Guannan Hao

Guannan has engaged with a range of initiatives to support the residents of Sheffield, whilst also taking up opportunities to develop his technical skills.

Engaging with the local community

At Sheffield Association for the Voluntary Teaching of English, Guannan helped socially isolated individuals improve their confidence in speaking English. He co-led English conversation classes, encouraging students to discuss cultural differences and develop communication skills. He also joined LearnForLife where he taught English to people from diverse backgrounds. He played a key role in fostering an inclusive learning environment, coordinating 5 2-hour sessions with over 5 volunteers in classes of more than 20 students. Through these experiences, Guannan developed his leadership and collaboration abilities.

Guannan also volunteered at Food Works, a community kitchen in Upperthorpe. He learnt new cooking techniques from the kitchen manager and wider team, and learnt how vital community kitchens are in addressing food insecurity whilst fostering a strong sense of togetherness for local residents. He then joined the Helping Environmental Regeneration in Broomhall project where he worked with a local couple to clean overgrown areas and maintain community gardens. This strengthened Guannan’s commitment to environmental care, as well as his commitment to broader values of sustainability and community engagement.

Technical skill development

Alongside his degree, he focused on improving his programming skills, particularly in Python, especially given the importance of big data analytics in empirical finance. He took online tutorials for the PECP certification exam by Python Institute, and gained high scores in Python fundamentals, control flow mechanism, data structure and functions. Through building this strong technical foundation, he is prepared for future challenges in empirical finance academics.

Applying his skills and knowledge and gaining hands-on experience

Guannan applied his technical and theoretical knowledge through two practical research roles in the Management School. In the first project, ‘Variation in the Nature of Innovation’, he developed Python codes to clean, filter, merge and categorise over 50 million US-based patent data with numeric and text labels.

Alongside his studies, Guannan Hao pursued CFA Level 1 certification in financial industry. Throughout the year, Guannan participated in online tutorials and after five months, he passed the exam and received the official certification. The qualification equipped him with a range of advanced quantitative and finance-related theories essential for his future career. 

In the second project, ‘Female Empowerment and Borrower Discouragement’, he took a collaborative approach to reviewing literature, proposing questions and co-developing a proposal with his supervisor. These projects strengthened his abilities to work independently and within a team, both crucial in an academic workplace.

In order to gain further hands-on experience, Guannan joined a global programming competition focusing on advanced machine learning techniques. Throughout the challenge, Guannan took the lead in developing open communication channels, balancing different perspectives and proposing a hybrid ensemble method. He and his team ultimately enhanced the model’s performance and secured a silver medal.

Beginning his PhD journey

Guannan took opportunities to interact with scholars and peers from a range of academic activities. He attended the CRAFiC workshop at the Management School where he networked with renowned scholars from different universities and was inspired by their research during four academic sessions. He also participated in a summer school at Mannheim Business School. Working alongside a team made up of students from five countries, he delivered an AI-driven presentation to a B2B manufacturing company’s CEO.

Guannan will now pursue a PhD at the Management School, through which he aims to tackle financing issues for vulnerable households via alternative financing channels, helping to create a more inclusive and sustainable financial landscape.