COVID-19 impacts have challenged so many of us in so many ways this year. It’s hard not to get bogged down in the crisis of it all — hard instead to remember that necessity is the mother of invention, and to focus on innovation during these unprecedented times.  At Evolytics, one team member has truly embraced the challenge, leaned into the uncertainties, and created some meaningful solutions.

We’re excited to share the work that Krissy Tripp, our Director of Decision Science, has done to address COVID-19 challenges.

Helping the analyst community

As Krissy began seeing changes in her data as the COVID pandemic developed, she not only began thinking differently about optimization strategies to act on today; she also began thinking to the future, and how COVID impacts would need to be quantified and accounted for in data analysis.  With this need in mind, Krissy documented a timeline of major world and regional happenings related to COVID, thus creating the first iteration of Evolytics’ COVID-19 Calendar for Analysts. 

The calendar was immediately useful to Evolytics’ analysts as they correlated changes in their clients’ data to changes in the COVID environment — increased on-site search for specific product types as WHO guidance changed, or increased interest in web pages that listed store hours during stay-at-home orders.  The long-term need for the calendar was also apparent, as our team worked with clients on how to adjust forecasts and year-over-year comparisons.

Seeing the value of the calendar firsthand, Krissy and the team supporting the calendar opted to make the dataset available to the entire analytics community for free.

Helping next-generation analysts

While Krissy and the rest of the Evolytics team were fortunate to have job stability during the COVID crisis, Krissy recognized that many were not so lucky.  

When Evolytics offered a work-from-home stipend to each of its team members for new office equipment and supplies, Krissy opted to pay her stipend forward.  She used half of her stipend to sponsor Digital Analytics Association memberships for five students at her alma mater, the University of Missouri, who had lost their job or internship offers due to COVID-19.  She used the other half of her stipend to purchase gift cards to local restaurants for her team.

Industry recognition

Krissy’s contributions to the analytics community have been recognized by the Digital Analytics Association (DAA). We are excited to announce that she has been selected as a finalist for this year’s Difference Maker Quantie Award.

The Difference Maker award is awarded to one recipient each year who “makes a difference in their community or in the world.”  Krissy was named a finalist based on a vote from the DAA membership, and we couldn’t agree more!