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Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

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Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#11

Post by mabbo »

A thought: what you have is a particular set of skills. What you do with those skills may bring you more fulfillment than the act of using them.

Maybe telecom isn't for you. Maybe you'd find happiness in doing data science for an NGO that is saving lives in Africa, or an early startup that needs their second "data and data infrastructure" person to get the company bootstrapped. Or maybe not- that's just one thing you think about.

At the same time, nothing is wasted. You've learned stuff. Hopefully, you will continue to learn stuff your whole career, your whole life. If it happens that the first major skill you learned wasn't the one most critical to your career, that's okay.

Graduate with your degree. It serves as proof that you can learn stuff and not have your life fall apart for a few years.

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#12

Post by hobs »

There's many Data Science role which are actually poorly understood Data Engineering roles which it sounds like you "might" like more - dealing with pipelines, writing a lot of sql, wrangling bad data, making it go fast and scale for some platform engineering team.

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#13

Post by eat_your_potato »

prohobo wrote: post #4

I would consider it one of your specialties as a SWE. There are plenty of startups that would love an engineer who understands data, considering how devastating a bad SQL query can become over time, and how difficult it is to verify data. For your next job just find a developer position.

Maybe you can transition to ML-Ops : it's building stuff around Data Science pipeline, and it's better to understand why it needs to be built.

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#14

Post by forgingahead »

Congrats on the progress you have made, and also for realising what your preferences are.

First: Finish your degree - a valuable and important signal to employers is that you finish things, not start and stop whenever you have a change in emotion. It's ok to feel discouraged sometimes, but it's never ok to quit what you're supposed to finish.

Second: Your data science experience is very valuable already, and so once you start learning SWE, you have a good mix of skills that many of your peers with only data science or SWE won't have.

Third: I still like Ruby on Rails for web app development, and there is still a ton of opportunities out there for employment on it. So think about learning that. To incorporate data science into web apps for production, there are a lot of options, and Rails will keep you productive with moving forward and learning more in that field.

Good luck, and congrats on your upcoming graduation!

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#15

Post by scrapheap »

First bit of advice, you're so close to graduation make sure you stick with it and graduate - finishing your course shows that you can learn and that you see things through.

Once you've graduated don't let the fact that your work experience is Data Science based put you off for applying for SWE positions. I've worked with a lot of software engineers whose education is in a different field, so switching over is certainly possible.

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#17

Post by ghoshbishakh »

saalweachter wrote: post #8

Firstly, finish your degree. For most employers, just checking off the degree is more important than exactly what it is. This is especially true for software engineering. You will have many, many coworkers who have degrees in physics or bioinformatics or mathematics and work as SWEs. Most of their stories will be exactly the same as yours, although "...but there weren't any good paying jobs so..." will be in the runn…

You think degree is important? I am trying to finish my PhD. But I don't want to stay in academia after I finish. Would my degree be helpful in getting any SWE jobs?

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#18

Post by notslow »

prohobo wrote: post #4

I would consider it one of your specialties as a SWE. There are plenty of startups that would love an engineer who understands data, considering how devastating a bad SQL query can become over time, and how difficult it is to verify data. For your next job just find a developer position.

I agree completely with this SWEs who understand data are extremely valuable. It sounds like you have enough hobby experience combined with your current work to get a SWE position. But, like other commenters have mentioned finish your degree first! Having a degree, any degree will open more doors for you.

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#19

Post by fsloth »

I've worked as software engineer for the past 16 years. My degree was completely orthogonal - physics - although I took some software courses on the side. Never stopped my progress.

Finish your studies, and then find an employer. Do a few online courses if you feel you need to brush up on your skills.

Your degree is most valuable by existing, not being in any specific field.

There are of course position that can be quite strict from qualifications point of view, but don't let that stop you. There are many, many others.

Re: Ask HN: I realise data science is not for me and feel depressed

#20

Post by kemiller2002 »

ghoshbishakh wrote: post #17
saalweachter wrote: post #8

Firstly, finish your degree. For most employers, just checking off the degree is more important than exactly what it is. This is especially true for software engineering. You will have many, many coworkers who have degrees in physics or bioinformatics or mathematics and work as SWEs. Most of their stories will be exactly the same as yours, although "...but there weren't any good paying jobs so..." will be in the runn…

You think degree is important? I am trying to finish my PhD. But I don't want to stay in academia after I finish. Would my degree be helpful in getting any SWE jobs?

It depends on how far out you are. Finishing what you start is always a "good" sign. That's what a lot of people look for.

With the OP, he's 4 months away from finishing his degree. In the grand scheme of life, that's a "blink of an eye". There is no point not to, and (I don't agree with this at all) people judge you differently if you have a degree vs. not.

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