•2 min read•from Data Science
Is working as a data scientist (ML focus) but not getting to interact with the business a common tradeoff, or is my company just weird?
Our take
In the world of data science, especially with a focus on machine learning, navigating the balance between technical expertise and business interaction can be challenging. After three years in two distinct roles within a large company, it’s understandable to feel isolated from business stakeholders, particularly in a specialized environment where collaboration is often limited. This scenario raises a crucial question: is this tradeoff common within the field, or is it unique to your situation?
Prefacing this with the fact that I've been in this field for 3 years, across 2 different DS roles at my company.
My company is huge and I know that often results in specialized roles, however getting a balance of business and technical exposure is much more difficult than I think it should be. My first role was heavily consulting-focused for DS work and very little building for production. I moved to a team with a more technical focus to make sure I didn't lose that skill set and it's very difficult to get work with an actual business stakeholder, and I'm now worried I'm going to get worse at that. I've tried to find ways to work that into the role and to go talk to people to help find projects but the manager does not seem to support that for the team, only for themselves and one of the leads.
I really don't feel like this should have to be an either-or dichotomy, especially since so many areas can benefit from data science work but they don't always know where or what they can ask for. Technical skills are important but they mean nothing if you can't work with the business. Is this more common for the stats/ML side of DS work or do I just need to start job searching?
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