A Misfit in this Big Data World

Khushi Agarwal
Sep 5, 2018 · 3 min read

Have you ever wondered what drew you into your career/ learning path?

As we all know, Data Science has been tagged as the sexiest job of the 21st century. This has followed by a surge in the number of people towards this career. Being an average millenial myself, I too was drawn towards it after reading this news. Unfortunately or not, for me, it happened right after I completed my first year of college, studying Business Management. A Misfit? (Also, fun fact: I pursued my high school in Science). So while one of our new faculties in 2nd year in my college was enquiring of our interests, among the many CFA and MBA aspirants, stood I. Said I wanted to pursue my MS in statistics/analytics or related fields in future. Definitely, a misfit.

I read countless articles about this sexist profession and what makes it up. From that, I figured that it’s this really anomalous amalgamation of different applications of computer science, mathematics and domain expertise.

In particular, two of its applications appealed the most to me:

  1. Storytelling with Data- while this has been around for a while, I was particularly drawn by the aesthetics and interactiveness of the art of storytelling with the help of data. One of my favorite’s is R2D3 that uses statistics to create an interactive design.
  2. Recommendation Systems- Honestly, to me, it almost felt like magic, how a machine can predict my preferences and behaviour even before I am aware of it. I started following the technology blogs of all the major tech start-ups like Netflix and AirBnb. I was amazed and intrigued by their power at the same time. Yes, there was a limited grasp from their content due to my academic limitations but it inspired to explore more.

I was particularly drawn how these techniques were branching out to all industries like retail, finance, healthcare etc.

And just like that I threw myself into a rigorous learning path- trying to cling onto the best resources for a career in Data Science. Discovering the right choices for me on ClassCentral, to talking to colleagues, finding a mentor and joining various slack workspaces has all been a part of my journey so far.

Which way to go?

The future is uncertain but for now, I really enjoy taking my stragetic management course in college and some statistics courses later, online. I would love to share my journey forward and share other cool resources that could inspire you to learn more or start out your next project.

Do give it a thumbs up if you enjoyed reading.

Thanks!

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