Hello world, it’s Annie. Growing up I couldn’t decide what I wanted to be. In preschool I wanted to be a mermaid/toothfairy.In kindergarten I wanted to be a farmer. In grade school I wanted to be a teacher. In middle school I wanted to be a psychologist. In high school I wanted to be a musician. When I actually had to decide what I wanted to be in college, I picked economics because “I liked my senior year econ class”.

What I didn’t know, is that through my lifelong journey to pick a career, I was using data all along to draw conclusions and support my decision making. My google search history looked something like this…

Q: “What is the average teacher’s salary?
A:
Analysis: Well what if I have 10 kids and I get divorced, how am I possibly going to support my family and live comfortably as a single parent with this salary?

Q: “How much school do you need to be a psychologist?”
A:
Analysis: By the time I finish school, I’m going to be so far into debt, that it’s going to take me x years into my career to actually be making a profit.

Q: “What is the probability of becoming a famous musician?”
A:
Analysis: With those odds, I have a better chance of standing out in the rain and getting struck by lighting twice in the same hour.

“Which jobs have the best outlook and highest need in the next 5 years”
The business school led me to Computer Information Systems. CIS led me to data analytics. Analytics led me to my passion. My passion led me to my masters. My masters led me to my job in consulting. I’m back where I started, with business as fact, and technology as a dimension.

Data can be used to help companies make better business decisions. Data can be used to tell an autonomous vehicle how and when to turn left in an intersection. With bigger data, comes even bigger dreams.