Please vote for me in the ACM SIGKDD 2021 Election

I am honored to have been nominated to run for the chair of ACM SIGKDD. Please vote for me in this election. The deadline to vote is 9am PST on Jun 1 tomorrow! SIGKDD members can find an email with the subject "ACM SIG 2021 Election" from [email protected] on or around May 27 with the website and their unique PIN.

I have served the SIG in various capacities over the last two decades including serving as the general chair of the KDD conference (2016), associate general chair (2010) and sponsorships chair for 6 years (2012, 2014, 2015, 2018, 2020). During this time I proposed and launched several successful innovations at KDD including the hands-on tutorial track(2016), industry-practice invited talk track (2010), networking with VCs (2016), and country/region specific networking groups (2014). I am grateful to have received the ACM SIGKDD lifetime service award for these contributions in 2019.

Why should you vote?

The Board of the ACM SIGKDD traditionally appoints key office bearers or committees to run our conference, journals, and annual awards. However, due to the >100-fold growth in the number of data scientists world-wide over the last 10 years, we need to expand ACM SIGKDD’s role substantially. If elected, I propose to evolve ACM SIGKDD into a full-fledged professional body for data scientists, similar to the American Medical Association to help members:

• Find jobs and increase your salary.
• Grow your skills as a data scientist, allowing you to achieve greater impact.
• Form professional networks that will help you get professional mentorship, career guidance, etc.
• Eliminate misguided regulatory / legislative restrictions that reduce your ability to have a larger impact at your job and in society.
• Promote the adoption of standards for all parts of the data analytics process.
• Promote diversity in our community by broadening access and participation across race, gender, and nationality.

I hope to leverage my experience organizing >15 academic conferences & workshops and leading large R&D teams in the industry to help SIGKDD navigate this evolution.