Data Science That Tells Stories
This is the #20 episode of the Tachless Show with Kira Tchernikovsky. Show about people who succeed by doing things differently.
Sayantan Dasgupta of Gramener walks me through the most undervalued aspect of data - stories that it can tell.
** WHAT IS DATA SCIENCE? **
Data science is a scientific approach for analyzing data to extract new insights translated into business action. It is a fantastic foundation on which you can start building your narratives and stories. Data flows from all corners. It does not matter what industry you are in or who your audience is. Organizations are sitting on heaps of data waiting to be combed or put to good use. With data science, you can make this possible.
A report made by Deloitte says 49% of its respondents believe that data analytics is the key to better decision decision-making. With the right skill, resources, and processes, organizations can improve their decision-making significantly with data science.
Another survey by Mckinsey says that the gap between leaders and laggards is widening. Leaders are those organizations that are good at getting the benefits out of their data investments. And this is the level any organization should aspire for.
** When do organizations need to start leveraging data science? **
There is no specific time frame as to when an organization should leverage data science and AI. Gramener has clients ranging from startups to SMEs to Fortune 500 clients.
The most common questions that we get from clients tiptoe around the same topic:
• How to make sense of all the data that’s flowing in? What beyond our CRM data etc.
• How do we make our sprint reports interactive?
• How do we make our executive decision support dashboards better?
• How do we quantify the results from data science projects?
• How much should we invest in Data Science & AI?
• How to build processes and teams geared towards a data-driven ecosystem?
** What data needs the company to ‘put in’ to get the insightful stories out? **
Every organization is different, and they have multiple sources of data. Be it data from their EPR system, Excel, Cloud, CRM. It doesn’t matter. Depending on their level of data maturity, they can transform these disparate data sources into strategic assets. The entire organization will benefit. It doesn’t matter what department wants to improve. In short, organizations capture different elements of this journey.
To simplify, you can come with tons of unstructured. Sporadic data, ask the main questions and get answers.
** USE CASE: project with Microsoft for the city of Calgary and the Canadian climate change topic. **
Gramener partners with Microsoft for various conservation and sustainability efforts as part of their AI for Earth initiative. For this case, the aim was to develop a geospatial and predictive solution that could curb the Urban heat Island impact in the City of Calgary, Canada. According to IPCC, a 1.5 degrees average rise in temperature may put 20-30% of our species at risk of extinction. The urban heat island effect contributes majorly to this rise in temperature.
The client wanted to mitigate this impact. Gramener’s ‘AI for Resilient cities’ solution identifies buildings contributing to the Urban Heat Island effect. The tool uses data such as weather information, socio-economic parameters, Microsoft building footprints, satellite imagery, and infrastructure data to find such buildings.
The municipality stakeholders in Calgary, where the project was piloted, use this tool to analyze and plan climate interventions and corrective actions at a micro-level.
** The most undervalued benefit of working with data **
If you are a data-driven organization, you use data to read reports and drive insights. Your data insights seep into every aspect of your journey. Today, most organizations use data in some way or the other to create stories around their brand or determine directions. But the challenge is to bring quality to this aspect. This is where data storytelling offers you unparalleled benefits compared to regular data analytics.
-- ** --- MY GUEST -- ** ---
Sayantan Dasgupta
Director Demand Generation at Gramener + Musician
/ mrdasguptaofficial
https://gramener.com/