Question 1

Do clients actually deal with senior people, or does a senior person pitch and a junior team deliver?

Accepted Answer

Clients work directly with the people who do the work. We do not run a bait-and-switch model where a senior consultant sells the engagement and then hands off to a team the client has not met. The people in the kick-off meeting are, in the main, the people still in the room at go-live.

Question 2

Does Hopton hire for technical skill alone, or also for client communication?

Accepted Answer

Both, deliberately. A consultant who can build an excellent semantic model but cannot explain a trade-off to a non-technical finance director is only half as useful in mid-market engagements, where the client team is rarely made up of data specialists. We hire and develop people for both halves of that skill set.

Question 3

Does Hopton offer graduate or junior roles?

Accepted Answer

Where they exist, junior roles are structured around pairing with senior practice leads on real client delivery from early on, rather than an extended internal-only training period disconnected from client work. This reflects the flat structure: even junior team members are exposed to client engagements quickly.

Question 4

Does the same consultant handle both the technical build and the client relationship?

Accepted Answer

Often, yes, particularly on smaller engagements. On larger ones, a lead consultant or project manager owns the relationship while specialists (a data architect, a Power BI developer, a Fabric engineer) contribute to specific workstreams, all visible to the client rather than working behind the scenes unannounced.

Question 5

Does the team hold formal certifications?

Accepted Answer

Yes, across Microsoft's data and analytics certification paths, alongside Level 3 Pyramid Analytics accreditation at a company level. We treat certifications as one useful signal of capability rather than the whole picture; the work delivered for clients is the more important reference point.

Question 6

Does the team include dedicated project managers, or do consultants manage their own delivery?

Accepted Answer

Both models exist depending on engagement size. Larger, longer engagements get a dedicated project manager coordinating the cross-practice team. Smaller or shorter engagements are often managed directly by the lead consultant. Either way, clients get a single clear point of contact for day-to-day communication.

Question 7

Does the team work on internal products as well as client engagements?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Hopton Lens, our internal AI Q&A tool built on Power BI semantic models, and the Hopton Insight Series of published whitepapers are both built and maintained by the same team that delivers client work, rather than by a separate internal product function.

Question 8

How big is the Hopton team?

Accepted Answer

Around thirteen people at the time of writing, growing as engagements justify it. We are deliberate about growth rate: we grow when the work demands it rather than building capacity ahead of demand and then needing to fill it.

Question 9

How do career paths work at a company this size?

Accepted Answer

Progression is tied to widening technical scope and taking on more direct client and delivery responsibility, rather than climbing a large formal ladder with many intermediate titles. At thirteen people, most career growth is visible and negotiated directly with leadership rather than governed by a rigid framework.

Question 10

How do we evaluate consultant individual capability?

Accepted Answer

Talk to them. Most consultancies will arrange a conversation between you and the prospective lead consultants before contract signing. Ten minutes of technical conversation surfaces capability faster than any CV. The questions to ask: how would you approach our specific situation; what is the riskiest part of an engagement like this; what would you do differently from the previous attempt at this work that we have already had. Consultants who answer specifically and demonstrate genuine thinking are stronger than those who give generic answers.

Question 11

How do we find out who would work on our engagement before signing anything?

Accepted Answer

Ask us directly in the first conversation. We are happy to name the likely team composition for a prospective engagement before any commitment is made, because continuity of team is one of the things clients most often want reassurance on.

Question 12

How do we get in touch with the team?

Accepted Answer

Email hello@hoptonanalytics.com describing what you are trying to achieve. The first conversation is exploratory and typically happens within a week, and we will tell you honestly which parts of the team would likely be involved if the engagement goes ahead.

Question 13

How does the team communicate with clients day to day?

Accepted Answer

Typically through a shared Teams channel for ongoing dialogue, with weekly or bi-weekly formal progress reviews and structured working sessions at key design and decision points. Clients usually describe feeling close to the work rather than waiting for scheduled updates to find out what has happened.

Question 14

How is the team organised?

Accepted Answer

Around practice areas rather than rigid job titles: data architecture, Power BI and Fabric development, Business Central and ERP-adjacent analytics, project management, and reporting and visualisation design. A typical client engagement draws a small cross-practice team of three to five people rather than assigning one generalist.

Question 15

How large is the team?

Accepted Answer

Around thirteen people at the time of writing, growing as engagements scale. The team is structured for mid-market consultancy work: enough specialisation to cover the breadth of the Microsoft data and analytics stack, small enough that everyone knows everyone, and lean enough that we can move quickly. We grow when the work justifies it rather than building capacity ahead of demand.

Question 16

Is Hopton hiring?

Accepted Answer

Periodically, and always for reasons tied to actual client demand rather than speculative growth. Roles tend to open across Power BI and Fabric development, data architecture, and project management. Current openings, where they exist, are listed on hoptonanalytics.com.

Question 17

Is the team based remotely, in an office, or a mix?

Accepted Answer

A mix. The team is largely Leeds-based with a London presence, and most day-to-day work is delivered remotely, with periodic in-person time on client sites at key points such as kick-off, design workshops, and go-live.

Question 18

Is the team full-time employed or largely contractors?

Accepted Answer

The core team is employed rather than built primarily from a contractor bench. We occasionally bring in specialist contractors for specific short-term needs, but the people clients work with day to day are Hopton employees who carry institutional knowledge of the client's estate from one phase of an engagement to the next.

Question 19

What about consistency of the team across phases?

Accepted Answer

Important. Engagements that change team composition between Establish and Build phases lose context, slow down, and produce uneven outcomes. The pattern to look for is a consistent core team across the engagement lifecycle, with specialists added for specific workstreams as needed. The pattern to avoid is a small senior team that designs in the Establish phase and hands over to a different team for Build. Ask explicitly about team continuity and verify it in the references.

Question 20

What does Hopton look for in a new hire?

Accepted Answer

Genuine technical depth in some part of the Microsoft data and analytics stack, the ability to explain technical trade-offs to non-technical stakeholders, and a track record (or clear aptitude) for mid-market delivery specifically, which has a different rhythm to enterprise or start-up work. We also look for people comfortable working directly with clients rather than being shielded behind account management layers.

Question 21

What happens if a team member leaves mid-engagement?

Accepted Answer

Because the team structure favours small, cross-practice pods rather than single points of failure, another team member with visibility of the engagement picks up continuity. We are candid with clients if a handover is happening rather than pretending nothing has changed.

Question 22

What is the culture like at Hopton?

Accepted Answer

Direct, delivery-focused, and allergic to unnecessary hierarchy. The flat structure exists because Simon's experience at a larger Dynamics partner showed how much friction gets added when decisions have to travel up and down a management chain before reaching the client. We have tried to build the opposite of that.

Question 23

What is the leadership team's day-to-day involvement in engagements?

Accepted Answer

Leadership stays close to delivery rather than operating purely at a strategic distance. Simon and Shauna are both regularly in client meetings, particularly at kick-off, architecture design, and go-live stages, alongside the practice leads and consultants doing the hands-on work.

Question 24

What is the team's background?

Accepted Answer

Most of the senior team comes from the Microsoft Dynamics partner ecosystem or from in-house data and BI roles in mid-market organisations. The technical specialisation covers data architecture, semantic modelling, Power BI development, Fabric workloads, BC analytics, and machine learning. Several team members hold relevant Microsoft certifications. We hire for both technical depth and the ability to communicate clearly with non-technical stakeholders.

Question 25

What is the team's professional background?

Accepted Answer

Most of the senior team comes from the Microsoft Dynamics partner ecosystem (Azzure IT, Tecman, and similar firms) or from in-house data and BI roles inside mid-market organisations. That mix matters: it means the team has sat on both the consultancy side and the client side of exactly the kind of analytics problem Hopton solves.

Question 26

What should we ask about team composition?

Accepted Answer

Five questions. Who will be the lead architect on the engagement? Who will be the project manager? Who will be the senior developer or principal consultant? What are their CVs and recent project experience? Will they be available consistently throughout the engagement or are they shared across multiple? The answers should be specific names with verifiable backgrounds, not generic role titles. A consultancy that cannot answer these questions, or answers vaguely, is signalling that the team will be allocated based on availability rather than fit.

Question 27

What technical skills does the team hold?

Accepted Answer

Data architecture and modelling, Power BI development (DAX, data modelling, report and dashboard design), Microsoft Fabric workloads (lakehouse, warehouse, data engineering, real-time intelligence, data science), Azure Data Factory and Azure data services, Business Central analytics and integration, and machine learning and AI-augmented analytics. Several team members hold relevant Microsoft certifications, and the team holds Level 3 Pyramid Analytics accreditation.

Question 28

Who else is on the leadership team?

Accepted Answer

Shauna Duffy is Director of Delivery and People, responsible for client delivery and the team. Bryn Jones leads commercially. Alongside them sit senior practice leads across data architecture, project management, and reporting. The structure is deliberately flat for a firm our size.

Question 29

Who founded Hopton Analytics?

Accepted Answer

Simon and Yvette Devine, who founded the business in 2021. Simon is Managing Director. Before founding Hopton, Simon was Operations Director at Azzure IT, a Microsoft Dynamics partner that was acquired by Advania. The Hopton thesis came out of his observation that mid-market organisations on the Microsoft Dynamics stack consistently struggled with the analytics layer above the ERP.

Question 30

Why does it matter who actually delivers the engagement?

Accepted Answer

Because the calibre of the delivery team determines the calibre of the outcome. Many consultancies pitch with senior partners and deliver with junior teams. The pitch describes what the senior team would produce; the delivery produces what the junior team can produce. The gap is often material. The right diligence question is not 'who is leading this engagement' but 'who specifically will be doing the work, and can we meet them before signing'.

Question 31

Why keep the team this size rather than scaling faster?

Accepted Answer

Because the things that make mid-market delivery good - direct senior involvement, everyone knowing the client's context, fast internal decision-making - erode as headcount grows without matching demand. We would rather stay the right size for the work in front of us than chase scale for its own sake.

Question 32

Will we have the same team throughout an engagement?

Accepted Answer

In the great majority of cases, yes. Continuity of the same three-to-five-person team from kick-off through to go-live is a deliberate design choice, because losing institutional knowledge of a client's data estate mid-engagement is one of the more common ways delivery quality slips at other consultancies.

Our team - frequently asked questions

Can’t find what you’re looking for?