One thing I am very thankful for, is honest feedback. In a world of constant change, I see it as crucial to get feedback on my performance as frequent as possible. Here is a sample of my feedback collection, which is also available on LinkedIn.


Michael is a state of the art economist and data scientist with cutting edge knowledge, not “only” from an academic perspective but he is also very hands-on in business. He can improve businesses by applying and deploying artificial intelligence applications to improve value. He can connect and team up with corporate leaders, colleagues and peers at all levels and accelerate the digital transformation.

It is inspiring to work with him. He is brilliant in connecting with people of different cultures, maybe as a consequence of his international exposure over his whole life. If you want to roll out applications on a global level, Michael can and will make it happen.

Wilhelm Bielert, PhD

(CDO, PremierTech, Canada)

Michael is one of the smartest and hardest working people I know. He is deeply passionate about data science and does not only have a deep knowledge about predictive statistics and AI, he is a particularly good researcher and has broad knowledge and experience about AI application for multiple industries. His behavioral economics background makes him unique in the AI applications space. His ability to translate between data scientists, engineers and business stakeholders is unique and his proven track record of creating business value is outstanding. Michael is down to earth, honest, and always tries to motivate people to reach their highest goal. Those characteristics make him the perfect leader, leading by example. I loved working with Michael and hope that our paths will cross again someday.

Kadir Hallac, PhD

(Senior Director, Aetna/CVS, USA)

I worked with Michael whilst he was head of data science at TD Reply. Michael’s solutions have helped marketers and CEOs in blue chip companies such as L’Oreal, Audi, Bayer and Telefonica, better understand marketing’s effect on sales. The fact that he can converse eloquently with some many diverse stakeholders, gives you an idea of his talents.

Dominic Stinton

(Partner, Reply, UK)

I got to know Michael when he was visiting the University of Adelaide as researcher while I was doing PhD. Michael is an incredible behavioral economist and teacher. He is knowledgeable in so many fields of economics, business and marketing, psychology and especially statistics/advanced analytics. Michael has been a great mentor and friend and I am so thankful for all of his contributions to my research and his advice.

Mila Tarabashkina, PhD

(Researcher, UWA, Australia)

I had the pleasure to work with Michael during my time at TD Reply. We worked side by side for several fortune 500 companies (from automotive, via ICT to FMCG and more) providing them answers to their business questions – always derived by a data-driven approaches. It was always great fun to work with Michael as he was not only the (nerdy) data scientist digging into data lakes or coding applications in R. He also mastered to keep the perspective in overall business context asking the right questions challenging the status quo. Equipped with these skills we were able to execute projects in Asia, Europe and the US working with stakeholders at executive level. Besides the “everyday” project work Michael (and his team) was driven to define and develop products for licensing from the scratch – Thanks to always straying to extend his knowledge reading (data science) publications. I enjoyed working with Michael a lot, miss the times buddy!

Henry Lundt

(Senior Associate, Berylls Mad Media, Germany)