generation.

• Leveraging GPT-Based Generative Models for Automated Quiz Generation
• Dissertation followed a Design Science Research framework to design an artifact (Quiztinar) that utilizes researched methods to enhance generative output to be more specific and usable in a teaching environment. The software utilizes a pipeline to apply a two-step editable chain-of-thought prompting technique, mimicking reasoning abilities using the model GPT-4o, a decoder-only model that doesn't utilize any explainable techniques to mimic reasoning out of the box.
• Software: Generate Quizzes from Teaching Slides/Syllabus Material using GPT-4o

Key courses:

• Machine Learning in Marketing

  Master's level course for utilizing latest Machine Learning techniques in a Marketing setting, with a heavy focus on the applied side.

  Course highlight: Biggest project was to develop a predictive model based on simulated basket-data, utilizing technologies often used in NLP, to target individual customers with discount coupons that will yield the biggest profits.

  • Project: Developing a Product2Vec model for more efficient coupon targeting.
• Advanced Data Analytics for Management Support

  Data science course under the Chair of Information Systems that also introduced Python. With a heavy focus on NLP, its final graded project was about predicting the number of claps a medium.com article would score based on the available variables. The project used real scraped data.

  • Project: Utilizing NLP and predictive analytics tools to predict the number of claps on a Medium article.
• Business Analytics and Data Science
• Master-level introductory course to Data Science with a heavy focus on using R.
• Applied Predictive Analytics Seminar
• Information systems seminar with the main focus on exploring up-to-date data-science techniques.

Bachelor of Business Administration

Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport, Alexandria, Egypt
2015-2019

Field of study: Finance and Accounting

Final grade: 3.79/4