The Power of Communities to Data Scientists
Ever heard of the saying,” If you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together”
Yes, back at it again. Hello, fellow data scientists and data enthusiasts. Hoping the New Year is treating you well like a well cleaned tabular dataset ready for analysis. Coming into the year, I have encountered a lot of people who felt stuck in their careers realizing little to no growth and are currently looking for the next big thing to plug into to share their knowledge and learn new things happening in the space.
My obvious response was, how come and yet there is so much to do and to contribute to in the community, especially in this day and age of emergence of new technologies.
They didn't know what to make of it only to ask what impact does a community has in my career as an established data scientist.
TECH COMMUNITIES AND THEIR IMPORTANCE
Storytime: Before I started out in my journey to being a data scientist. I was out and about trying to understand concepts from complex lecturers on youtube and reading books that I didn't make to reach the end after a long period of time. I had heard of communities when I was in my web development days but as data science was new, I didn't know where I could find one that catered for my needs as a beginner.
Luckily, I was in a Bootcamp that had knowledgeable mentors who organized for us to showcase a project we had worked on in women in data science and the machine learning community. I wasn't ready for sure and I almost bailed with the level of anxiety I had in front of crowds. Working in a team, I had no option as I didn't want to be a disappointment.
Long story short, the presentation was successful and now my main goal was to find a way I could belong in that community and plug for I had discovered a gem. The feedback we received for our presentations and the questions that were asked which we hadn't dived into helped broaden my thinking in approaching data.
Other importance of belonging to a data community include:
- Networking and connecting with like-minded individuals.
- Collaborating with community members on a certain project /hackathon as a means of learning or skilling up.
- Access to opportunities that are shared within the community.
- Sense of belonging when you feel included and identify as a member of a particular successful community and freedom to be authentic in the member’s company.
- Engaging with a community can enable you to realize your passion through the exchange of knowledge with other members. One can find out about other disciplines that intersect with what they are interested in pursuing.
- A community can also be impactful when an individual wants to acquire professional development skills be it technical or soft skills. This happens when the community leads organize events geared to upskill the community.
- Communities are a good source to connect with mentors who help one find a suitable pathway to prepare for a particular profession by sharing their experiences and challenges they may have encountered in their journey.
Those are some of the benefits of belonging in a community and definitely, there are more pros and fewer cons.
Now, what should you do after acquiring this knowledge?
WAYS TO LEVERAGE THE ACCESS TO A COMMUNITY AS A DATA SCIENTIST
Look for a data-centered community around you. Platforms such as Meetup and Eventbrite
- Make a point to register for events happening across the week to get familiar with topics discussed in the community.
- Make connections with people who come to the event by getting to know their interests and creating a friendly environment to communicate without giving stalker vibes. In the virtual world, always follow up with a LinkedIn connection and if you have mutual interests it will be easy to follow up with a chat.
- Volunteer to lead sessions in the community or participate in doing presentations to share your interest and knowledge with others and often opportunities emerge from exposing your skills to other members. In the crowd sometimes there are skilled individuals who are looking for skilled people to join their team.
- Always observe the rules and guidelines developed for the community and respect each member’s privacy and avoid creating an uncomfortable environment for people to engage with by resulting in abusive language and conflict within the community.
DATA SCIENCE COMMUNITIES THAT ARE A MUST JOIN !!!
Nairobi Women in Machine Learning and Data Science
Alliance4ai Futuremakers Chapters
Now there is no excuse as to why you don't belong to all these communities. From this foundation, you will get access to other communities specializing in other disciplines of data science.
Now it's time to get started by joining a community and interacting with others. Follow me for more amazing data-centered articles and send lots of claps if this blog was helpful to you in your data journey.
From yours truly,
Rose Delilah Gesicho
Data Scientist and AI Community Coordinator.
Cheers.
