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The Data Science Journey

How to Plan For A Flourishing Career

Photo by Alvaro Reyes on Unsplash
Photo by Alvaro Reyes on Unsplash

Introduction

By no means am I where I’d want to be in my career, yet I am enjoying every bit of my Journey. Previously, I stated that The Most Important Data Science Project consist of a constant adding of value to one’s self.

The Most Important Data Science Project

Although I am biased, blogging about Data Science is a great way to constantly add value to yourself, since whilst you blog you cement your learning, improve communication and enhance your brand. Platforms like Medium have made getting started with blogging easier than ever.

Note: More details on how to begin blogging is beyond the scope of this post but if you’d like to learn more then I’d recommend viewing Ayodeji Awosika‘s Youtube Channel .

Every journey has a destination.

When I first learnt to drive, it took me some time to get used to the car (mainly clutch control) but once I was comfortable enough I took my test and passed. Now, I only drive my car when I need to go somewhere…

In the same way, when you’ve had a feel around the various aspects of Data Science and have become somewhat comfortable (i.e. data cleaning, feature engineering, data visualization and modelling) we take a test, which may mean being hired or winning a competition etc. When we pass, the idea is to now use your skills to take you to various destinations.

In this post, I will share how I planned my journey in Data Science.

Note: This assumes you’ve had some exposure to Data Science


The End comes First

Success is relative, hence you ought to define what success means and looks like to you or someone else will!

Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to do your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming.

Prior to starting my Data Science Blog, I was reading many articles surrounding the topics such as how people made $2000+ per month from blogging or how they went viral in 4 months, and how to get 5000+ followers in x amount of days/weeks/months – I don’t read these post anymore!

I am not saying that those things aren’t a cute way to tickle one’s own ego, but as I’ve grown as a writer, I’ve realised that these are only by-products of real success, nonetheless I adopted these things to be my gauge for success.

When you take the success of others to be your measurement gauge for success then you are setting yourself up to be miserable.

Although the initial intention was to retain what I’ve been learning, when I saw what others were able to do on Medium, I instantly wanted a taste. I wanted to get 10,000 followers in 4 months, then I switched my goal to making $2000 per month, then I wanted to land more job offers. But WHY? I had no reason for any of these things.

Had it not been for my previous company furloughing me when Covid-19 put the world on pause, I’d probably of stopped blogging altogether.

I used the example of a blog because now the blog works in cohesion with where I want to go as a Data Scientist. To enhance your Data Science Career, you must first identify where you’d want to take your career.

What does success as A Data Scientist look like for you?

Are you a Lead Data Scientist?

Are you building teams?

Are you mentoring people?

Do you prefer Computer Vision task?

Have you founded a Start Up?


Reverse Engineering

With a clearly defined ending to refer to, it is much easier to cross reference from our future self to current self to identify whether we are on track, but it’s even better if we can find someone already in our post.

Our job is to bridge the Gap from where we are now to where we want to go in the future.

Do you want to be a Kaggle Grandmaster? Yes – It would help to find someone who is a grandmaster and copy what they done to become a Grandmaster.

If you told yourself that you want to be a Lead Data Scientist, your job is to look up what it takes to become a Lead Data Scientist, meaning you must learn the different paths, necessary steps, the attitude, the mindset, etc, that you ought to develop to grow into this role…

You may accelerate your growth if you can find a Lead Data Scientist and ask them questions.

What route can I take to get to where I want to be?

Who is in a Position I’d like to be in that I can copy?

Steal Like an Artist – Austin Kleon

You get my gist.


Urgent Patience

I know this may sound contradictory so let’s define "Urgent Patience"

Urgent Patience → Acting with a sense of urgency each day, but having a realistic view of time.

Generally, becoming one of the most recognised Data Scientist on the internet is not something we can quickly do on a Friday afternoon before drinks. Hence, we ought to recognize that it may take 5 years (maybe less, maybe more) to attain the goal we have set.

Time is our greatest virtue!

If we can recognise the time lapse between where we are and where we want to be and still go into each day committed to finding an opportunity to make progress towards those goals then we are practicing urgent practice.


If you liked this post, you may also like:

How to Secure a Data Science Role You Actually Want

Start your Data Science Journey in 4 Steps

Tips for Effective Technical Blogging

Let’s continue the conversation on LinkedIn…

Kurtis Pykes – AI Writer – Towards Data Science | LinkedIn


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