What makes a great Trader?

Developing and strengthening the team has been a key focus for Director of Sport’s Trading Danny Greer, over recent months.?We caught up with him to find out more.

Tell us about your own career?

I started as a Tennis Trader in Coral and worked my way up over a 14-year period, to Head of In Play and then Head of Sports Book with Ladbrokes Coral, before the subsequent takeover by Entain.?I joined William Hill two years ago.

What’s been your team’s biggest challenge at William Hill this year?

Our focus on In Play analysis has been a game changer.?If you think about football for example, the odds may change just a handful of times before a match but once the kick-off has happened this increases to 1,000s of price changes across multiple markets.?We needed to become much more sophisticated at monitoring and responding through our In Play analysis.?It’s been the single most important lever to increasing our margin this year.?We’ve done it by developing the tools in house.?Alan Hunter, our Trading Analyst, has created some fantastic new trading and monitoring tools which allow us to define good and bad business in real time – and with pace.

How are you developing talent as part of William Hill’s Build ambition?

There’s a variety of things. For example, we’ve taken on a bunch of new graduates, running workshops to develop their skills as Junior Analysts, as well as coaching and mentoring them.?But also, we are creating a clear pathway for progression.?That’s equally important for juniors coming into the business and for our more senior Traders.

We’re proud to champion?Internals First?in Trading and the majority of all our promotions in the last couple of years have been from within the Trading team.?We have some really great people in the team, and I love that we can offer opportunities.?It’s also important that we attract a diverse range of people to Trading, which has not always been easy, but with a couple of female managers in the team we are making changes. Still a way to go but heading in the right direction.

What are you most passionate about at work?

To create a frictionless experience for our customers - right from when they logon to the website, through simple navigation, easy bet placement and then quick settlement. That’s great customer experience in my eyes and something every single one of us needs to strive to achieve.

Best sporting moment?

Andy Murray winning Wimbledon in 2013.?I was a Tennis Trader at the time and to see a British player win, was fantastic.?Murray is a bit “marmite”, but I admire his ability, drive and what he’s achieved in the sport.