One sure way to get a job these days is to be a "Big Data" specialist. These are the people who can interpret massive amounts of information and tell businesses how to use it to make money. It's a very specialized set of skills involving computer science, business and statistics. The Harvard Business Review says the dominant trait among data scientists is an intense curiosity.
So how do you get a job like this?
Dean of Northern Kentucky University's College of Informatics, Kevin Kirby says the skill set is a combination of various fields. "It's a very special set of skills but it's very broad. It's not computer science. It's not business. It's not quite statistics. It's all of that together."
Here are a few things data scientists do:
- look at social media
- business transactions
- cell phone geo-tracking
This fall NKU says it will be the first in the country to start a bachelor's program in Data Science. Other schools have just master's degrees in it.
dunnhumbyUSA, based in Cincinnati, used to do data science primarily in the food arena, for companies like Kroger, Sonic and Panera but is expanding into retail. It also works with Macy's.
Senior Vice President of Client Solutions Milen Mahadevan says, "There is lots of data and you can create great fun algorithms, you know. Understand crazy things. But actually it's the human aspect in the real work, trying to understand it, what are people actually doing? I think what NKU and the College of Informatics have done is fairly unique and is actually put a lot of that together."
The Harvard Business Review says the dominant trait among data scientists is an intense curiosity. That combined with new technology will make it easier to hold that data will help clients collect and use the information.
If there is any doubt data scientists are needed...IBM reports the world is creating 2.5 quintillion bytes of data every day, with 90% of it in the past two years.
