To give an example, trade shows are generally much more expensive than affiliate marketing (CAC’s are higher). However,

I love to learn and try to learn from everybody. That’s why I haven’t unfriended some of my most obnoxious friends on Facebook. Sometimes amid their crazy rants, I learn something.,Sometimes I hate this idealism of mine because I am often disappointed in people. Still, I would far rather operate from this point of view than be someone who creates their own reality and will not ever leave it.,I have friends who are the staunchest conservatives and others who are the most liberal liberals. Typically I love this. The kind of people I don’t understand are those who seemingly have no opinions about anything. I’m not quite sure how you can care about the world, and stand for nothing.,So back to the day when I tried not to engage with the unteachable. I didn’t last long. I ended up in a long debate with a friend who I could once argue with positively, before he went to law school and started to argue to win instead of to argue to learn. I know better than to engage with him on certain topics, but I get hooked in.,I’ve received really good feedback for my more opinionated data science articles, which is why I wrote this. Like always, take this with a grain of salt if you disagree with anything that I said. But if you enjoyed it, please let me know what else you’d like me to write about.,I am an idealist. In the perfect world I carry around in my head, people want to learn. They want to get better. They want to stop doing stupid things. They want to figure out what is right and wrong. They approach issues with as clean of a slate as possible and try to figure them out. They want the best for all, but if they can’t have that, they want the best for the most. Yes, they are interested in the impact on them, but it’s not the priority.,This means I disagree with my friends on occasion. Or some friends most of the time. I look at the world differently than most and find myself on different sides at different times. Or maybe no side. Perhaps both sides. I see a lot of grey in the world, and not a lot of black and white.,I’ve received really good feedback for my more opinionated data science articles, which is why I wrote this. Like always, take this with a grain of salt if you disagree with anything that I said. But if you enjoyed it, please let me know what else you’d like me to write about.,In a previous article, I said that it’s better to focus on a few tools and be really good at them. I still stand by that statement, but the sad reality is that your employer(s) will most likely expect you to evolve and learn more tools as you go.,That day I said I wasn’t going to do it. I was not going to engage with people who were not teachable. I was not going to try to open minds that were voluntarily closed. I even made the vow on Twitter.,Also, if you switch employers in your career, you’ll likely have to learn a new set of tools because every company has its own desired tech stack, so be wary of this when choosing new employers.,Even if you’re a team of one, you’re going to have to communicate with upper management about the work that you’re doing and the tangible business impact that it’s having. You’ll also likely have to collaborate with other teams and business analysts to build that domain knowledge that we talked about a few points earlier.,The good news, however, is that you can eliminate tons of decisions: You can prepare your outfit, your meals, your to-do list, and so much more before going to bed. By doing so, you ensure that you don’t waste precious mental energy on insignificant decisions the next morning.,This one is more for those who think that being a data scientist means that you can hide in a room building models all day. No matter what any employer tells you, even if they say you can work at home 24/7 or work as a team of one, you’ll be required to collaborate and communicate with other stakeholders.,Through reading this, I hope that I was able to give you some (more) insights and useful advice that will help clear some of the misconceptions you have and also make your data science journey a lot smoother than mine!