What I Wish I Knew When I Started as a Data Scientist

Data Science has been billed "The Sexiest Job of the 21st Century" where the tools developed and used are leading to life changing technologies (both as a positive and in terms of some devastating unforeseen consequences). In an aim to get you on the positive/sexy trajectory in your career, I want to share with you all of the things I wish I knew before starting a career in data science, some insights I gained by making some terrible mistakes (but living to tell about them), and some things that I learned that absolutely made me a better data scientist. I hope this introduction into the subject will help get you started a few steps ahead of your contemporaries when you finally step into the job market.

Bio: Dr. Sean Guillory

Sean Guillory attained his Ph.D. in Cognitive Neuroscience from Dartmouth College where he primarily worked with neurosurgery patients to help improve the mapping for brain functions that were personally important to their lives. After taking that experience to help build up a start-up business incubator aimed at helping humanity (Fruition Tech Labs) and working on data science efforts to help catch online scammers (ConsumerAffairs), he now focuses on ways of utilizing his background in automation, biometrics, and social science methodology to help with issues within Defense and National Security. He is also a proud member of the Information Professionals Association, the Mind Science Foundation’s Science Committee, and a Thematic Task Force lead for the National Science Foundation’s Engineering Research Visioning Alliance (ERVA).