Make Way for the Business Scientist: Part 2

Recently I posited the concept of the business scientist to describe individuals who have a strong focus on improving business outcomes and who are ideal candidates to make use of self-service, AI-powered analytics tools to explore solutions. Unlike “citizen data scientists” who have to fight their way into the data science world, new tools free business scientists from the burdens of advanced mathematics and writing code. 

Business scientists are able to directly apply their considerable business knowledge and intellectual curiosity to pursue novel data exploration. Thanks to automated discovery, business scientists can use familiar language and accessible visual tools to test ideas. 

So we’ve explored the how and why of the business scientist’s existence, but maybe the most interesting question left is to ask is the one about how this changes things. The business scientist is a well of untapped potential that already exists, so what does a day in the life of a business analyst or line of business executive turned business scientist look like?In Part 2 we explore the roles we might expect a Business Scientist to play:

The Responsive Leader

One significant opportunity available to the business scientist is to build on their deep understanding of customers and business outcomes by developing fresh perspectives on existing problems. It’s all well and good for an executive to know that a given KPI in their purview is not what it should be. It’s quite another to do something about it. The business scientist knows the outcome they want to bring to life and is able to develop a fresh take on how to get there. 

In a typical environment, that executive may previously have been able to turn a few limited dials and levers within their domain. They may then have punted the problem to a data science team for further analysis at some unspecified date in the future. 

But our business scientist is equipped to roll up their sleeves and ask questions and explore opportunities right now, letting their business instincts guide them across operational silos to root out causes and unearth solutions to help the business change course to best achieve its business objectives.

The Storyteller

Stories are essential to human learning and understanding. When a business scientist asks a question, the response is delivered in a concise, natural language format that is easy to consume. More importantly, it invites the business scientist to further flesh out that story, increasing their own knowledge but also creating a prose-based product for dissemination, smoothing the transfer of knowledge and sparking creativity in others. This is something new: the chance to research the business domain to glean its key stories and expand understanding. That’s why automated discovery is so important; it gives business scientists the ability and insight to tell the whole story. In this way Einstein Analytics Plus transforms business scientists into effective storytellers who share what they’ve learned across their business.

The What-If Analyst

Like scientists in every field, our business scientist already knows how to apply their knowledge to explain what happened in the past. Such experts have always asked themselves, “What if…” questions. Supported by self-service AI, they are now in a position to answer that question. Like physicists anticipating the appearance of an exotic particle, business scientists can now use visual tools to build a model that explains their operational universe and predict how changes – a marketing campaign, a discount, a new supplier – may impact future outcomes.

The Synthesizer

All of the preceding activities available to our business scientist are valuable in and of themselves, but they must be shared if the business is to realize their full potential. The interactive and modular toolset available to them makes short work of producing new dashboards. Rather than waiting weeks or months for a programming project to run its course, the business scientist can quickly collect their insights into new dashboards to guide decision-making

The Agent of Change .. A Trailblazer

It’s true that data is permeating every aspect of industry, but possessing volumes of data is not the same as using data. Until we get data analytics into the hands of the many, its utility will always be limited. The progression from data science as the domain of the unicorn data scientist to the citizen data scientist was a baby step in that direction. The emergence of the business scientist is where we see the floodgates open. 

In a very real way, this role points the way to the future. The business scientist is an agent of change whose most impactful purpose is to serve as examples to peers and colleagues, showing the way forward for others.