Reaching 20k+ readers on Medium and nearly 3k learners by email, I draw on my 4 years of experience as a Senior Data Engineer to demystify data science, cloud and programming concepts while sharing job hunt strategies so you can land and excel in data-driven roles. Subscribe for 500 words of actionable advice every Thursday.
[ETR #19] 1 Question New Data Engineers Can't Ask
Extract. Transform. Read.A newsletter from Pipeline Hi past, present or future data professional! I recently participated in a technical design meeting that was derailed by a single, fundamental question. “Why?” Despite the fact that I worked with the particular data source we were discussing for nearly two years, I fell into the common trap of going “on autopilot” and failing to question the initial need for the data. At this point, you would think asking “why” of years’ worth of work would be offensive. Instead of myself or other team members getting defensive, it led to a productive conversation about not just refining our approach to ingestion, but also inspired talk of how we can manage stakeholder expectations and softly encourage them to “do more with less.” Fortunately, you don’t need to derail a meeting to leverage what I call a productive why. Asking occasional, tactful “whys” can position you as a critical thinker and thought leader (or at least an enthusiastic thought contributor) within your org. When appropriate, consider asking…
I realize you may not be in a professional role; nonetheless, I’ve found a lot of value can result from occasionally asking “why” even when you’re simply writing code. For instance, I was a habitual user of Pandas’ .append() method. Unfortunately, to my disappointment, Pandas 2.0 deprecated .append() in the past year. I easily could have panicked and said “Iterating and appending key values to an empty data frame is how I’ve always converted JSON to a data frame. What am I going to do?” But being forced to adapt to the change made me think about what prompted that habit initially. To learn what that motivation was plus how a simple "why" nearly left me tongue-tied in an interview, read the latest on Pipeline. And so you don’t have to question where those hyperlinks go, here they are as plain text.
Questions? zach@pipelinetode.com Thanks for ingesting, -Zach Quinn |
Extract. Transform. Read.
Reaching 20k+ readers on Medium and nearly 3k learners by email, I draw on my 4 years of experience as a Senior Data Engineer to demystify data science, cloud and programming concepts while sharing job hunt strategies so you can land and excel in data-driven roles. Subscribe for 500 words of actionable advice every Thursday.
Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from Pipeline Hi past, present or future data professional! I dreaded entering the job market after my data science master's. I felt like I knew more than a data analyst but less than a professional data scientist. I've since realized my program was more effective than I thought, but it couldn't prepare me for the key areas like cloud deployments and real-world problem-solving I had to learn on the job as a data engineer. And I’ve noticed these gaps in...
Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from Pipeline Hi past, present or future data professional! If you live in the U.S., this week marks the end of back to school season; though, if you’re like my southern relatives, you’ve been back since July. The closest feeling most adults get to back to school (aside from the teachers), is starting a new job. While a new org, title and compensation package represents new opportunities, it’s also easy to feel like the “new kid”, which can lead to being...
Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from Pipeline Hi past, present or future data professional! I once participated in a remote job interview in which the interviewer was on the video call while driving... and smoking. While that instance was among the most memorable interview experiences (for the wrong reasons), I’ve had just as many interviews that have blended together and faded into the recesses of my mind. The common denominator, however, was the insistence on asking one question. The...