Cohort 7 Student Spotlight: Meet Divya
Divya Bhargavi joined the Masters in Data Science Program after a position at Amazon in Business Analytics piqued her interest in the field of Data Science. Continue reading to learn about her background and future goals.
What were you doing before joining the MSDS program?
Prior to moving to San Francisco, I worked as a Business Analyst with two major e-commerce marketplaces in India (Flipkart and Amazon). Being in a constantly evolving business domain, in a fast-growing Indian economy, I found myself at the crux of an industry that is poised to reap the benefits of machine learning in the coming years. I hold an undergraduate degree from IIT, majoring in Ceramic Engineering, a sister branch of Material Science. While I was in college, I participated in many business case studies that demanded data-driven insights. For my bachelors project, I worked on Solid Oxide Fuel Cells. It involved a lot of data analysis with basic regression models and finding patterns in the data. Upon graduating, I had to choose between getting a Masters in Material Science or taking up an offer from an Indian e-commerce company as a business analyst. I was beginning to get excited about data analysis, so I accepted the offer and never turned back.
How did you find out about Data Science?
When I moved to Amazon, I was exposed to the tremendous amount of data they had on customers purchases, several business metrics, machine learning models that impacted the top-line sales directly. At a point, I felt I could not scale my analysis because the number of features I was working with was huge. I felt a machine learning algorithm would help me more than trying to find patterns by myself in Excel or Tableau. Staying on a business team also gave me good intuition about the business problems that could be solved with machine learning, however I didn’t have the right skill set and that’s when I started looking for Data Science programs.
What skills did you gain from the previous positions you held?
The most important skill I learned was breaking down and deciphering problem statements that I handled. At both companies I worked for, I was groomed to understand the problem by trying to see it from the customer’s perspective and then you work your way up to frame a metric that would measure your performance. I was also introduced to building SQL queries, creating basic data pipelines, program management, and leadership skills. At Amazon, I was the only analytics contact for a business team of 20 to 30 people. I had to learn the art of “when to say NO!” and which projects to prioritize.
Why did you choose this program?
The location played a huge role when choosing this program. I had heard about how the whole area is excited about the latest trends and there will be meet ups that can teach you about them. I was also really impressed by the number of machine learning startups around San Francisco. I particularly liked USF for its exhaustive and rigorous curriculum, access to Deep Learning sessions from fast.ai and its applied data science exposure through practicum. I spoke to a couple of USF alumni who were extremely helpful and were unanimously cheerful about the exposure the program provides. Some of my friends are fast.ai fellows, so when I told them I was attending the MSDS program at the University of San Francisco, they told me ‘Jeremy Howard is there, so it’s a good program’.
What area of Data Science excites you the most?
Currently I am drawn to deep learning. I took the certificate course offered by the Data Science Institute and learned how deep learning has the power of boosting your accuracy and capability of handling different types of data. With fast.ai, it doesn’t take much time to learn deep learning. Specifically, I’d like to further explore recommendation systems and chat bots.
After graduating from this program are you looking to enter any specific industry?
I’ve always been biased toward customer analytics because you learn ‘why do you do what you do’. When I finish the MSDS program, I’ll be able to leverage pictures, text, and tabular data to find holistic information about a customer. I want to be able to create a persona for each customer and give valid recommendations for them. I’ve always found this domain interesting, but I am open to any field that has challenging problems and any company that stimulates me intellectually.
In your free time, what have you done and what would you like to do in San Francisco?
I like to explore the city by walking and finding different vegetarian restaurants. I really like this Indian place called Chat Corner near our school. I also try catching up with my undergraduate friends and meeting MSDS alumni. I’ve heard there are really good trails to hike around San Francisco, so that is the next thing on my to-do list.
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