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My latest in Information Management: “‘Sexy'” Data Science is a Team Sport”

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The word got out last year: data scientist is the “sexiest job,” a late-2012 declaration by the renowned Tom Davenport of “Competing on Analytics” fame. Trouble is, “sexy” goes bad faster than fish.

“Data scientist,” still fresh, is my word of the year. In 2013, the data analysis industry discovered it, many loved or hated it, but most of all, we repeated it. Google Trends shows the mention of it soaring like the 1990s Dow Jones Industrial Average — and you know what happens next.

Alert as data scientists are to patterns, I wonder if many don’t shudder at the “sexy” label.… Read the rest “My latest in Information Management: “‘Sexy'” Data Science is a Team Sport””

Execs vs. data analysts gives us the Analytics Gap

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One insurance company’s chief data scientist is “terrific at what he does,” says his boss, even “brilliant.” The company is lucky to have him. But he never sees the inside of the executive suite.

“He is a quirky, quirky guy,” says the boss, “and he is a super powerful dude in what he’s doing for us.” But upper executives would judge him harshly. “There would be a terrible outcome.”

Let’s call it the Analytics Gap. At least in this company and probably in many others, some of those who interpret the data don’t stick to rigid, unspoken rules of behavior. And those who with the greatest executive authority can’t quite appreciate what these people can tell them.… Read the rest “Execs vs. data analysts gives us the Analytics Gap”

Minding data’s pedigree

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Does it seem to you like data analysis is busting out all over the place? It might become another fun game like chess or Chutes and Ladders — so this might be good time to recall an old admonition: Don’t just consume data, mind its pedigree.

Repeating the warning, though, makes you look like a party-pooper. In 2007 at the TDWI conference in Las Vegas, a keynote speaker raised it one morning. Jonathan Koomey — author of Turning Numbers into Knowledge and one of those voices the BI world needs more of — did his best. But I could see the unfolding disaster from my banquet table, as attendees glanced at each other in scorn.… Read the rest “Minding data’s pedigree”