I engaged with hundreds of leaders to write this book, whether through interviews, formal contribution, or informal collaboration. I am indebted to many for helping me to complete this book.

I would like to thank Elise Amyot, who reviewed all chapters and case studies contained in this book. Elise's insightful, constructive, and invaluable feedback helped make the book easier to understand for all readers.

I would also like to thank Kim Lascelles, who reviewed my two previous books and helped by reviewing the first proposal of this book as well as some early chapters. Kim is a key pillar for the writing of my books.

Writing a book with a full-time job is a big undertaking. It would not have been possible without the support and input of other professionals, the hundreds of industry leaders and experts who generously participated in my research and shared their unstructured data analytics (UDA) journeys. You will see contributions and great insights throughout the book, in the form of quotes and concrete examples of how they make UDA work. I would like to thank all of them. The following list identifies many to whom I am indebted:

Foreword to the Book

• Paul Zikopoulos, Vice President Big Data and Cognitive Systems—IBM

Interviews and Case Studies

• Wayne Thompson, Chief Data Scientist, SAS Data Science Technologies—SAS
• Fiona McNeill, Global Technology Product Marketing Manager—SAS
• Suzanne Sprajcar Beldyck, Head of Content and Communications—SAS Canada
• Heather Johnson, Manager, Analytics, Assets, Market Development and Insights—IBM
• Eugen Wen, Vice President, Group Advanced Analytics—Manulife. Thanks a lot for your continuing support.
• Stephani E. Kingsmill, Executive Vice President, Human Resources—Manulife Financial
• Cindy Forbes, Executive Vice President and Chief Analytics Officer—Manulife Financial
• Vishwa Kolla, Assistant Vice President, Head of Advanced Analytics—John Hancock Financial Services
• Winston Lin, Director, Strategy and Analytics—Houston Rockets
• Tommy Balcetis, Director of Basketball Strategy and Analytics— Denver Nuggets
• Keith Boyarsky Director of Analytics—Toronto Raptors
• Yongzheng (Tiger) Zhang, Senior Manager, Data Analytics/Data Mining—LinkedIn
• François Laviolette, Director, Laval University Big Data Research Centre—Université Laval
• Seth Grimes, President and Principal Consultant—Alta Plana Corporation; Founding Chair—Sentiment Analysis Symposium
• Greta Roberts, Chief Executive Officer and Cofounder—Talent Analytics, Corp.
• Pasha Roberts, Chief Scientist and Cofounder—Talent Analytics, Corp.
• Diane Deperrois, General Manager South-East & Oversea Regions—AXA France
• Mateo Cavasotto, Cofounder and Chief Executive Officer—Emi Labs
• Doug Klinger, Chief Executive Officer and Member, Board of Directors—Zelis Healthcare
• Mark Stoever, Chief Executive Officer—2020 Inc. former CEO Monster Worldwide Inc.
• Arun Chidambaram, Global Head Talent Analytics—Pfizer
• Troy Barnette, Customer Engagement Executive SAP; former Sr Director Corporate Service Business Relationship Lead at Under Armour
• Rell B. Robinson, Senior HRIS and HR Analytics Professional—Bloomberg
• Ian Bailie, former: Senior Director, People Planning, Analytics, and Tools—CISCO; current: Cofounder—270 degrees
• Dawn Klinghoffer, General Manager, HR Business Insights—Microsoft
• Joanie Courtney, President and Chief Operating Officer, Professional Division—EmployBridge
• Bruno Aziza, Chief Marketing Officer—AtScale
• Louis Gagnon, Chief Executive Officer—MyBrainSolutions
• Art Papas, Chief Executive Officer and Cofounder—Bullhorn
• Gregory Piatetsky-Shapiro, President and Editor— KDnuggets
• Ian O'Keefe, Managing Director, Global Head of Workforce Analytics— JPMorgan Chase & Co.
• Vasu Nagalingam, Director, Personal Wealth & Retirement—Merrill Lynch
• Hugues Bertin, Chief Financial and Risk Officer, head of Digital Transformation—BNP Parisbas Cardif
• Stéphane Brutus, Ph.D., RBC Professor in Motivation and Employee Performance—Concordia University
• Jennifer Priestley, Ph.D., Associate Dean, Graduate College—Kennesaw State University
• Paul Mason, Senior Manager, Corporate Education—University of California, Berkeley
• Chantal Czerednikow, Dentist—Centre for Innovation, Montreal Children's Hospital, McGill University
• John Houston, Principal and US Data Science Offering Leader—Deloitte
• Amel Arhab, Senior Business Analytics Leader and Strategist, Senior Manager—Deloitte Consulting
• Abby Mehta, Ph.D, Senior Vice President, Marketing Insights and Media Analytics—Bank of America
• James Gallman, People Analytics Director—Boeing
• Fanta Berete, Responsable Pôle Devp. Ressources Humaines et Formation—CCI France
• Bryan Richardson, Global Practice Manager, Risk Advanced Analytics—McKinsey & Company
• Paul Fletcher, Senior Vice President Marketing—Aviva Canada
• Edmund Balogun, Project Director—IQPC
• Eric Siegel, Founder—Predictive Analytics World Conference Series
• All members of APM (Association pour le Progres du Management), a French CEO association with more than 6,500 members. Thanks for your useful insights, contribution with interviews, and business challenges you provided during our executive workshops that inspired some adjustments to the book.

Thanks to the members of the Monster Worldwide team:

Matt O'Connor, John McLaughlin, Claude Yama, Meredith Hanrahan, Pat Manzo, Javid Muhammedali, Steve LeClair, and the Monster product team for their support and assistance with some content for this book.

I am also grateful for the support of the Manulife executive team, who found some time for my interviews despite their busy schedule. And special thanks to Eugene Wen for his continuing support and insightful inputs that help to reshape some parts of this book. And Angela Costa for helping to set up all interviews with some executives at Manulife. And Eugene Wen-Eugene your support and insightful inputs were extremely invaluable and helped to reshape some parts of this book.

I would like to thank my friends for their support: Nathalie de Repentigny for the continuing support for all of my major projects, Ryan Jung, Alejandro Del Moral, Eugene Wen, Eric de Larminat(for your support to find creative solutions to successfully address unplanned challenges), Kim Vu, Oumar Mbaye, Alfonso Troisi, Karima Ahrab, Marc Bienstock, Ezana Raswork, Sean Dalton, Karim Salabi, Diawo Diallo, Eugene Robitaille, Mario Bottone, Mr and Mrs Guy, Siroux, and Guy François (my personal Abs coach at YMCA) and his colleague Rick Padmore.

I would also like to thank my family for their support: my parents, my mom Martha and my dad Samuel, for nurturing my passion for mathematics and teaching me the value of hard work at an early age; my brother Faustin (Moise), my sister Betty, my cousin David, my niece Marthe, my aunt Marie Christine, and my uncle Jackson (Isaac).

Special thanks to my two daughters, Roxane and Sofia, and my wife Marjolaine for their patience and understanding while I was robbing family time to research and write this book, hiding in the basement. Your love and support are key pillars to this achievement.