Ahead of the Curve: Data Miner

By Marty Nemko

Posted: December 19, 2007

Data Miner. There's always a new magic pill that's supposed to make businesses more successful. Some examples from the past decade: the Six-Sigma approach to quality improvement, team-based decision making, diversity training, and data mining. Those fads appear to be fading, except for data mining, the use of statistics to predict or explain customer behavior. Examples: Did a new drug really work better than a placebo (let alone than the gold-standard drug)? What products should be pitched to each of your previous online customers? Which times of the year and for which markets should production be increased? How likely is it that certain credit card spending is fraudulent? Data mining is a great career for people who'd enjoy using statistics to unearth patterns in data, using ever more powerful software. Opportunities are particularly good if you also have business sense.

More info: "Career Advancement in Data Mining"

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