Written by

Bernard Marr

Bernard Marr is a world-renowned futurist, influencer and thought leader in the fields of business and technology, with a passion for using technology for the good of humanity. He is a best-selling author of 20 books, writes a regular column for Forbes and advises and coaches many of the world’s best-known organisations. He has over 2 million social media followers, 1 million newsletter subscribers and was ranked by LinkedIn as one of the top 5 business influencers in the world and the No 1 influencer in the UK.

Bernard’s latest book is ‘Business Trends in Practice: The 25+ Trends That Are Redefining Organisations’

View Latest Book

Follow Me

Bernard Marr ist ein weltbekannter Futurist, Influencer und Vordenker in den Bereichen Wirtschaft und Technologie mit einer Leidenschaft für den Einsatz von Technologie zum Wohle der Menschheit. Er ist Bestsellerautor von 20 Büchern, schreibt eine regelmäßige Kolumne für Forbes und berät und coacht viele der weltweit bekanntesten Organisationen. Er hat über 2 Millionen Social-Media-Follower, 1 Million Newsletter-Abonnenten und wurde von LinkedIn als einer der Top-5-Business-Influencer der Welt und von Xing als Top Mind 2021 ausgezeichnet.

Bernards neueste Bücher sind ‘Künstliche Intelligenz im Unternehmen: Innovative Anwendungen in 50 Erfolgreichen Unternehmen’

View Latest Book

Follow Me

What Really Is Data Science? A Super-Simple Explanation For Anyone

2 July 2021

You will often hear people involved in data and analytics described as “data scientists”. But if you meet one, it’s unlikely he or she will be wearing a lab coat. And their office is likely to contain simply a single computer, rather than benches of apparatus and instrumentation. So are they really scientists? Or is it just a “buzz word” job title designed to make them look more intellectually worthy than they are?

Well, a “science” is a field of study in which it is possible to draw conclusions and advance knowledge through a process of theorising, experimenting and analysing results. If you’ve been involved with business analytical projects you’ll recognise that’s generally how they work, too. Therefore, a person collecting and analysing data and using it to increase their knowledge, is a data scientist.

It is a fairly new term – recorded as first being used in 1960 but not coming into widespread use until the 1990s. Before then, the work and study which is now carried out by what we would call a “data scientist” was simply thought of as a branch of statistics, and its practitioners were statisticians.

However during that same time period, another field of academic study rose quickly in popularity and prominence. And students of this other new science – computer science – found that the technologies and techniques they were developing could be merged very effectively with those being developed by statisticians.

This led to a huge increase in the amount of data that can be generated, stored and analysed, as well as the speed of that analysis, and therefore the rate at which knowledge could be generated from data. And the crux of the matter of data science is the extraction of insights from data.

Of course, simplifying matters to that extent, means that anyone simply turning any data into insights is engaged in data science – for example, reading a text book. And, to be honest, they are!

But to really qualify as a scientist, as I mentioned above, you should be putting the information through a rigid and formalised, scientific process, involving identifying a problem that needs solving, theorising how it could be solved, and experimenting using your data to attempt to find a solution. You should also record your results in a standardised way and present them for review and verification to others with knowledge in the field.  

This closely reflects the processes carried out every day by professionals with the job title of “data scientist”. In business, the problems will be dictated by commercial goals, and the experimentation will take the form of model-building and simulation. The goal will be to create results that fit the goals, and are also repeatable because we understand exactly how they came to be. Just like a real scientist!

Generally speaking, data science represents the convergence of three previously separate (though closely related) scientific disciplines – statistics, mathematics and computer science.

So, in some ways it’s a patchwork of existing bodies of knowledge and methodologies. But the process of putting them together gives rise to possibilities beyond those offered by any one individual area.

Some still argue that data science is still just an extension of the study of statistics, boosted by better computing power and increased storage, and to be fair, they do have a good point. But as with everything today it’s largely a matter of branding, and “data scientist” certainly sounds sexier in my opinion than “statistician”. Universities and colleges are jumping on the band wagon, increasingly offering courses at undergraduate and post-graduate level titled “Data Science”.

So, there’s my overview of what exactly is meant by the term “data science”, why I feel it deserves the title of “science” (and why its practitioners deserve to be called “scientists”) and why it is so fundamentally important to this new 4th industrial revolution.

For more, check out these articles:

The 9 Best Free Online Big Data And Data Science Courses

The 6 Key Data Science Skills Every Business Needs Today

The 6 Best Data Science Master’s Degree Courses In The US

Forget Data Scientists And Hire A Data Translator Instead?

Business Trends In Practice | Bernard Marr
Business Trends In Practice | Bernard Marr

Related Articles

What Tech Trends Should Companies Focus on in 2023? Here Are Three to Consider (And One to Ignore)

It’s common to hear it said that today, in order to thrive, every business needs to become a tech business.[...]

The Top 10 In-Demand Skills For 2030

What will the world be like in 2030? Well, obviously, no one knows for sure, but we have some interesting predictions:[...]

Beyond Dashboards: The Future Of Analytics And Business Intelligence?

Analytics and business intelligence (BI) have long been understood to be fundamental to business success.[...]

The Top 5 Data Science And Analytics Trends In 2023

Today, information can be captured from many different sources, and technology to extract insights is becoming increasingly accessible.[...]

The 5 Biggest Business Trends In 2023 Everyone Must Get Ready For Now

Businesses have faced huge challenges and have undergone an incredible amount of change over the past few years, and this won’t slow down in 2023.[...]

8 Simple Ways To Enhance Your Data Literacy Skills

We’re living through the fourth industrial revolution (or “Industry 4.0”), a revolution that’s defined by wave upon wave of new technologies that combine the physical and digital worlds.[...]

Stay up-to-date

  • Get updates straight to your inbox
  • Join my 1 million newsletter subscribers
  • Never miss any new content

Social Media

0
Followers
0
Followers
0
Followers
0
Subscribers
0
Followers
0
Subscribers
0
Yearly Views
0
Readers

Podcasts

View Podcasts