When I started to learn about data science and consider it as a career choice, there was a diagram that I came across regularly and still come across today, in articles and even text books aimed at introducing and educating the world about the “sexiest job of the 21st century.” First created by Drew Conway, it illustrates the three broad skill groups you need to be a data scientist.
Data science is a new career for the age of Big Data (whatever that means this week), but you can see that it’s at the intersection of qualities many people have been developing for years. As a graduate of the Science to Data Science (S2DS) summer school, I know people who have come to data science from a wide variety of backgrounds and found a new niche for themselves.
However, I believe there’s something missing from this picture — a vital skill that comes in many forms and needs constant practice and adaption to the situation at hand: communication.
This isn’t just a “soft” or “secondary” skill that’s nice to have. It’s a must-have for good data scientists.
Some opinions expressed in this article may be those of a guest author and not necessarily Analytikus. Staff authors are listed https://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/the-one-critical-skill-many-data-scientists-are-missing
