Discussing leadership
AA: This all involves strong leadership. What do you think makes a great data leader? What do you think you offer as a leader, and what inspires you in other people who you see as leaders in this space? What advice can you give someone looking to move from the technical space into a leadership role?
JTW: That’s a really tricky one. I think you have lots of experience in this space as well. I think you’ve had a tremendous journey yourself.
Sometimes when I hear this question, I almost feel like I want to apologize to the technical person asking it because there is this notion that leadership is not technical: either you’re a data leader or you’re a technical person. To me, that in itself is quite a dysfunction.
In an ideal world, you would have a track where a leader would say, “What exactly are you managing? Are you managing business strategy, vision, budgets, and projects? Or technical strategy, methods, and research...