Key lessons that I'm picking up:
> In year two I was internally transferred to the workforce analytics team, working to forecast job demand and build a job recommendation engine to move people within the organization.
I'm hearing this a lot from friends.
> On the side, I continued self-learning. I picked up Python (love it) and took classes in machine learning. Spark, a shiny (pun intended) big data framework was emerging and provided free courses on EdX—I devoured these too.
I'm currently noticing this myself. I'm devouring content on Hack The Box. I'm currently making 16 hour days and am at 200+ hours within 2 weeks, and devoured half of their active boxes.
You don't need a background once you have 16 hour per day (every day) determination. There are people who need more than sheer determination, but enough don't. They simply need Elon Musk level determination.
> They were struggling with accurate product categorization and had heard about my sharing on the Kaggle competition.
Use the right status symbols. It used to be university, now it is being at the top of a competition.
> My family and closest friends thought it was risky. However, deep down, I knew I would regret not accepting the offer.
A potential pitfall that he avoided. I've been heavily hit by this and kind of stalled my life for a year. So yea, he could've listened to them. I know I shouldn't have, but I did. He didn't and pushed forward.
> The failure and embarrassment was very public. But so was the recovery and success.
One that I know from my personal circles: go to a public embarrassment that isn't yours and no one dares to touch and make it into a success. It's not easy to do but if you can do it, then do it, in the right company this will transform your life. Or at least, it transformed the lives that I know of whom did it. They didn't do it consciously though, it's upon reflection that they realize.
> But once in the field, there were PhDs with more experience around me—why did I get promoted above them?
When I read this I'm simply thinking that he didn't get promoted above them. Being a VP is something different, I imagine, than being a data scientist, so different skills are at play. Yes, you need technical competence but you also need VP skills. Let's see what he says.
> The measurable value I created was 3x that of an average data scientist.
Well, he could also communicate that. Could the avg data scientist do that? I don't know, I bet half of them couldn't or wouldn't care.
> I was promoted to be a role model and to mentor the team to deliver and communicate better.
Like I said, VP skills.
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To close:
I think he's right in his assessment, simply by looking at my successful friends, family and acquaintances and by constantly asking what they do.
I'd summarize his success as:
A) Get in (I'm struggling super hard at this part, "you can problem solve but have too little experience" is what I get, it's depressive, it's a key stage)
B) Create trust with everyone
C) Be the best pick for the new position out of your team
From those key stages one can distill that technical skill is initially important and communication later.
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If anyone wants to hire me as a mix between a hacker and programmer anywhere in the world let me know! I have 1 year of work experience in software engineering (excluding the bootcamp I taught for a year). My Hack The Box profile is looking to be more impressive every day.