Boost Your Analytics: The Rise of the Citizen Data Scientist

Are you struggling to hire talented data scientists to glean insights from your corporate data? There’s currently a lack of big data talent hampering corporate analytics and causing nightmares for CIOs, but I have good news for you: you may already have all the data scientists you need!

There are alternatives that could help you boost corporate analytics. The rise of visual data discovery and approachable analytics (read more here ) are making room for a new hybrid role within organizations: the citizen data scientist.
With easy-to-use visual analytics tools, the citizen data scientist is able to create models that use predictive or prescriptive analytics, even though they’re not statisticians.

It’s a new hybrid role that will prove extremely valuable to your organization. These citizen data scientists can use their business knowledge and embed it into the models they’re testing, prototyping or building. And in collaboration with different stakeholders, they can help drive initiatives from all the different business units within the enterprise.
Their data and analytics undertakings will give a quick start to new and innovative projects.

Your Citizen Data Scientist Strategy
So, where do you start? Begin by determining where you already have pockets of expertise, where more talent is needed, and where talent could be better used.

Next, decide which analytics initiatives should be further developed, which should be maintained, and which should be cancelled. The key here is to work in smaller iterations and fail fast when necessary.
Leading organizations that are fostering a citizen data scientist culture and cultivating their analytics teams, have a much better chance at acquiring deep analytical talent.