Eugene Yan, an Applied Scientist at Amazon, shares what his day-to-day looks like in a CareerFair interview. He describes typical activities including working with data, applying machine learning for book recommendations and search, and navigating meetings and documentation. He highlights the leverage of building ML systems at scale for millions of customers as a major perk, while noting challenges like overly complex stakeholder requests and data access delays. He also reflects on how his Psychology background shaped his analytical and communication skills, and emphasizes that communication is the most critical skill for data scientists.
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What does an average day look like?What does a non-average day look like?What’s your favourite part about the job?What’s your least favourite part about being a Data Scientist?You’ve worked in both Singapore and the United States - are there any cultural differences you’ve noticed in the workplace that would necessarily impact your day to day?Do you think more people in tech would benefit from having a humanities background? You studied Psychology as an undergrad. What are some ways in which that has helped you in Data Science?How is working at a big company like Amazon different to working at a startup like Lazada? Do you enjoy one more than the other?You also have a masters in CS. Did you even consider going down the Software Engineering route?Something I’ve noticed is that you’ve given a few talks and like to speak at meetups. How much do you think strong communication plays a role in being a successful data scientist? How can younger professionals cultivate that skill?8 Impressions