Before You Hire A Data Scientist...

When asked the question, what is the hottest tech job on the market right now, the answer is simple, however, it's more important to ask what does it mean to your organization?

What is Data Science?

Before you hire a Data Scientist, ask the question, what is it that I want to get accomplished? Big Data is everywhere, there is a lot of it and it takes the right people to be successful. There are three type of roles required for producing or creating Data Science, and they do different things. 

When building out a team, make sure you have an idea of what you what to accomplish (layering additional data onto your data for operational insights or trying to create a product) so you aren't putting someone in a position to fail. More often than it should, the wrong people get hired and are either put on an island or put somewhere where there is no defined team, plan or strategy. Before you build your Data Science Team, make sure you have a defined strategic plan. This breakdown should help.

The three types of roles for Data Science are:

1.     Business/Data Analyst

2.     Data Engineer

3.     Data Scientist

Business/Data Analyst- Their main job function will consist of exploring the business to understand and document the needs. Meeting with employees and taking requirements from the business. Understanding what data needs to be gathered to put in a data lake or repository. Look for someone with the people skills, the ability to listen, and the ability to put together a road map for the more technical roles to follow.

This will be delivered to

Data Engineer- Take the data and transpose it, put it in a lake or repository so that others can mine insights. Then prepare the Big Data, organize it, set up the environment for access and governance. You are only as good as the data that you have.

This will be delivered to

Data Scientist- Crunching/Consolidating small and large data sets and modeling or mining insights. The good news is that they will not have to understand the business, simply how does the data provide value to the business. However, those that do understand the business have a much greater chance at delivering a much more optimal result.

With the end of the year in sight and Big Data booming, Data Scientist is the hottest job out right now. Before you start a search for data science talent (creating job descriptions, conducting interviews, etc.) make sure you have a strategic plan. Because it’s like a tree falling in the woods, if you give great insights and immaculate data to people that do not understand it, is it relevant?