How to Become a Data Scientist - The Skills, Certifications and Education You Need

Data science refers to the process of extracting meaningful information and insights from huge amount of both structured and unstructured data by using various tools, algorithms, artificial intelligence (AI), statistics, mathematics, programming, problem-solving, and machine learning principles among others. In other words, data science is the study of where information comes from, what it represents and how this information can be efficiently processed to help businesses offer better customer experiences and thus gain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Discovering hidden patterns from the raw data and extracting insights and information from it can help organizations predict customer behavior in a more efficient way. This in turn can help an organization serve its customer more efficiently, rein in costs, recognize new market opportunities, offer better products and services and subsequently gain a significant advantage over its competitors.

A data scientist makes use of AI, complex algorithms, cluster analysis, statistics, mathematics, machine learning algorithms etc. to predict the occurrence of a particular event in the future.  A Data Scientist looks at the data from many angles, sometimes angles not known earlier. Perhaps the most important skill a data scientist must possess is the ability to present the insights gained from data, and its significance, to top management in a meaningful and easy to understand manner.

Skills Required for Data Scientists

Data scientists need to be data-driven problem-solver and must possess formidable skills in mathematics, statistics, programming, analytics, machine learning and data mining in addition to experience in algorithms and coding.  Python is the most common coding language that is used in data science along with Java, Perl and C/C++. You also need to have the ability to work with huge amount of unstructured data as well as sound knowledge of database querying languages like SQL.

Education Background

To become a data scientist, the basic educational requirement is a bachelor’s degree in a computing related field. A degree in computer engineering, computer science, MIS, informatics or anything like that will do the job. The sound knowledge of mathematics, statistics and analysis and a strong academic background in computing is strongly recommended to kick-start your career as a data scientist. Those with a master’s or doctorate degree before starting the career may discover data science as an extremely challenging and remunerative career option as they may find a place directly into mid-level or top-level management.

Certifications Required

Basic training to acquaint you into data science is available through massively open online courses. These courses aim to instill a basic knowledge of data science into students. Further, to broaden technical knowledge base, there are a wide range of topics and specializations to take into consideration data science certifications. These certifications may relate to big data platform or a particular toolset such as Certified Analytics Professional, Oracle or SAS certifications, etc.