Hi All,
Last week Thursday (23 Sep 2021) I submitted my application for the Stage 1. Today (Tuesday 28 Sep 2021) I got a negative feedback and in the explanations it seem the reviewing person didn’t properly look through my evidences and the ones he looked at he came to an incorrect conclusion on them.
I am looking for some guidance on how to do a proper appeal and will be very grateful if anyone more experienced than me on this can generously look through my documents and the feedback. 
I am willing to email the person the documents and Tech Nation’s feedback. Email me at freemansh2000[at]gmail[dot]com
Some summary though:
Applied for Exceptional Talent
My Tech Area:
Data Science and FinTech
Recommendation Letter 1: From the CEO of a product-led company that I have done some data analysis and BI solutions for. His company is the biggest in his niche in Sub-Saharan Africa and does millions of USD user transactions in a month. He attested to my deep expert level, mentoring programs for over 3000 people and existing products I have built (with links that can be verified online)
Recommendation Letter 2: From the CEO of an North American company that is listing on the stock exchange and I did financial modeling/valuation and analysis for which is being used for the capital raise. He attested to my fintech skills, global recognition and published works and entrepreneurial skills.
Recommendation Letter 3: From Managing Partner of a private equity firm that manages a multi-million Euro fund and invests in startup in Africa. I handled data analysis, financial valuation and investment structuring, developed product to automate/standardise the startups financial analysis and valuation. She attested to my work with them and value I added regarding creating an e-product that automates the valuation analysis and building courses that their new recruits take to understand data analysis and financial modeling
Tech Nation Feedback on the Recommendations:
His letters of recommendation are not from individuals, who themselves would be considered to be exceptional talents themselves. Many of them are from individuals who have had very limited direct exposure to the applicant in a working environment. And, their observations are largely summaries of the information contained in the applicant’s personal statement and provide very little insight to explain why the applicant is exceptional.
Mandatory Criteria Evidences:
- A global award from Microsoft (https://mvp.microsoft.com/) (this was discredited as a general recognition which Microsoft gives partners, which is not so as it is given to high ranking industry experts who are independently vetted and has nothing to do with partnership with Microsoft)
- MBA and MSc Financial Engineering (saw no comment about this)
- International Speaking Engagements (again discredited as all Microsoft events that I used to promote my company. But they were all tech events by different non-Microsoft technical communities/bodies where I presented on my own tech expert area and never advertised my company/services there. That my tech expertise and tools are Python, Azure, Microsoft BI tools, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Power BI doesn’t mean I was marketing Microsoft. The data science and BI space is so vast that one picks specific tools and master them rather than learning all types of tools. And for the types of analytics and management BI I do, there are no great opensource tools. You are either using Oracle tools, Microsoft tools, IBM tools or Google tools. And it’s a very curious thing to be an expert on them all. So naturally I will do tech talks and demonstrations on the tools I have mastery of.
Optional Criteria 1 Evidences:
Financial Markets Data App and Chatbot that I developed and is being used by many companies/people (conveniently not mentioned in the feedback)
Evidence of revenues from my online training courses on BI, financial valuations and analytics, revenues from digital financial markets data analytics web app and other digital products (again, not mentioned in the feedback)
Financial Market Data Platform, which is fully functional and revenue generating, providing investment analysts analytics on the financial markets (again, ignored)
Company Registration and Tax (they went to the company website and concluded that I only do training and consultancy services even though the other evidences show I have other tech products. I can’t have all my tech products under one name/website).
Optional Criteria 2 Evidences:
Technical books published which are doing well on Amazon (they again say I published the books to promote my business, which baffles me. If you are a frontend developer are you going to publish a book on cybersecurity because your day job is frontend development. The books are purely technical books to advance the knowledge and application skills of people growing in the BI and analytics space.)
My Online Courses (again, that they are promoting my business. Over 40,000 people have taken the courses over the last 6 years and the rating is between 4.6 and 4.8 aggregate for the 3 courses. Why would anyone buy a course on data analytics only to watch the trainer promote his business rather than impact the knowledge you want to acquire. Interestingly, there’s no where in the videos I promoted my business beyond displaying my profile in the intro video.)
Additional Recommendation Letter from a peer and CEO in another country (they said no peer endorsed me)
Last paragraph in the Tech Nation feedback
The applicant has also not provided a compelling reason why he wants to come to the UK other than offering data science and analytics solutions to the UK. He has not developed any new products and it appears that he wishes to simply offer consultancy services that are similar to what is currently being offered in his home market.
The only way I think anyone would come to that conclusion is if they: 1) disregard the financial markets app I built and is being used by 1000s of people 2) disregard the chatbots I built that allows you get interactive access to stocks, macroeconomic and investment data 3) ignore the web platform I built which already generates sales and is the only one of its type in the country 4) ignore the online courses as if they are not digital products too 5) ignore the mention of trading algorithms powered by my analytics engines and MSc research work which I am unable to complete the implementation in my home country because of platform restrictions (the platforms I need to use do no allow registrations from residents of my current country)
Apologies for the long post, just wanted to give as much info to get helpful responses. And if you don’t mind helping me, email me at freemansh2000[at]gmail[dot]com and I will forward you all my documents and actual feedback from Tech Nation.
