Would You Data Scientist?

What is the difference between a data engineer and a data scientist? This week on Would You Data Scientist, Wendy is joined by Alley Robinson to answer that very question. Alley is currently pivoting from software to data and shares her experience and tells us how she moved into the field. As always Wendy will have some great interview tips as well as some guest stumping hypotheticals. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• The difference between a data scientist and a data engineer is that a data engineer sets up the architecture for the data and loads it into different databases for data scientists to then analyse. A data scientist is also more likely to interact with stakeholders, customers, and clients as well. 
• An engineer is usually super techy, whereas a data scientist has a balance of the tech and the communication skills. 
• Alley is going to start her Masters in 2022 but also thinks that the practical boot camps will help you get to where you need to go.
• When you're in the interview process remember that you're interviewing the company as well as them interviewing you. You need to see that they're a good fit for you and how you like to work and your career prospects. 
• Alley has found that the teams that are more diverse have been more successful. This could be down to a diversity of ideas and the safe environment that creates. This kind of workplace encourages more ideas as there isn't a fear of being shot down. 
• Alley's biggest piece of advice for someone wanting to get into data is to just go for it, keep up to date with what's going on and if you can explore it by yourself then you should.

BEST MOMENTS

'Shifting into data was something I'd never expected' 

‘If your job description is always in the same place then you're going to get the same kinds of applicants' 

‘You don't have to be stuck in one thing for your whole career' 

EPISODE RESOURCES

https://www.linkedin.com/in/alleyrobinson/

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter
qwerkrecruitment.com
@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's the first podcast of 2022! So this week it's a little different on Would You Data Scientist, Wendy is joined by Emily Dale, Analytics Professor at Rockhurst University. Find out how fulfilling and engaging working on the other side of education is, as well as what other data roles you could do that don't have the title of data scientist.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Emily was only studying data science for two classes before she got her first job in data science. The course went so fast and you had to keep up. You don't have to do a full degree, study what you need to.
• While working in telecommunications, Emily used data to figure out that people in the US who don't often travel far from their home are more likely to switch cell plans after traveling just once.
• If you like data science then you don't have to have a data science position. Look past the job title, employers are looking for business intelligence developers, data engineers, and managers who are able to speak analytics. Go with what you enjoy.
• We need more diversity in teaching to get more diversity in students, which will lead to more diversity in job applicants.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS

'Being a teacher, the good outweighs the bad every time'

‘I love the realistic aspects of how we can apply data science in business'

‘I learn more from my failures than I do my successes'

EPISODE RESOURCES

Emily on LinkedIn

Data Feminism

MS in Data Analytics from Rockhurst

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter

qwerkrecruitment.com

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Annie has done exactly what this podcast is aiming to promote, she pivoted to data science using the skills she had developed in previous roles. Annie is Global Head of AI & Behavioural Sciences at MRM and joins Wendy on this week's Would You Data Scientist to talk about her experience pivoting and the work she's doing in the industry. Listen in to find out how a mentor can help your personal and career development as well as tips on getting hired. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Annie did a data science boot camp run by Pivigo when she was pivoting from science to data science. She's done exactly what this podcast is about, using your transferable skills to pivot into data. 
• The technical skills are the foundation to data science but the problem solving and critical thinking are vital for the role. 
• Both Wendy and Annie have worked with mentors and careers coaches recently to help them make decisions. It's such a help having someone trusted you can talk to and gain advice from. 
• It's great that the tools for data science are open to everyone, but often people throw in information and don't understand what the data is saying and what the consequences are. 
• Having an analytical background and showing that you have an interest for data, for example through doing a boot camp, can really make you stand out to a recruiter. Prove that you've solved a problem that you're passionate about using data and communicate it well in the interview.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS

'The microchips now are more powerful than what flew Apollo to the moon' 

‘I have amazing female role models all around me in the tech sector' 

‘You're not just treating the data as a fuel' 

EPISODE RESOURCES

Annie on LinkedIn
Pivigo

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter
qwerkrecruitment.com
@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Founder, CEO, and Chief Scientist at AGI Innovations and Aigo.ai, Peter Voss joins Wendy on this week's Would You Data Scientist. Find out all about the work Peter does in AI and how the chatbots he creates are truly personal and don't invade privacy. Also listen in for tips and resources for getting your career in data science off the ground.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Peter wants Aigo.io to become a triple personal assistant. The first personal is that you own it and it serves your agenda, not a cooperation. The second personal is that it is customised to you as an individual. The final personal is for privacy, a sounding board for your decisions so that you don't have to involve anyone else in your personal business.
• Peter's company is committed to not selling people's information to advertising and gives people the ability to delete their own history within the software.
• Getting into the consumer market is very expensive and high risk. One way Aigo could get into peoples hands is through universities that have contacted Aigo about using it as a personal assistant for students and staff.
• There are so many data science companies looking for people who are truly motivated, passionate, and interested in the field. If you can demonstrate that then you'll only be increasing your chances.
• The way a job description is written and where it is posted can have a massive impact on the kinds of people who apply. Companies who want a diverse set of applicants should look at the wording they use in the description and post in multiple different places.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS

'If you don't have the qualifications then you need to be prepared to come in at the ground floor'

‘I'm completely self taught and love learning'

‘The best way to combat bad AI is to have many different AI'

EPISODE RESOURCES

https://www.linkedin.com/in/vosspeter/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCl3XKNOL5rEit0txjVA07Ew

https://twitter.com/Aigo_ai

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter

qwerkrecruitment.com

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE GUEST

Peter Voss is a Serial Entrepreneur, Engineer, Inventor and a Pioneer in Artificial Intelligence. Peter started out in electronics engineering, but quickly moved into software. After developing a comprehensive ERP software package, Peter took his first software company from a zero to 400-person IPO in seven years.

Fueled by the fragile nature of software, Peter embarked on a 20-year journey to study intelligence (how it develops in humans, how to measure it, and current AI efforts), and to replicate it in software. His research culminated in the creation of a natural language intelligence engine that can think, learn, and reason -- and adapt to, and grow with the user. He even coined the term ‘AGI'(Artificial General Intelligence) with fellow luminaries in space.

Peter founded SmartAction.ai in 2009, which developed the first AGI-based call centre automation technology. Now, in his latest venture, Aigo.ai, he is taking that technology a step further with the commercialisation of the second generation of his ‘Conversational AI' technology with a bold mission of providing hyper-intelligent hyper-personal assistants for everyone.

In addition to being an entrepreneur, engineer, inventor and AI pioneer, Peter often writes and presents on various philosophical topics including rational ethics, free will and artificial minds; and is deeply involved with futurism and radical life-extension. 

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Noon van der Silk is the senior software engineer at Tweag and joins host Wendy on this week's Would You Data Scientist. Join the conversation on machine learning, teaching, how university degrees can give people from some backgrounds a leg up, as well as all the usual chat on ethics and how to best stop an evil super villain. Also find out Noon's thoughts on where the UK stands compared to other countries in terms of diversity in data science.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Noon ended up teaching AI and machine learning with the aim of giving people intuition and motivation. They could find out the details by themselves but he wanted to make sure they were confident to explore the topics on multiple levels.
• Noon had the experience of being turned down for a job because he didn't have a degree, which as you know, Wendy doesn't agree with.
• If a degree is a must have on your job description, then you should re-evaluate that. A degree for a degree's sake doesn't mean anything, it's just an expensive line on your CV.
• University can give some people access to jobs that they would not have had before.
• People who pivot jobs can be exceedingly valuable because they have built up a completely different skillset to the people already in that team.
• When Noon was working in Melbourne, he found that the diversity was heading in the right way but when working in the UK he found that the working group was not very diverse. The excuse seems to be trouble finding the right people.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS

‘I thought there is no way computers can learn anything'

‘Statistics seems easy but when you learn the details you think what is going on here'

‘Don't be afraid to follow that and squish it into AI somehow'

‘How can I be directing this towards positive purposes'

EPISODE RESOURCES

Noon's favourite piece of tech XMonad

Tweag.io

Noon on LinkedIn

R;pple Suicide Prevention Chrome Extension

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter

qwerkrecruitment.com

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION 

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Kate Pozeznik doesn't dread Mondays anymore and neither do her clients, that's because she helps people advance their careers in pursuit of their unique versions of life success. Kate is the founder of Quirk, not to be confused with Qwerk, and joins host Wendy as the guest on this week's Would You Data Scientist. Find out how you can pivot your career, what are the transferable skills you didn't even know you had, and so many more great pieces of advice. Stick around until the end of the show for a unique discount from Kate.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Kate started Quirk when she noticed that professionals within IT weren't very good at articulating the value they bring to their employers and weren't getting the promotions and job opportunities they deserved.
• Kate customised her LinkedIn profile and CV to exactly suit the role she wanted and managed to get the recruiter to reach out to her before she even had to apply.
• There are so many skills that stay-at-home parents learn that are transferrable to “real world” jobs. Our society still doesn't truly value the skills of empathy, compassion, organisation, time management, and so many more that stay-at-home parents learn.
• Even if you have gaps in your employment there will be transferrable skills that you've picked up and that you can tell people about.
• Surround yourself with positive people who want to see you succeed.
• Within data science there are so many roles. If you're looking to pivot then you should do personal value exercises that evaluate what is important to you. This will keep you focused on following career paths that are right for you.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS 

‘They want to enter a role that will constantly change and evolve'

‘It requires growth for you to be successful'

‘I was so amped to do this that these things didn't stand in my way'

‘Show how excited you are about data science'

EPISODE RESOURCES

Listeners of Would You Data Scientist get a discount on Resume Reviews, just get in contact with Kate to arrange yours.

[email protected]

Kate on LinkedIn

https://www.quirkpersonalbranding.com/

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter

qwerkrecruitment.com

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Data Science leader Gurleen Sabharwal is guest this week on Would You Data Scientist where her and host Wendy Gannon give you their advice on getting into the field of data. Find out about how Gurleen has developed online chat bots, how your diverse skillset can help the whole team, data privacy, and the cultural differences between working environments.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Everyone brings different skillsets to the job. You can use them to your advantage when going for a position and to help other members of the team. Your skillset becomes a skill the whole team can learn from you.
• What is it that you would like to work on? What problems do you want to solve? Research the different data science industries and work out what fits in with what you want from the job.
• Before applying for a job have a portfolio of all the work you've done solving problems with data. Show your skills and your passion with examples.
• Showing that you can solve problems with data is more important than a Master's degree according to Gurleen. It can help, but isn't essential.
• Remember, working in data science can do great things for women.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS

‘There's a lot of imposter syndrome from women and people from none technical backgrounds'

‘If you want to do something simpler to explain things to the business, then do that'

‘Your location information is being shared'

EPISODE RESOURCES

Gurleen on LinkedIn

Cassie Kozyrkov - Chief Decision Scientist at Google

ABOUT THE GUEST

Gurleen is a customer focused data science leader with extensive experience in enabling data driven decision making at large organizations.

She has over 14 years of experience with large B2B and B2C businesses where she has helped them to:

• Build large high performance and diverse data science / analytics teams.
• Convert business problems into data science / analytical solutions by leveraging strengths in ML/ AI, predictive and data analytics.
• Create seamless personalized customer experiences across all touch points (including chatbots).
• Perform data led storytelling to bring compelling insights to key stakeholders for business adoption.
• Enable cloud adoption by embracing change.

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter

qwerkrecruitment.com

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION 

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr. Selina Parmar is Head of People at Sideways 6 and joins Wendy on Would You Data Scientist this week. Selina doesn't have a background in data science, she works on the recruitment side of the business. She's here to tell you all about how she goes about hiring data scientists and what you can do to make yourself more employable.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Selina looks for candidates that are willing to learn and display that at every stage of the process. She also likes candidates who also interview her to find out more about the company and why they are a good fit for each other.
• Real work examples are super important. Make it clear what you've done and how you've tackled challenges. This also shows that you're good at documenting your work.
• Research the company when you apply, in your cover letter make sure you're showing that you match their company values.
• Growth, mindset, humility, and motivation are the four most important things Selina looks for in an applicant.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS

‘CVs are a necessary evil right now, but I don't know if they'll be needed in the future'

‘Tell people what you're actually evaluating them against'

‘It's an essential that you're hiring the right kinds of people for your company'

EPISODE RESOURCES

https://www.linkedin.com/in/selinaparmarphd/

ABOUT THE GUEST

Dr. Selina Parmar is Head of People at Sideways 6, a company that exists to build better businesses through employee ideas.

VALUABLE RESOURCES 

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter

qwerkrecruitment.com

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on Would You Data Scientist, Wendy is joined all the way from Portland Oregon by guest Danielle Nelson, senior data scientist at Rented. Find out why a piece of climbing equipment might be the best bit of tech ever, and how you can get into data science even if your degree is in 13th century French literature.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• If you want proof that you can retrain from any career into data science, Danielle studied linguistics and French literature, then had a career as a marine biologist, listening to the echo location of whales and catching frogs.
• Rented provide dynamic pricing for property managers for vacation rentals. They essentially use data to generate the optimal price for any given day to ensure the property is booked.
• Danielle's rule is that if she can't explain how a model works to her husband, then she won't use it.
• The more you can make the work you're doing capable of being integrated with the larger system of where you're working, the better.
• A good hiring manager would love to see your impact in your application, what was the outcome of your work. Did you save a company X amount of money or did you help save this endangered species. Tell them the consequence, and they'll ask how you did it.
  
  

BEST MOMENTS

‘I saved critically endangered North Atlantic Right Whales by listening to them'

‘There's lots of different flavours of data science'

‘The way you word your transferrable skills is important'

EPISODE RESOURCES

https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniellevnelson/

https://www.rented.com/art/

If you're interested in working for Rented or have any questions for Danielle then e-mail [email protected]

ABOUT THE GUEST

Danielle Nelson is a skilled statistical data scientist with ample visualization and modeling experience, an eye for aesthetics, and a strong quantitative background. Passionate about data equity, awesome data visualizations, weaving stories from data points and analyses, and using data to make a better world.

VALUABLE RESOURCES

linkedin.com/in/ethicalrecruiter

qwerkrecruitment.com

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Director of Data Science at Vertafore, Scott Ziemke joins Wendy on this week's episode of Would You Data Scientist to get in depth about data science in the insurance field. Find out how data differs from sector to sector, how it's sometimes the same, and how data differs from academia to the world of work. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Vertafore has the largest insurance policy data set in the world. 
• One of the biggest use cases in insurance data science is re-marketing, essentially catching people who may leave for a better deal elsewhere and targeting them with something to incentivise them to stay. 
• Academic data sets still don't measure in complexity to an enterprise data set. The scale and size of the data problems are much greater in the industry than people are used to seeing while studying. 
• Some kinds of data science apply to all businesses. For example, every company has a HR department and there is HR data science. 
• If you're looking to get into data science then get experience hands on with a real-life data set. Employers will generally look for the person with experience rather than just the learning.

BEST MOMENTS

‘All our competitors use data' 

‘Analytics can do something that a human could never process' 

‘Most people don't have good data' 

‘How do you populate your résumé with experience as quick as possible'

EPISODE RESOURCES

https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottcziemke/

https://www.vertafore.com/

ABOUT THE GUEST

Scott Ziemke: “I am a hands-on, analytics leader with over twelve years of expertise in data science and innovative analytics strategy.

From small-scale projects to industry-changing initiatives, I have spent my career providing services and building products using data science algorithms and technologies. My passion is leading teams that acquire, engineer, and monetize data.

Vertafore is an industry-leading SaaS fintech, part of the Roper Technologies portfolio.”

VALUABLE RESOURCES

LinkedIn

Qwerk Recruitment Website

@qwerkrec on socials

ABOUT THE HOST

Wendy Gannon started Qwerk Recruitment in the middle of the Covid Pandemic to disrupt the recruitment sector with ETHICAL data recruitment and treat everyone with love, dignity and respect. Avid Music photographer of 15 years.

PODCAST DESCRIPTION

Interviewing successful Data Scientists to find out about their journey into Data Science and any struggles they've faced to help next generation Data Scientists from all walks of life to access their dream career.

This show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.