How should a data team ensure users or other team members trust their data? How can you foster analytical, innovative thinking on your team or in your company at large? What is good or bad data? What’s the future of data analysis?
These were some of the questions answered at this year’s Data Connect Conference.
The DataConnect Conference is sponsored by Women in Analytics, an organization that showcases women in the field of analytics and their significant contributions. The conference is held every year in Columbus, Ohio. There are multiple tracks, each with its own set of topics and speakers. The 2022 theme explored applications of Artificial Intelligence. While that is a pretty big topic, the breakout talks unfolding from that theme showed the nuance, capabilities and even dangers of AI.
The crowd-favorite talk was the keynote panel from the first day. The panel focused on the ethics of data by hosting three women who had intersecting, vested interest in AI: a professor, a lawyer, and an FBI employee. They discussed the ethics of capturing reliable data so that the subsequent actions taken by companies or external teams do not lead to harm to the general public. It seems like a straightforward idea but if the team collecting the data isn’t diverse or accidentally implements bias, the whole process can be thrown off before a single piece of data is collected. In addition, there are historical reasons everyone should be careful that data does not negatively harm a community; bad data can result in ongoing trauma that endures across multiple generations. Afterwards, everyone at the conference was buzzing about this talk and referencing the quotes from the speakers.
In addition to the talks, every year the conference hosts a data visualization competition. From all the submissions, five finalists show off what they’ve made at the conference. Touring the five finalists was another highlight to the two days; all attendees had the option to vote on their favorite. The first place winner had collected data about Sherlock Holmes and the stories featuring him. It was whimsical, analytical and (at least according to this writer) the clear winner out of the five presented.
Key findings from the conference,
- When creating data visualizations, you need to think of the user that would be using that visual. Can they trust what they’re seeing? Asking yourself a question like this can help you as the designer create trust not only in the visualization but also in the data behind it.
- There is no neutrality in AI — the machine is being fed data. So as an analyst and a human, we must recognize that we are more than just a collection of data.
- When harvesting high-quality data, you want to look at the quality of the framework that gathers the data, then within the data you should strive for completeness, uniqueness, validity and accuracy.
- Data is rooted in process; this is the nexus of where you can fix the problem of bad data.
- When creating your data models, think about the stakeholders and their goals. What will they be looking to achieve with these models? Although a data team can be shielded from business goals, they should know these in order to get buy-in from higher-ups.
This conference provided a platform for female speakers in the data and analysis space. Almost 1,000 people attended from all around the U.S., so networking was easy and plentiful. After holding off on conferences for a year and half, the chance to meet in person for this conference and talk with professionals was a fantastic opportunity. At Digital Additive, we know the importance of data to our clients, so staying up to date on trends and practices is core to our own DNA. We look forward to more conferences like this in the future!
Want to join a team that understands the impact of data and the importance of treating it strategically and with care? Learn more about Digital Additive’s open positions today.
