The Biggest Pitfalls of New Analytical Initiatives

Our guest Andrzej Wolosewicz has had years of experience helping companies define and build machine learning and analytical solutions that have a measurable impact on the business, and he shares with us his experience and expertise. He shares with us the biggest pitfalls he sees companies fall into over an over as they try to implement these initiatives.The problem was there was a lot of activity every month that they were doing, but in terms of progressing, their analytic capabilities were really kind of being able to to grow and be more effective. They weren't, they weren't able to do that. As the saying goes, they had a lot of action but not a lot of progress.Ginette Methot: I'm Ginette.Curtis Seare: And I'm Curtis, and you are listening to Data Crunch, a podcast about how applied data science, machine learning, and artificial intelligence are changing the world.Andre Wolosewicz: My name is Andre Wolosewicz. I am currently the director of sales at HEXstream. We are Chicago based analytics and data consultancy. But this is kind of the, the latest step on my journey. So I actually started out coming straight out of college into a, a predictive modeling startup. And this would have been in the late nineties. Artificial intelligence at the time was, was a big buzzword as it is today. And we were looking at being able to do fairly advanced modeling of systems, but actually looking at the data as being the model. So if you were looking at uh, everything from a jet engine to the human body to complex refineries, we didn't necessarily understand all the nuances of how they ran, but we had all the data and so we would use that data to build out those models. And then I ended up going from that actually flipping into the, into the other side of the world around program management.So, not so much doing the analysis, but understanding how the analytics and designs and all of those steps fit together to actually deliver a furnished product. And so that was, that was very useful because it taught me that, hey, there's a lot more, you may find things that are interesting, but on the business side of the world you have all of the constraints that analysts may not always be aware of or or may not, you know, really want to take into consideration like budgets, schedule, things of that nature. And so I learned how to operate with that. And then another interesting twist of fate, met somebody who knew somebody who was looking for somebody that could provide that line of business experience, but actually selling a business intelligence platform. Not necessarily that you knew how the all the software worked. And you know, if you click here, this happen, if you click here, that happened, but could sit across the table from somebody who was in a line of business and say, I understand the business problem you're having.I understand how to solve it and here's how the technology can be applied. Because the, the reality is technology in and of itself will never solve a tool. It needs people, it needs processes, it needs the people to use it. My Dad used to like to look at a rake and say, well, the art's not going to rake itself, so the rake does the job, but it needs somebody to use it. After about five, six years actually selling and being involved with the bi platform, the opportunity to join HEXstream came up, and for me, this was kind of a combination of all of the past experiences because it gave me the opportunity to engage with clients and engage with our inner teens on what is it that you're trying to do. So going back to my first experience, what is the project? What is the model?What is the data that you're trying to work with and build? But then I also had to understand why that was relevant. Why would a client engage with a company like HEXstream to undertake a project? How is that project measured? There's a lot of things that over the years I've found people would love to do,