Remember how we used to have bonus episodes? With International Women’s Day coming up in a week, it seemed like a good time to bring them back. Tim is joined by Rehgan Avon , the founder of the organization that runs the DataConnect Conference , which will be June 2-3, 2022 in Columbus, Ohio (and virtually). It’s a conference open to everyone to attend, but all of the speakers are women or gender minorities. Tim and Rehgan also discuss the current state of gender diversity in the profession and ...
Mar 01, 2022•13 min
How do we measure the performance of this podcast? With well-formulated KPIs, of course! With targets set for them. Since Tim is the taskmaster who insists we revisit our KPIs every year, we decided he would be our guest for this show, and Michael and Moe would take turns trying to stump him with impromptu role playing as difficult stakeholders in challenging scenarios. For complete show notes, including links to items mentioned in this episode and a transcript of the show, visit the show page ....
Feb 22, 2022•1 hr 1 min
With so many types of companies to work for, and analysts being in high demand, we're at a point where many of us find ourselves in the enviable position of being able to pick which company — and which type of company — we want to work for. Oh, bother! That means… we have to choose! In-house? Consultancy? Agency? Product? What's the "best" option? If you already know the answer is, "It depends," then you just might be the perfect fit for consulting! For complete show notes, including links to it...
Feb 08, 2022•1 hr 3 min
Hey, buddy, we've got a good tip for you: buy low, sell high! If you want a more succinct tip, then we've got one word: plastics! If you would like some ACTUAL tips that you might actually want to apply in your day-to-day (or data-to-data) work, then you will have to give this episode a listen. Back by popular demand, we took a meandering walk through some of our go-to tips ("life hacks" if you're in the Bay Area) for productivity, communication, analysis, and more! For complete show notes, incl...
Jan 25, 2022•1 hr 5 min
Mistakes happen. In healthy work environments, not only is that fact acknowledged, it's recognized as an opportunity to learn. That's something JD Long has been thinking about quite a bit over the past few years, and he joined the show for a chat about psychological safety: what it is, why it's important, and different techniques for engendering it. Michael trolled Tim almost immediately, which is: 1) ironic, and 2) slated to be addressed in a blameless post-mortem. For complete show notes, incl...
Jan 11, 2022•1 hr 18 min
We did it! Another year in the books, and 2021 was a bit of a ride. As we do every year, on this episode we reflect a little bit on the podcast and then a lot on the industry: what the major themes of 2021 were, and what we think might be coming in 2022. Google Analytics 4, 3rd party cookies, remote work and Zoom meetings, and even the metaverse! Plus, of course, this is our annual excuse to get our executive producer, Josh Crowhurst , on a mic! For complete show notes, including links to items ...
Dec 28, 2021•1 hr 12 min
Some would say that, given the breadth and depth of data that is available to businesses these days, a surefire path to business value is to load up a department with smart data scientists, task them with developing a solid machine learning strategy, and then execute that strategy. The people who've said that might take issue with this episode. Cassie Kozyrkov joined the show to discuss decision-making: what it is, how we often frame decisions too narrowly, and the different roles data can play ...
Dec 14, 2021•1 hr 9 min
It's a podcast episode. That's WHAT it is. But… WHY should you listen to it? Exactly. Or, perhaps, that's exactly WHY! Are you confused? You won't be after checking out our discussion with Jenni Bruckman about the vast and varied world of qualitative research and how it is the perfect partner to quantitative data. Give it a listen, and then let us know WHY you did and WHAT you thought of it! For complete show notes, including links to items mentioned in this episode and a transcript of the show,...
Nov 30, 2021•1 hr 3 min
Hey there, mister. That's a mighty nice multi-touch attribution model you're using there. It would be a shame to see it get mixed up with a media model. Or... would it? What happens if you think about media mix models as a tool that can be combined with experimentation to responsibly measure the incrementality of your marketing (while also still finding a crust of bread in the corner for so-called "click attribution")? According to a 2019 paper published by ThirdLove (which happens to have been ...
Nov 16, 2021•1 hr 1 min
What does neuroscience have to do with the work of the analyst? It turns out that neuroplasticity is to the modern analyst what plastics were to Benjamin Braddock, and it all comes down to Hebb's Law. Or, put another way, successfully working with peers and stakeholders can take some focused effort, some feedback, and some practice, and that's what "coach" James Hayes joined the episode to discuss! For complete show notes, including links to items mentioned in this episode and a transcript of th...
Nov 02, 2021•1 hr 5 min
One of our KPIs for the show is to keep the Topic Repeat Rate (TRR) below 1.2%. From carefully monitoring our show dashboard, we had an actionable insight: we could finally revisit episode #002. Conveniently, the topic of that show was dashboards, which explains the self-referential stemwinder of a description of this episode. That show was "a long, long time ago. We can still remember… when the dashboards used to make us smile." For complete show notes, including links to items mentioned in thi...
Oct 19, 2021•1 hr 18 min
What is a system without empathy? What is a show summary without an attempt to overly distill the discussion to the point of sounding like nonsense? On this episode, Hilary Parker (who you may know from the Not So Standard Deviations podcast or elsewhere) joined us to discuss what we can learn from the design process (as in: actual designers) when it comes to analytics and data science. Among other things, that mindset highlights the importance of the analyst empathizing with stakeholders. Tim g...
Oct 05, 2021•1 hr 18 min
Stop for a minute and think about the highest stakes campaign or test you've ever run. Were you nervous? Now, instead, imagine that you're on an aircraft carrier with a few thousand people on board whose safety you are responsible for, and your team is about to watch 40,000 tons of ordnance detonate (in an environmentally friendly way) right next to the ship... so you can collect data to verify that the various systems are working as expected. On this episode, our guest can't really talk about t...
Sep 21, 2021•1 hr 10 min
As analysts, it can be easy to get so focused on the data that we lose sight of the imperative that we answer meaningful questions (aka: validating relevant hypotheses). On this episode, we sat down with Wil Reynolds , co-founder and accidental lead generator for SEER Interactive , for a discussion that turned out to be about curiosity and the power of trying to prove yourself wrong (and being willing to invest the time to do so!). In the end, we concluded that Wil has always been a "data person...
Sep 07, 2021•1 hr 8 min
Have you ever worked in a large organization where the data team(s) are perfectly structured to deliver efficient, harmonious, and meaningful results to the business with 'nary a gap nor a redundancy? If you answered "yes," then we'll go ahead and report you to HR for being a LIAR! From high growth startups to staid enterprises, figuring out how to organize the data and data-adjacent teams is always chock full of tradeoffs. And that's the topic of this episode. For complete show notes, including...
Aug 24, 2021•1 hr 5 min
Have you ever thought, "you know, it would be interesting to take my analytical knowledge and just totally run an organization based on what the data says?" Yeah. Us, either. That's terrifying! But, that's exactly what our guest on this episode did. Ben Lindbergh , along with his stathead-in-crime (aka, co-author) Sam Miller , took over the management of a minor league baseball team in 2015, and the result was The Only Rule Is It Has to Work: Our Wild Experiment Building a New Kind of Baseball T...
Aug 10, 2021•1 hr 16 min
Data is everywhere and it's simply not going away. Plenty of people do seem to ignore it to their peril, but if we are trying to make sense of the world, making good sense of data is absolutely critical. In business we call it data literacy, and, truthfully, it is a mandatory skill set for almost anyone. Data and understanding data might have a set of rules, and it seems like not everyone is committed to playing by those rules. Sometimes even our own brains get in on the act of hiding what the d...
Jul 27, 2021•1 hr 5 min
We're baaaaaaack…! Shorter show name, a rebrand, some minor formatting and structural updates, but still "Moe Kiss with a couple of guys who listeners can't keep straight." On this episode, we talk for a little bit about what we've been doing while we were on hiatus and then dive into a topic that only Cassie Kozyrkov has dared to deeply explore before: the distinction between analysts, statisticians, data engineers, ML engineers ...and data charlatans. Well, really just the first two. But, Cass...
Jul 13, 2021•1 hr 5 min
Once upon a time, there was an analyst. And that analyst had some data. She used that data to do some analysis, and from that analysis she realized she had some recommendations she could make to her organization. This was the point where our intrepid analyst reached a metaphorical fork in Communication Road: would she hastily put all of her thoughts together quickly in a slide deck with charts and graphs and bullets, or would she pause, step back, and craft a true data story? Well, if she listen...
Jun 29, 2021•59 min
We can watch (sort of) what users do on our sites. That's web analytics. We can ask them how they felt about the experience. That's voice of the customer. But, can we (and should we?) actually analyze their emotional reactions? On this episode, Michael and Tim sat down with Dr. Liraz Margalit , Head of Digital Behavioral Research at Clicktale , to bend their brains a bit around that very topic. And, they left the discussion thinking differently about conversion rates, and even realizing that scr...
Jun 15, 2021•57 min
Do you model professionally? Would you like to? Or, are you uncertain . These are the topics of this episode: Bayesian statistician (among other official roles that are way less fun to say) Dr. Elea Feit joined the gang to discuss how we, as analysts, think about data put it to use. Things got pretty deep, included the exploration of questions such as, "If you run a test that includes a holdout group, is that an A/B test?" This episode ran a little long, but our confidence level is quite high th...
Jun 01, 2021•1 hr 6 min
What’s in a job title? that which we call a senior data scientist by any other job title would model as predictively… This, dear listener, is why the hosts of this podcast crunch data rather than dabble in iambic pentameter. With sincere apologies to William Shakespeare, we sat down with Maryam Jahanshahi to discuss job titles, job descriptions, and the research, experiments, and analysis that she has conducted as a research scientist at Datapeople (formerly TapRecruit), specifically relating to...
May 18, 2021•1 hr 4 min
Did you hear the one about the Harvard-educated economist who embraced her inner wiring as a lateral thinker to explore topics ranging from HIV/AIDS in Africa to the impact of Hepatitis B on male-biased sex ratios in China to the range of advice and dicta doled out by doctors and parents and in-laws and friends about what to do (and not do!) during pregnancy? It’s a data-driven tale if ever there was one! Emily Oster , economics professor at Brown University and bestselling author of Expecting B...
May 04, 2021•1 hr 3 min
Is your organization customer-centric? Does your product team dive into the demographics of your customers to figure out what features will make them as happy as possible? If so, then you're doing it all wrong! Perhaps. On this episode, the gang chats with Dr. Peter Fader ( @faderp ) from The Wharton School and Zodiac Metrics, about putting customer lifetime value (CLV) front and center when it comes to developing and executing marketing strategies. For complete show notes, including links to it...
Apr 20, 2021•1 hr 5 min
Thanks for stopping by. Please get comfortable. We’re going to be taking a few notes while you listen, but pay that no mind. Now, what we’d like you to do is listen to the podcast. Oh. And don’t worry about that big mirror over there. There may be 2 or 3 or 10 people watching. Wow. We’re terrible moderators when it comes to this sort of thing. That’s why Els Aerts from AGConsult joined us to discuss user research: what it is, where it should fit in an organization’s toolkit, and some tips for do...
Apr 06, 2021•49 min
Have you ever seen a one-man show in the theater? It's awesome. Unless it's terrible. The same can be said for one-person digital analytics teams. It can be awesome, in that you get to, literally, do EVERY aspect of analytics. It can be terrible because, well, you've got to do EVERYTHING, and it's easy for the fun stuff to get squeezed out of the day. On this episode, we head back Down Under for a chat with Moe Kiss , product (and digital) analyst at THE ICONIC . Whether you pronounce "data" as ...
Mar 23, 2021•56 min
In recognition of International Women's Day , and because it's a really important topic, this is a very special episode. The two straight, white, cisgender male co-hosts of this podcast sat this episode out, while Moe took over the mic for an in-depth discussion with Alison Vorsatz from Fairygodboss and Aubrey Blanche from Atlassian about diversity (a term they both try to avoid) in the workplace. If this episode doesn't change your perspective and compel you to action, you are almost certainly ...
Mar 08, 2021•1 hr 1 min
As analysts, we often have unique knowledge of the data, specialized responsibilities for data-related deliverables, and an expectation that we'll be at the ready to dive into high priority requests. What happens, then, when we're out of the office, be that for a planned vacation, for an unexpected illness, or for bringing a new human being into the world? And, what happens if it's that last one and you're also the most beloved co-host of the top-rated explicit analytics podcast? Tune in to this...
Feb 23, 2021•59 min
You know that sinking feeling: the automated report went out first thing Monday morning, and your Slack messages have been blowing up ever since because revenue flatlined on Saturday afternoon! You frantically start digging in (spilling your coffee in the process!) while you're torn between hoping that it's "just a data issue" (which would be good for the company but a black mark on the data team) and that it's a "real issue with the site" (not good for the business, but at least your report was...
Feb 09, 2021•1 hr 1 min
As we put the awfulness of 2020 in the rearview mirror, we thought it might be fun to look back to another bleak period: the 2007-2008 financial crisis! Why? Because Tim hasn't stopped talking about Subprime Attention Crisis — the Tim Hwang book that draws a parallel between the digital advertising ecosystem and the subprime lending crisis from a decade ago — we decided to all give it a read and then sit down for a discussion with the author. From the opacity brought on by the many moving parts ...
Jan 26, 2021•1 hr 3 min
