Book Image

Cracking the Data Science Interview

By : Leondra R. Gonzalez, Aaren Stubberfield
Book Image

Cracking the Data Science Interview

By: Leondra R. Gonzalez, Aaren Stubberfield

Overview of this book

The data science job market is saturated with professionals of all backgrounds, including academics, researchers, bootcampers, and Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) graduates. This poses a challenge for companies seeking the best person to fill their roles. At the heart of this selection process is the data science interview, a crucial juncture that determines the best fit for both the candidate and the company. Cracking the Data Science Interview provides expert guidance on approaching the interview process with full preparation and confidence. Starting with an introduction to the modern data science landscape, you’ll find tips on job hunting, resume writing, and creating a top-notch portfolio. You’ll then advance to topics such as Python, SQL databases, Git, and productivity with shell scripting and Bash. Building on this foundation, you'll delve into the fundamentals of statistics, laying the groundwork for pre-modeling concepts, machine learning, deep learning, and generative AI. The book concludes by offering insights into how best to prepare for the intensive data science interview. By the end of this interview guide, you’ll have gained the confidence, business acumen, and technical skills required to distinguish yourself within this competitive landscape and land your next data science job.
Table of Contents (21 chapters)
Free Chapter
1
Part 1: Breaking into the Data Science Field
4
Part 2: Manipulating and Managing Data
10
Part 3: Exploring Artificial Intelligence
16
Part 4: Getting the Job

Understanding data ingestion

The responsibility of completing tasks within the early stages of the data pipeline (i.e., data ingestion and data storage) often falls under the responsibility of a machine learning/data engineer and not the data scientist. However, a data scientist should be able to understand what happens during these stages at a high level.

In the simplest terms, data ingestion involves developing automated processes to collect the data used for data science models automatically. Often, organizations/businesses already have processes in place to collect basic information about their activities, such as tracking website usage or customer purchase transactions. However, sometimes, to solve a particular organizational/business question, new data needs to be collected. The goal here is to automate the process to ensure that the data eventually used in a model is consistent, reliable, and free of bias to the best of the organization’s ability.

Data ingestion...