Does this sound like a real Data Scientist role, or more like analytics/enterprise software support?
Our take
I recently got hired into a Data Scientist role at my current company (aerospace/supply chain), and I’m trying to get a better sense of how people would classify the work.
In my previous role as a Data Analyst, I was more on the business development/analytics side. I worked on things like Tableau dashboards, SQL/Python analysis, market and proposal support, parts forecasting, and some NLP/ML-style projects for predicting parts or work classification (being taken over by a separate team). So this new role is aligned with forecasting, asset management, and supply chain decision support. Does seem like DS but I’m not 100% sure.
The new role is focused on service parts planning, forecasting, repair recommendations, proposal support, and working with an enterprise planning/optimization system. The thing I’m unsure about is that the core modeling is mostly handled inside specialized software called Servigistics. I wouldn’t be building the main forecasting or optimization models from scratch in Python. A lot of the work would be updating model inputs, running/supporting the system, analyzing outputs, explaining changes in the forecasts or recommendations, answering stakeholder questions, and building dashboards or analysis using SQL, Python, Tableau, and Excel.
I’m thinking about doing some lightweight analysis around the system, like leveraging Monte Carlo simulation for risk/uncertainty, forecast validation, bias analysis, and maybe using internal training material with a RAG/LLM setup to help with process support and onboarding. I want to do this to make sure I’m able to showcase I still possess strong technical skills for future opportunities.
Would you consider this a legitimate applied Data Scientist role even if I’m not hand-building models from scratch? Or does this sound more like an operations analyst/business analyst role with a Data Scientist title?
I’m not trying to be overly picky. I just want to make sure this is a good role to grow in for the next year or two and that I’m not moving into something that will box me out of more traditional data science work later.
One other thing is the job change did come with a 25% bump in pay which is a big reason why I took it, along with the title change.
Thank you.
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