Jim Powell

Career

From consultant to analytics leader

Thirteen years of consulting across eleven companies taught me to find the signal fast. Nine-plus years at Cox taught me to build a team that keeps finding it.

Twenty years, three chapters

20052010201520202025Cox CommunicationsSr. Manager, Financial Analysis & Data StrategyCox CommunicationsLead Data Scientist, EngineeringCGI (consulting)Business Analyst, Metrics & Project Management
Bars span start to end year. Cox Lead Data Scientist (2015–17) is the short middle bar; CGI includes embedded work at AT&T, BellSouth, Cox and others.

11 companies across 6 industries

  • TelecomAT&TBellSouthOLDECox
  • ManufacturingNovelisAir Liquide
  • InsuranceNorthwestern MutualCigna
  • TechnologyCGI
  • HealthcareCMS (Medicare/Medicaid)
  • BankingDeutsche Bank
From my work-history notes. Telecom is the home base, but the same analytics muscle has worked in six sectors.

Current role

Sr. Manager, Financial Analysis & Data Strategy · Cox Communications

Feb 2017 – present · Remote from Alabama, regularly in Atlanta

  • Established and lead a team of analysts and data scientists; 30% efficiency gain despite 8% annual growth in support requests.
  • Designed bottom-up forecast models so executives see both business performance and plan health, with a monthly storytelling summary.
  • Led the analytics behind Cost per Mile reduction (15% year-over-year) and, in 2025, the KPIs that reduced Construction CPM 10% and saved about $1.0M of Network Reliability opex.
  • Automated IRR and payback analysis for new-build development and applied machine learning to project 10-year growth.
  • Built an enterprise financial reporting data warehouse on on-premise tools.
  • Finance AI liaison: trained peers, hosted AI sessions, and built the “Jim from Finance” agent.
  • Mentor to analysts across Finance and Technology; helped leaders build staffing business cases and cost-distribution models.

Earlier roles

Lead Data Scientist, Engineering

Cox · 2015–2017

Built Informatica ETL workflows and Tableau dashboards giving leaders a view of network health. This laid the groundwork for the Analytic Center of Excellence and the Network Reliability team.

Business Analyst and Project Manager

CGI · 2005–2015

Metrics, estimation and process improvement for AT&T, BellSouth, Cox, Air Liquide, Northwestern Mutual, Cigna and more. Speaker at HDI and SEPG conferences.

Timeline

  1. 2005Graduates from Auburn (Information Systems Management, CS minor) and joins CGI, supporting BellSouth.
  2. 2007Builds metrics and estimation programs for AT&T. Severity 1 and 2 defects fall 55% in a year, and CGI wins AT&T’s 2008 Supplier of Excellence Award.
  3. 2008Air Liquide service desk work: root-cause analysis lifts first-call resolution 30% and customer satisfaction 7%. Co-presents at SEPG.
  4. 2009Presents at the Help Desk Institute conference. Serves as president of his fraternity corporate board.
  5. 2011Embedded at Cox as a business analyst for wireless, retail, care and sales BI.
  6. 2012Leads the U.S. metrics and estimation team at CGI.
  7. 2015Joins Cox as Lead Data Scientist: Informatica ETL and Tableau network-health dashboards.
  8. 2017Moves to Cox Finance and starts building the analytics team and a 3-year data strategy.
  9. 2023Becomes Chairman of Deacons at Northbrook Church (through 2024).
  10. 2025Becomes the Finance AI liaison; builds the "Jim from Finance" agent and an in-house analytics platform.

Education, credentials and skills

Education

Auburn University, B.S. Information Systems Management, Computer Science minor (2005).

Certifications

Lean Six Sigma Green Belt · ITIL v3 Foundations · QSM SLIM Suite · CMMI v3

Tools

Python, SQL (Oracle, Snowflake), FastAPI, React and TypeScript, Tableau, Power BI, Informatica, Oracle BI, machine-learning frameworks, Claude Code.

Competencies

FP&A, forecasting and scenario modeling, business cases (MIRR, payback, ROI), KPI design, data strategy and warehousing, executive storytelling, process improvement.