Data Strategy & Analytics Leadership for UK Organisations
Strategy direction, without the full-time overhead. We provide roadmaps, operating models and senior advisory to guide your data function.
Talk to our strategy teamAnalytics Maturity Model
What we offer
Provide you with the strategic direction of a 3–5 person team, serving the thinking and experience your organisation needs.
Analytics Strategy
We help you define a clear analytics direction - what to measure, what to build, and how to sequence investment for maximum impact.
Analytics Roadmap
A detailed, deliverable roadmap that bridges your current-state analytics and your desired analytics operating model.
Fractional CDO / Head of Data
Senior analytics leadership on a fractional basis - embedded in your team, driving strategy, managing delivery and holding accountability.
Operating Model Design
We define the right analytics operating model for your organisation - roles, responsibilities, governance and capability development.
Maturity Assessment
An honest, structured review of your current analytics capability - where you are, where you need to be, and what it will take to get there.
Board-level Advisory
Senior advisory support to help leadership teams ask the right questions, interpret analytics outputs and make data-led decisions confidently.
How it works
How Fractional Leadership works
Immersion
We spend time understanding your business, data landscape, stakeholder environment and strategic priorities.
Strategy
We develop a clear analytics strategy, roadmap and delivery plan - aligned to your business model and organisational realities.
Embedded delivery
We sit alongside your internal teams, leading delivery groups, managing third parties and ensuring accountable delivery is a constant.
Transition
When you’re ready, we build an internal capability that lets your own team take ownership with clear roles, documentation and capability.
The people behind this work
Our fractional leads have held senior data positions across multiple industries. They bring real-world experience — not theoretical frameworks.
Simon Devine
Managing Director
Simon founded Hopton Analytics in 2022 with a clear objective: to build a delivery-focused data and analytics consultancy that mid-market businesses could rely on. He leads the business from the front, staying close to client work and guiding the team.
Murray Wood
Senior Pyramid Analytics Consultant
Murray has a PhD in polymer chemistry and fifteen years delivering analytics in regulated industries including banking, energy, pharmaceuticals and telecoms. He is at his best early in an engagement, framing the problem and weighing the options.
Shauna Duffy
Director of Professional Services
Shauna has been with Hopton from the beginning and helped build the delivery function and shape the firm into what it is today. She leads professional services, setting the standards the team works to and partnering with client leadership on the engagements that matter most.
Craig Such
Non-Executive Chair
Craig is an entrepreneur, business founder and board-level executive who joins Hopton as Non-Executive Chair in an advisory capacity. His role is to guide and challenge the leadership team as the business grows, bringing outside perspective.
Flexible leadership
Fractional CDO & Head of Data
Not every organisation needs a full-time Chief Data Officer. Our fractional CDO service gives you senior analytics leadership - strategy, stakeholder management, team development - on a part-time or interim basis.
Typically one to three days per week, on a rolling engagement. We have placed fractional data leaders with mid-market businesses across retail, construction and professional services.
Talk to us about fractional leadership →What’s included
Common questions
Strategy & leadership questions
What is CDO as a Service?
CDO as a Service gives your organisation the strategic data leadership of a Chief Data Officer without the cost or commitment of a full-time hire. We act as your senior data leader - setting strategy, managing stakeholders and overseeing delivery on a flexible, part-time basis.
What is an Analytics Maturity Assessment?
A structured review of where your organisation sits on the analytics maturity curve - covering data quality, tooling, governance, skills and decision-making culture. It produces a written report and a prioritised roadmap. Most assessments take two to three weeks.
How do you deliver a data strategy?
We run a discovery process with senior stakeholders to understand business priorities, current data capabilities and gaps. The output is a written strategy document with a three-year roadmap, a technology recommendation, and a delivery sequencing plan tied to business outcomes.
What is the difference between a data strategy and an analytics roadmap?
A data strategy covers the full picture - people, governance, technology and culture. An analytics roadmap is the sequenced delivery plan that follows from the strategy. We deliver both, either together or in sequence depending on where you are starting from.
Also explore
Analytics Acceleration Programme
The structured delivery programme that puts strategy into practice across your organisation.
ServiceWhat We Do
The full picture of how Hopton delivers governed analytics — from platform to reporting to AI.
AIAI and Data Consultancy
How Hopton approaches AI — foundations first, then applied intelligence where it changes decisions.
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Need strategic data leadership?
Let’s discuss how fractional analytics leadership could work inside your organisation.
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