#233: Innovating with Data: Part One, with the Head of Data Science at Maurice Blackburn Lawyers, Jonas Christensen

This episode of the Data Futurology podcast is actually the reverse of normal – most of the time Felipe interviews experts in data science, but this time it’s his turn to be interviewed! Last year, he was on Jonas Christensen’s excellent Leaders of Analytics podcast, and we’ve got permission to republish it here. 

In the wide-ranging interview, Felipe starts by describing his history. If you haven’t heard the story before, it begins with Felipe growing up in the driest parts of Chile. It then continues with him teaching himself databases in his first job in IT, after originally coming to Australia as a backpacker with very basic English. From there Felipe's career in data has taken off, both with his roles in financial services and healthcare, and the launch of Data Futurology.

Deeper into the interview, Felipe describes the goals behind the podcast and the events that Data Futurology runs. He then ends the conversation with some insights about how data currently works in organisations, and what the future may hold.

One of the most interesting things that Felipe has observed over the years is the potential for data specialists to “graduate” to the most senior roles in organisations. Just as CIOs moved from being a relatively isolated part of the business with few prospects to now being seen as prime candidates for CEO roles, the head of data analytics will increasingly be called on to show broader leadership within their organisations.

What data professionals need to do is step up their “soft” or “power” skills (depending on which term you want to use), Felipe says on the podcast. One of the driving goals of Data Futurology is to help data specialists identify these opportunities within themselves and then work on them.

To get a real sense of just how passionate Felipe is about data and the people that work in this space, his appearance on the Leaders of Analytics is a must-listen.

Thank you to our sponsor, Talent Insights Group!

Listen to the Leaders of Analytics Podcast: https://www.leadersofanalytics.com/

Join us for our next events Advancing AI and Data Engineering Sydney:

https://www.datafuturology.com/events

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“Change management and adoption in AI is still a problem that we're facing today, and it will continue to be an area for us to focus on, because that's how we get to the impact of our work.”

—  Jonas Christensen, Head of Data Science at Maurice Blackburn Lawyers

WHAT WE DISCUSSED

00:00 Intro to Leaders of Analytics

2:30 Jonas Christensen introduces Felipe to his audience.

4:42 Filipe explains his background and history with data science.

14:01 Jonas asks what is unique about Felipe’s career, across all his self-taught knowledge and entrepreneurship?

19:00 Jonas asks what encouraged Felipe to start Data Futurology, and how he got it started.

25:54 Felipe shares his long-term vision for what Data Futurology could turn into.

28:37 Felipe shares his views on what the big trends in data science are.

37:10 Felipe discusses the implications of data science being a relatively new area of specialisation, in the context of the business as a whole.

40:15 Felipe shares some great examples of data analytics being used in a creative, innovative and high-impact manner by companies.

44:15 Felipe shares his vision of what the perfect data-driven organisation would look like and how it would handle data, analytics, and AI

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS

• “Change management and adoption in AI is still a problem that we're facing today, and it will continue to be an area for us to focus on, because that's how we get to the impact of our work.”

• “I really enjoy helping people with building teams and helping people improve and rise in this space.”

• “In the data science and AI space, we have so many ways to acquire technical knowledge. But then when you think about the leadership side of analytics and data science, it seems to me very sparse in comparison. I think that that's the area where you can make a difference in your career as a person, and have a huge impact for the organisations that you're involved in.”

• “My wife and I were married in 2018, and we were going to go on a long honeymoon, and I said something like ‘I’ve never had a break this long before, what am I going to do?’ My wife said, ‘well, you love listening to podcasts so much, why not do one yourself?’ The idea hadn't really crossed my mind before that. And then I started thinking, well, what would I do? What am I passionate about? And what is the change that I think needs to happen in the industry and based on the conversations that I had with professionals before?”

• “There's a whole world that is available for people that have our background. You add these power skills, and then can develop into professionals that can definitely lead organisations.”

• “The landscape requires such diverse skills, and they’re obviously not going to be in one person. So, if you can understand what part of the diverse skill set you are good at and passionate about and understand what other supporting infrastructure you need in order to maximize the impact, you are setting yourself up very well to succeed.”

• “Often we're focusing on delivery and building teams around that, but without enough connections to the rest of the organisation to help the information flow and make the most impactful use of the specialist.”

• “Something that I've seen as key to the quality of data that feeds the algorithms and the AI, is having the area that's responsible for entering and capturing the information also be responsible for the quality of the information.”

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At Data Futurology, we are always working to bring you use cases, new approaches and everything related to the most relevant topics in data science to help you get the most value out of these technologies! Check out our upcoming events for more amazing content. And as always, we appreciate your Reviews, Follows, Likes, Shares and Ratings. It really helps new data scientists find us.