Episode 19: The Democratisation of AI and Data Science
Download MP300:00:00 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Hello and welcome to value driven data science brought to you by Genevieve Hayes Consulting.
00:00:06 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I'm your host doctor, Genevieve Hayes, and today I'm joined by Geo George to discuss the democratisation of AI and data science.
00:00:16 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Geo is a director and co-founder of Mayfly Accelerator, a company that helps founders build, grow and scale disruptive startup.
00:00:25 Dr Genevieve Hayes
He is also a start up founder in his own.
00:00:27 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Right.
00:00:28 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And in a previous life worked as an executive in the government sector with a focus on strategy and risk management.
00:00:36 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Geo, welcome to the show.
00:00:38 Geo George
Thanks, gentlemen. I'm really excited to be having this discussion with you. Great topic, very contemporary and yeah, it should be a fun show.
00:00:46 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Once Upon a time, to be a data scientist also meant you needed to develop programming skills to rival those of a software engineer. This limited the abilities of those without programming skills to make use of AI and data science.
00:01:01 Dr Genevieve Hayes
However, recently this has changed with a huge number of no code and low code tools entering the market.
00:01:10 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Many of which are the products of startups, but startups are also leading the way in leveraging these tools and in the process, helping to make AI and data science available to all Geo. You yourself are a member of the startup community and.
00:01:30 Dr Genevieve Hayes
You also work closely with startup founders and help them to use these tools to get their own products off the ground. However, you yourself aren't a software developer.
00:01:41 Dr Genevieve Hayes
When we first met, you were actually working in a risk advisory role, although granted, even back then you are definitely very interested in data and technology.
00:01:53 Dr Genevieve Hayes
But before we get too far into today's topic, can you tell us a bit about your career journey from risk advisor?
00:02:02 Dr Genevieve Hayes
To where you are to.
00:02:04 Geo George
So this is gonna be a bit of a windy, twisty part, because even thinking back on my own career journey, yeah, there's there's not a lot that makes sense.
00:02:15 Geo George
It's only when you look back and reflect you can kind of connect those dots that weren't quite apparent at that time. So again, you know, we met.
00:02:24 Geo George
That government insurance organisation.
00:02:27 Geo George
Yeah. That's as as exotic as.
00:02:29 Geo George
It sounds but but.
00:02:30 Geo George
It it it generally was a great place and I I very much enjoyed that role providing provide new services to to clients. A lot of clients in the healthcare space, education space and that was kind of my first introduction to like serious data sites and watching some of the very cool stuff that you when your team do.
00:02:47 Geo George
And I remember at.
00:02:48 Geo George
That point I'm thinking, you know, wow, this is all so cool, but how do I even get started?
00:02:54 Geo George
You know, doing something like this and I wouldn't have thought back then that these these kind of tools and techniques that yourself and and the and the people who are that, that are scientists were using would become accessible to me.
00:03:06 Geo George
Well, since then I've I've done a bunch of things. I had a an amazing time in the state government sector working across economic development, healthcare, government services, portfolios, you know, loved my time there. I even had the opportunity to be part of the COVID response programme for the Victorian.
00:03:27 Geo George
Initiated to COVID-19.
00:03:29 Geo George
It was a time that was marked by playing in very large spaces, thinking about policy across a number of different sectors.
00:03:38 Geo George
Thinking about implementing strategy.
00:03:41 Geo George
Yeah, at at.
00:03:41 Geo George
A very large scale working with very diverse stakeholders to come up with solutions to really, really hard problem.
00:03:48 Geo George
And at some point there was a itch in me where I longed for my startup days. Back when I was at UNI, when the opportunity arose to join a venture capital firm, I jumped at it and I and I took that on.
00:04:02 Geo George
So that was kind of my part back towards the start up space. I've put all my time in.
00:04:07 Geo George
Government I've always been.
00:04:09 Geo George
Well, I've still been involved in startups and having an entrepreneurial mind.
00:04:13 Geo George
That I try to harness as much of that and put that back into the the government space. So I've run a couple of startup toolkit workshops within government and it was all great. But it was awesome to be fully immersed back into that sort of space. Working at NBC for and.
00:04:31 Geo George
After a while I I.
00:04:32 Geo George
Wanted to do a little bit more.
00:04:33 Geo George
Hands on it and perhaps have that experience of building a start up again. So that's when I started my flight. So later with my cofounder.
00:04:42 Geo George
Yeah. And what can I say? It's been good. You know, we and I promise this is the only bug that I'm gonna provide for my flight.
00:04:49 Geo George
But we work with really awesome founders right from ignition. You know where they have an idea through to launch and scale where they want to grow and you know, potentially exit their businesses as well. So we follow what's called the.
00:05:02 Geo George
Studio model but we help startups to build really innovative technology products. We help them market and get traction on.
00:05:11 Geo George
Products and we provide investments to scale and grow their tech startups as well. So we work across the spectrum of startups life cycle.
00:05:20 Geo George
So yeah, we get to be super hands on and at the same time have a bit of variety and the kind of start ups and you know startup founders that we work with. So yeah, hopefully that gives you an idea of.
00:05:32 Geo George
My journey from risk advisor to startup advisor.
00:05:35 Dr Genevieve Hayes
One thing I gotta ask you, do you?
00:05:37 Geo George
Yeah. So when we met? No, but now, yeah, just because of necessity and and you know interest. I do do a bit of programming.
00:05:46 Geo George
I wouldn't say I'm I'm.
00:05:47 Geo George
A Wiz programmer, but you know I could work.
00:05:50 Geo George
My way around.
00:05:51 Geo George
But in JavaScript, HTML and now and at the latest Edge framework is dark. So flutter I don't.
00:05:56 Geo George
Know if you've heard of it, but.
00:05:58 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Haven't heard of that one?
00:05:59 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I was thinking there was no way you could have gotten this far without having at least some programming skills.
00:06:04 Geo George
Yeah, and and it certainly helps to have a deeper understanding of, you know, some of the tools and technologies that we work with, so.
00:06:11 Geo George
And they thought we've got a team of developers that primarily use a lot of no code and low code tool to to maintain speed of iteration and and product velocity.
00:06:20 Geo George
But sometimes you know you do have to expand your capabilities with code and and and it's it's fun to kind of get deeper into the tech stack, so yeah.
00:06:30 Dr Genevieve Hayes
It never really surprised me that you ended up in the startup and tech.
00:06:33 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Based given all the conversations we have back when we first met, yeah, what surprised me was that you didn't start in the tech space to begin with. And you, you have a commerce degree, don't you?
00:06:45 Geo George
Yeah, that's right. So you know, I started off studying actual science, realised very quickly.
00:06:51
Yeah. And you?
00:06:52 Geo George
Know I realised it wasn't for me very quickly.
00:06:55 Geo George
So my only other kind of alternative to gonna maintain those credits to university was, you know, to to pick up economics and finance of the major so.
00:07:05 Geo George
Yeah, that's that's how I ended up with a comas degree.
00:07:08 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I'm sorry, that's find this hilarious, because that means that you and I both had the same educational foundation.
00:07:15 Geo George
Yeah, I know. And and so this is.
00:07:16
OK.
00:07:18 Geo George
What? What, what? I mean about the?
00:07:20 Geo George
Idiosyncratic nature of of life.
00:07:22 Geo George
You know, there's there's all these kind of things that happen where two people can start off from, you know, the the same starting point, but end up in completely different places. But you know, given that we've naturally overlapped.
00:07:35 Geo George
And connected again, you know, maybe maybe we're not.
00:07:39 Geo George
That different places you know now.
00:07:43 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Do you think your business background has helped you get where you are?
00:07:46
OK.
00:07:47 Geo George
Yeah, I I think the the foundational skills have are certainly help that they are just the basics that.
00:07:53 Geo George
You kind of need to know.
00:07:55 Geo George
But I I do think a large part is all of the skills that I've acquired on the job. Seriously, like in my career.
00:08:02 Geo George
A lot of the the key.
00:08:05 Geo George
Skill sets is just around people managing people, managing stakeholders, trying to sell a vision and idea a product. So while the the the business background did help you know how are utilised it and the the additional skills that I've picked up along the way that you know helped me the most I would say.
00:08:24 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Well, I think I found from my own experiences, even though I'm quite happy to have moved on from the insurance sector, I think it's a really good sector to start out doing data science in because it's a mature application of data science. This is a industry where people have figured out how to use data science in order to add.
00:08:45 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Value and with a lot of other sectors. They haven't figured that out yet, so being able to see the insurance sector as a best case use case is a really good way of forming a prototype in your brain that you can then apply to other.
00:09:00 Geo George
Yeah, I I couldn't agree more. I think the applications of data science in an insurance landscape is so much more tangible than buying data science to traffic management or something.
00:09:12 Geo George
Like that you.
00:09:12 Geo George
Know like. Yeah, because there's.
00:09:14 Geo George
A very direct correlation between how well you.
00:09:17 Geo George
Interpret and understand the data to your bottom line.
00:09:20 Geo George
When you're in an insurance space.
00:09:22 Geo George
I think it.
00:09:23 Geo George
Was some of the work that that you and your team did that that really picked my interest in data science and data analytics?
00:09:29 Geo George
Watching how you can translate noise, a lot of the the claims data that they work with, as you know like can be quite noisy.
00:09:37 Geo George
But taking that noise and getting insights from it, it's almost like magic, you know? And.
00:09:42 Geo George
And certainly like.
00:09:43 Geo George
When you don't have a fine appreciation of some of the tools and techniques that you use it, it does seem like magic.
00:09:48 Geo George
How you can take all of that noise and data and then get useful insights that that could be put back into providing better services or preventative programmes in the healthcare space that direct?
00:10:00 Geo George
The save lives it it. It is a great space to start out in. If you've got an interest in in data science, you're good.
00:10:07 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Do you reckon if you could go back in time, you'd have taken a more textrix path right from the beginning.
00:10:12 Geo George
You know I've.
00:10:13 Geo George
Got I've I've thought about that quite often. Whoops, I didn't mention this at the start, but I did right before being my. I did have a couple of texts inside. I had my.
00:10:22 Geo George
Start up, you know, venture from the start up and led couple of hard lessons that way had a bit of an exit, but it wasn't anything obviously to you know to retire or anything like that?
00:10:32 Geo George
And I worked at another startup and one of the reasons why I joined via my A was because I wanted to do something completely different. I had gotten a taste of.
00:10:43 Geo George
Start off well, then, yeah, there's there's a lot of advantages to it, but if you're just starting out your career and you're itching for something a bit more large scale working in the startup environment gives you a lot of variety, but it doesn't necessarily give you scale, or if if the startup obviously does well and and it scales naturally you.
00:11:01 Geo George
Could you could?
00:11:02 Geo George
With it. So I've thought about this quite a bit and and I don't think I would change anything. I'm happy with the opportunities that I was given.
00:11:10 Geo George
You know V Mia.
00:11:11 Geo George
And you know, working in state government. So I got a mix of both the agility of what startup life is like and the scale of working in state government.
00:11:22 Geo George
You know which.
00:11:23 Geo George
Oftentimes, when you're you're talking about strategy and policy, you're you're considering a vast stakeholder group which you know you just can't get that from a startup environment.
00:11:31 Dr Genevieve Hayes
On that note, let's move on to the topic of today, which is the democratisation of AI and data science, and this is actually a topic that you suggested Geo in suggesting this topic.
00:11:44 Dr Genevieve Hayes
One of the comments you made was that you'd seen a lot of startups facilitating this democratisation. Now, before we go on just to make sure you and I are on the same page.
00:11:55 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Our listeners are on the same page. What exactly do you mean by democratisation?
00:11:59 Geo George
So before before we start, as I was saying, we naturally had a conversation about how AI and and data science has become like popular macular.
00:12:08 Geo George
Now you know, obviously chat, cheaper tea and and some of the you know, use cases. That's that's demonstrated has has helped in that way but you don't have to be in a super tech centric role.
00:12:20 Geo George
Have some sort of a a run in.
00:12:22 Geo George
With AI and.
00:12:23 Geo George
And data science, it could be you leveraging some of the benefits of these technologies.
00:12:29 Geo George
Or it could be you're you're.
00:12:30 Geo George
Directly working with some of these technologies.
00:12:32 Geo George
If you think back 10 years, the types of people that were utilising and and interacting with these with these tools and technologies is it was just mainly related to you know, people like yourself, you've got a background in data science, you work in the in the.
00:12:48 Geo George
Place, but certainly not people like myself, who who've got a non technical background. You know, people who are interested in building businesses, people who are interested in optimising their businesses and you know, there might be a small business owner, but you know have a have a rich collection of data from product reviews or people sending through feedback or.
00:13:09 Geo George
Because nowadays these tools are so accessible that literally anyone they can pick them up and and use it, you know, ranging from small business owners to educators even to optimise your own life.
00:13:22 Geo George
One trend that I'm seeing is sort of this hyper rich data gathering of personal health data. You know, I've I've got enough of watch.
00:13:30 Geo George
People you are using.
00:13:31 Geo George
Different kind of health tracking device.
00:13:34 Geo George
And it's generating a lot of data, but then we're coming up to same kind of problems that that you might experience.
00:13:41 Geo George
You know when you're working at a.
00:13:42 Geo George
Large company where you're generating a lot of data.
00:13:44 Geo George
But all of.
00:13:44 Geo George
That is being sort of treated as noise rather than signal. Nowadays there's there's tools coming out where you can analyse your own health data and and optimise.
00:13:53 Geo George
Your life, not just your business. Using some of these tools and and.
00:13:59 Dr Genevieve Hayes
What I'm really interested in is, you know you have all these articles in the newspaper saying how the education sector is freaking out about ChatGPT, and how, you know, this will be the death of SA's and stuff like that.
00:14:12 Dr Genevieve Hayes
But I actually came across an article in the newspaper the other day where it was saying the people who run.
00:14:18 Dr Genevieve Hayes
The open universities platform, they're incorporating GPT 4 into their platform to help educators use it to create customise assessment tasks for the people who are studying these courses.
00:14:34 Dr Genevieve Hayes
So that they can get their courses up and running a lot faster and customise them exactly to what the students are struggling with.
00:14:43 Dr Genevieve Hayes
So it's two sides of the same coin. You've got the people who are freaking out, but you've also got the people who are seeing this as an opportunity.
00:14:51 Geo George
And here's the thing.
00:14:52 Geo George
About this dialogue that that we've recently seen quite out of, yeah, university. They're really worried about.
00:14:58 Geo George
Their course content somehow being perverted or taking advantage of using large language model. Then maybe it's a reflection on the the course content itself.
00:15:10 Geo George
I I do think charging you can do a lot of things, but you know it it's not gonna replace critical thinking and the types of.
00:15:18 Geo George
Skills that university should be able to teach. Yeah, just take a a very simple kind of example, I'd say essay writing is is often something that's that's mentioned a lot in in this context, so chat.
00:15:30 Geo George
PT, You know, just writing people's essays sort of. Now universities have access to tools just like anyone has access to tools that could detect the use of large language models in text content.
00:15:41 Geo George
And and it detects it with a high degree of accuracy. So then the question becomes, well if we can detect the use of ChatGPT.
00:15:50 Geo George
Or large language models in some of the coursework that's being submitted. Then it's a policy question. Do we allow for the content?
00:15:59 Geo George
Data by large language model that in coursework. Or do we say it has to be original content that was written by the students or do we take a hybrid approach where you leverage some of the new capabilities that that you get from these large language models and then combine it with your own analysis and your own ability to craft a narrative and a structure?
00:16:19 Geo George
To arrive at something that potentially leverages the benefits of your own narration abilities, and your own critical.
00:16:26 Geo George
Making abilities, but also the quick access to content and information that you get from large language models like chat, GP.
00:16:35 Geo George
I think the sweet spot is like combining the two together rather than, you know, having a hard line approach of 1 or the other. So yeah, that that's just my own views on it. I think universities can.
00:16:46 Geo George
Do a lot better when thinking about ChatGPT and the education context.
00:16:51 Dr Genevieve Hayes
The area where ChatGPT excels is that it is really good at summarising large volumes of data. If you're teaching students to just summarise large volumes of data, the fact is that ChatGPT will always outperform the.
00:17:06 Dr Genevieve Hayes
It's there's no way the students can do better than it. It's just like a student can't do better than a calculator.
00:17:12 Dr Genevieve Hayes
They'll make mistakes. The calculator won't, but the thing that ChatGPT can't do is ChatGPT doesn't have experiences of its own, and what I've seen some academics.
00:17:26 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Propose and I really like this idea. Is set assignments which give the students experiences in doing something like writing a computer programme to solve some sort.
00:17:38 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Problem and then ask them to write about their experiences in doing it. You know, what did you learn from this?
00:17:45 Dr Genevieve Hayes
What were you surprised by with this? What was more difficult than you expected? Because that's asking them about their personal experiences, which is something that that GPT can never have.
00:17:58 Geo George
Yeah, and and that's a fact.
00:18:00 Geo George
That's like kind of, you know, where to put it, which is you're right, it shouldn't. Can't be better than a calculator, just like it shouldn't.
00:18:05 Geo George
Can't be better than a large language model and summarising large points of information, so universities that really teach content that's that's designed to regurgitate it and reside large volumes of information, they're naturally gonna have a problem with.
00:18:19 Geo George
The introduction of.
00:18:20 Geo George
GPT and and alms into kind of common use cases. So then it really is about getting more creative about educating students and education focused on experiences rather than just rote learning and regurgitation of. I think it's, it's.
00:18:37 Geo George
It's almost forcing the education sector to have a real hard think about the the philosophy of how people educate, and this is a conversation that that I had with a friend of.
00:18:47 Geo George
Mine recently about in.
00:18:49 Geo George
Modern education system.
00:18:50 Geo George
It's really designed to turn out COGS in a machine, and if you think about sort of the origins of the modern education system, dates back to the Victorian era.
00:18:58 Geo George
Where you know there.
00:18:59 Geo George
Was this large empire building and you needed the empire? He operated the machine and and it needed replacement codes and pieces and widgets and units for for this machine and and the education system has evolved to provide.
00:19:13 Geo George
About demand, now we're going to this new age of knowledge work and you know, I've read a really interesting stuff from Deloitte where by 2032 thirds of all jobs are gonna be jobs that are soft, skill intensive.
00:19:26 Geo George
So jobs that focus on the human elements of, of working and of of your skill.
00:19:31 Geo George
Set so it's really.
00:19:34 Geo George
And it's also an almost an.
00:19:35 Geo George
Existential issue for for the education system, which is.
00:19:38 Geo George
Do we adapt to this new way of working where we're transitioning from this Victorian era system designed to feed widgets and cults into the machine, to something that's more evolved and potentially involves higher level thinking around knowledge work and and how you facilitate the?
00:19:58 Geo George
Creating utility and productivity using not work learning but creative thinking, creative problem solving, human interactions, and soft skills. Leveraging your experiences to actually solve problems and create value.
00:20:13 Geo George
So I I think it's a, it's a super exciting time. But I do think the education.
00:20:17 Geo George
Space has kind.
00:20:17 Geo George
Of evolved to meet the new demands.
00:20:19 Geo George
That are being created.
00:20:20 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Have you read some of the stuff Seth Godin's written about the education system?
00:20:25 Geo George
I've heard some of.
00:20:26 Geo George
The stuff that I haven't read it in detail.
00:20:28 Dr Genevieve Hayes
He wrote it was like a 100 page manifesto or or something was basically saying that pretty much exactly what you just said.
00:20:36 Geo George
So it was quite a large bit of work, so I I've I've read the Cliff notes on that I can.
00:20:42 Geo George
Yeah, I can say that, yeah.
00:20:43 Dr Genevieve Hayes
It's it's worth reading anything Seth Godin writes. It's worth reading, yeah.
00:20:48 Geo George
I'll. Yeah. Now, now.
00:20:49 Geo George
That I've got it so hard, everything that I'll I'll make more of.
00:20:52 Geo George
A a point.
00:20:55 Dr Genevieve Hayes
So we're talking about these low code code and no code tools and obviously ChatGPT is the big example. What other tools have you seen people use?
00:21:06 Geo George
Yeah. So for our block is a great example. It lets you build really cool machine learning models.
00:21:13 Geo George
You know, use your own data or use prebuild finetune models to solve a particular need that you might have it.
00:21:20 Geo George
It might be analysing website traffic to target certain users to optimise your ads then, or it might even be you run a dry cleaning company and you want to get more efficient in in how you manage your you know your workflow right.
00:21:33 Geo George
Right, that's a cool tool, but also yeah, a a lot of stuff like sentiment analysis and thematic analysis tools that are like super inaccessible 10 years ago are are so accessible. So you've got platforms like Alien Monkey learn.
00:21:49 Geo George
Also, you know Google, Microsoft, all the large tech companies have their own solutions for no code machine learning tools.
00:21:57 Geo George
Like I could I could go on and on and list a couple of these like companies, but if you just do a quick Google search, no code machine learning, you'll get literally hundreds of results. So yeah, funny, funny.
00:22:09 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Yeah. What? What I think we're saying here is exactly what happened with website development. Maybe 10 or so years ago, there was a time when if you wanted a website built, it had to be hand coded using HTML and JavaScript and whatever. And I remember back when I was an undergraduate, we had that as one of our assignments.
00:22:31 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Or business information systems course that I had to do. And yeah, I remember spending weeks and weeks.
00:22:38 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Hand coding this website and the final product was very average. I would be embarrassed for anyone to see it today and I was really proud of it.
00:22:47 Geo George
Right.
00:22:50 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I thought this was fantastic at the time and it looked would buy those standards, but you know, now you've got all those tools like Wicks and elementor.
00:22:59 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And a normal person can build a website in an afternoon without knowing how to code things you know. So obviously those software developers that used to hand code websites.
00:23:11 Dr Genevieve Hayes
They've gone off to do something else further up the value chain and as a result, the people who are moving into developing websites for people, they're often graphic designers.
00:23:24 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I just wonder you know, how do you see this playing out with data science? Where do you reckon the data scientists are gonna go and who do you reckon's gonna move in to use these tools in their?
00:23:35 Geo George
That's such a great question because.
00:23:37 Geo George
You know, you're right. Like we have seen this happen to an industry like very recently and it's the the the trends are all the same.
00:23:45 Geo George
You know, you're you're getting this sort of the people that are highly skilled in the space going up the value chain and the masses getting access to some of these schools that does like 95% of the use cases you.
00:23:56 Geo George
Know that that you.
00:23:57 Geo George
Quality and I do think that unlike what happened with the the web.
00:24:02 Geo George
2.0 You know where.
00:24:03 Geo George
You're you're getting.
00:24:05 Geo George
Programmers and you know really talented engineers work on even harder computer science applications.
00:24:11 Geo George
This is gonna sound a.
00:24:13 Geo George
Little bit left field but bear with me here.
00:24:15 Geo George
Mm-hmm. So what I think is gonna happen in the data science space is people who have those more refined skill set.
00:24:24 Geo George
You know and and.
00:24:24 Geo George
We've studied data science and and have made a career of it. They're gonna focus on more providing strategic advice around how you implement a good data strategy as an example, but it becomes more of that human element of data science where it's it's not necessarily creating tools to collect, understand.
00:24:45 Geo George
And disseminate data it. It becomes more about that more strategic element of OK what does your data?
00:24:51 Geo George
Capability look like.
00:24:53 Geo George
How do you put in place you know a robust data strategy that gives you the edge in business. And I I think the tools are going to become quite common, at least the the calibre of tools that that I'm seeing nowadays.
00:25:05 Geo George
The skill barrier is is low enough that that the masses kind of are able to access it. So then I think that the people who've got those.
00:25:14 Geo George
Higher value skill set I I I'm gonna go more into that kind of strategic role where they're.
00:25:20 Geo George
They talk about how.
00:25:21 Geo George
You integrate data science with one of the human aspects of of business or, you know, like education or whatever field it is.
00:25:29 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I can imagine it going in two directions. I mean, there is still gonna be a need for people who understand the algorithms, and I can imagine them ending up in research and development spaces and someone has to produce the no code and low code tools. But yeah, I can also see that there will be.
00:25:48 Dr Genevieve Hayes
That strategic advisory type space on how to make use of these tools and how to understand them.
00:25:55 Geo George
Another way to kind of think about it is, yeah, you're right. Like someone's gonna be producing these models, right?
00:26:02 Geo George
So for example, like the new capability that the transformer model provided in.
00:26:07
You know how.
00:26:08 Geo George
How people use large data sets and and translating that to, you know, information and and models machine.
00:26:15 Geo George
Anymore, like someone's got to be there designing those new type of models, like pushing the.
00:26:21 Geo George
Here, but if you look at the the total population of people who are are using data analytics or data science of a of a profession you it's gonna be a very small handful of people that are that are like they're on on the frontiers of that frontiers.
00:26:37 Geo George
Of the technology like.
00:26:38 Geo George
Producing these these you cutting edge tools.
00:26:41 Geo George
And techniques I think for the masses of people in the field, it's it's gonna either translate into leveraging these tools that that people have created and and applying it and and.
00:26:53 Geo George
Providing new capabilities to to businesses and organisations, or it's gonna be like, OK, well, what is a higher level, you know service that we can provide within this realm of data science and and I you know it's it's more like OK you've got these tools, you've got people who could implement these tools. How do we actually go about putting together a two piece of strategy.
00:27:13 Geo George
That effectively leverages these technologies to, you know, improve your business or your organisation or whatever it is.
00:27:20 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And this is now coming back to the education space that we were discussing before.
00:27:26 Dr Genevieve Hayes
A lot of the people who were educated in data science, their education was solely focused on the whole technical algorithms programming type side.
00:27:35 Dr Genevieve Hayes
They haven't had that training in the strategy and advisory type side of things. So it sounds like the degrees are going to have to be completely rewritten.
00:27:45 Dr Genevieve Hayes
In order to accommodate this sort of skill set.
00:27:48 Geo George
Yeah. And you know.
00:27:50 Geo George
As I said before, like there there's a lot of studies these.
00:27:52 Geo George
Days around how?
00:27:54 Geo George
Jobs are increasingly demanding higher level of soft skills.
00:28:00 Geo George
So I think that's gonna be a natural evolution of just the modern landscape of work and careers in the in the Western world. So you're you're right. I I I do think.
00:28:09 Geo George
People will either have to upskill themselves and and soft skills or, you know, nationally, have to meet the demands of of this new way of working, talking about the intersection of soft skills and AI. I'm just gonna give us a a little plug here, a startup that we're working with. Thinker who?
00:28:26 Geo George
They've got a a traditional kind of service based business where they provide development to large organisations around soft skills and yeah.
00:28:36 Geo George
A whole bunch of.
00:28:37 Geo George
Other skills done weapon as well.
00:28:38 Geo George
But still skills is something that there's been a lot of.
00:28:41 Geo George
Demand on now they're they're thinking about how, how do they use a tech.
00:28:46
Right.
00:28:46 Geo George
Platform in combination with machine learning and and AI to bring that to the masters. So I do think as as these natural demands kind of get created in modern careers. There's gonna be solutions that are gonna come out, you know, using equally innovative technologies to kind of.
00:29:03 Geo George
Just some of those needs, you know, so whether it's teaching soft skills for data scientists or it's like teaching more people how to use some of these machine learning tools that.
00:29:14 Geo George
There's gonna be new.
00:29:15 Geo George
New technologies that kind of service, those those needs and and we're already seeing that thing that happening now.
00:29:21 Dr Genevieve Hayes
What seems like you've got it's a bridge being formed from both sides. I mean, you've got startups like that one you just mentioned, thinker. Was that the name?
00:29:30 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Yeah. So that's helping people with the technical skills to make it to the soft skills side of the river so to.
00:29:38 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And then you've got these other startups that are helping the people who might have the soft skills make it to the technical side of the river through the use of these no code and low code technologies.
00:29:49 Geo George
Yeah. And, you know, it makes me think, what are the new kind of capabilities that we're gonna end up with in like 5-10 years time? Like, like students who are in high school.
00:29:57 Geo George
Yeah, like are.
00:29:58 Geo George
Are they leveraging?
00:29:59 Geo George
Like, really advanced? Yeah. Data analytic techniques, as you know, to to do their coursework similarly. Like, you know, do we have a seasoned data scientists providing like strategic advice to?
00:30:14 Geo George
A Fortune 500 board around how you craft a data strategy that's gonna be pivotal to the competitive advantage that the company might have in this ever increasing competitive landscape.
00:30:25 Geo George
You know, so it's it's it's a very, very.
00:30:27 Geo George
Exciting time, you're.
00:30:28 Geo George
Right it is.
00:30:29 Geo George
It's kind of cross pollination that's happening. It's fantastic.
00:30:33 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Well, I think I find really fascinating.
00:30:34 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Back when I was doing high school and university and my undergraduate degree of university, the standard calculator was your good old Casio FX-100 or FX82.
00:30:46 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And I I would have thought that, you know, given the amount of time that's passed since I was doing high school and university and undergraduate university, they would be using some sort of fancy graphing calculator or something in all their exams. But a lot of universities are still using the good old Casio.
00:31:06 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Affix 82.
00:31:07 Geo George
Yeah. And now that's kind of what we were talking about before. It's you know you're you're seeing these kind of pressures to involved in their education like that part you haven't seen before like, yeah, I still remember using the FX-100, you know, to do my derivatives exam and and I just remember like having these equations.
00:31:27 Geo George
You have to calculate. This is very fancy, but to calculate delta which which literally runs.
00:31:32 Geo George
Cost 2 lines on the page and and you're there, you know, entering these equations in now. Yeah, that that kind of makes me think like why, you know, well, what is that testing out?
00:31:42 Geo George
Is it testing out my ability to use the calculator or is it testing out my ability to understanding the mechanics of of how you derive these calculations?
00:31:51 Geo George
I do think.
00:31:52 Geo George
Now universities are kind of facing this existential threat where it's widely acknowledged that, OK, you're.
00:31:58 Geo George
You're coming right up to the barrier where using a calculator is just not gonna cut it. The workforce requirements these days need you to have more than the ability to recover it it it needs you to use the calculator plus a whole bunch of different tools that you have and adding your own bit of people creativity to produce value.
00:32:19 Geo George
And universities, as I said before, they're.
00:32:21 Geo George
Either going to have to.
00:32:22 Geo George
Adapt or you're going to see these new models of education which are already becoming highly successful, where it's it's more about apprenticeship part.
00:32:30 Geo George
Overtake the monopoly that these universities have had in providing higher education for the workforce. So it's it's now an environment where it's do or die.
00:32:43 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I actually like the idea of becoming an apprenticeship model because as someone with a university degree, I've had the conversation umpteen times with other people from a similar background of why did we spend all this time getting a university degree when all these people who did apprenticeships in plumbing and building?
00:33:03 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And whatever trade making some more money than any of us.
00:33:08 Dr Genevieve Hayes
You know, if you could actually learn how to use these data science and AI type tools in a practical environment, you could probably end up doing far better than if you just learn it in a university type setting.
00:33:21 Geo George
Well, that's an interesting way to think about it because there is a stock that you can't really get away from, which is like there's always going to be.
00:33:30 Geo George
Higher level skill sets. Yeah, that's, you know, kind of pushing the frontier, so to speak. But there's also an equally large subset of demand for people who can, like, take these existing tools and then, like, implement it.
00:33:43 Geo George
Right. So I do think there's a need for kind of both models of education, but it's it's around the degrees to which.
00:33:51 Geo George
Each model serves the workforce needs. So yeah, if you if you think about like the apprenticeship model.
00:33:59 Geo George
You've got these boot camps. You know, if you're familiar with kind of coding boot camps, you can see that they're they're, you know, vastly successful in being able to churn out these, like, super qualified, capable programmers and developers.
00:34:13 Geo George
Now traditionally you would have to do like a four year computer science degree and then perhaps a masters.
00:34:18 Geo George
In order to be useful for for a company that that's looking for that type.
00:34:23 Geo George
It's like now you've got this model where like you know, there's there's people who are really interested in that space and and kind of building those high level of skill set don't need to do a basic undergraduate degree and and then a masters to kind of get to the really interesting bits perhaps they could just do an extended degree where it's like you you get straight into the.
00:34:44 Geo George
Of developing these higher level skills, where it's acknowledged that, OK, well you, you've got access to the same pool that that everyone has and and that's like, you know base level of skills that that you already possessed. Let's let's talk about what more interesting things that you can do.
00:34:59 Geo George
With these skill sets.
00:35:00 Geo George
And like nowadays you can only get access to that if you're doing a masters degree and and not necessarily if you're doing an undergraduate degree, which tends to be more generalist.
00:35:09 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Seem like being the difference between an electrician versus an electrical engineer. If you want to just learn how to, I don't know. Rewire a house. You don't need to do an electrical engineering degree.
00:35:22 Dr Genevieve Hayes
You go and do a apprenticeship in being an electrician and the fact is the world needs tonnes of electricians who can wire houses and fix whatever problems they're having with the.
00:35:32 Dr Genevieve Hayes
City and it would be a waste for the electrical engineers to be doing that work. But the world also needs people who can understand the physics behind how electricity works. And for those people, you need some electrical engineers.
00:35:48 Geo George
And and that is just such a.
00:35:49 Geo George
Fantastic analogy. Because you're right, like if.
00:35:52 Geo George
You think about data science being comparable to like the city of being sort of integral to modernising or or the continual modernising of of our workforce and our workforce capabilities. And like we're we're having the same.
00:36:07 Geo George
Constraints that you that you might have in the 1920s when the world was rapidly electrifying. It's like, but now there's there's such a demand for dollar signs and then the traditional university education models just isn't designed to to plug in those or to fulfil that demand.
00:36:24 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Yeah. So have your people who are going to do just the hands on electrician type work using the low code and no code tools and doing an apprenticeship and then have another group of people who need to know the university level, data science doing the degrees.
00:36:41 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And yeah, it'll be a much more efficient allocation of resources.
00:36:45 Geo George
Yeah, I agree. And I I do think you are going to get that. So you know I mentioned boot camps before and nowadays there are there are boot camps that provide for data science courses.
00:36:56 Geo George
So you've got data science boot camps. I have a a good friend and a developer. What that I work with, who studied the same same degree as we we we met at university.
00:37:06 Geo George
Studying finance and an economic and he's since gone on to do this. Data science, food camp.
00:37:12 Geo George
And has just become a fantastic analyst or run Python programmer, or the machine learning solutions that you come up with.
00:37:21 Geo George
It's it's. It's like, you know, I wouldn't say it's like as good as adults, but it's it, it kind of gets the job done.
00:37:27 Geo George
You know, it's like it's it's very.
00:37:29 Geo George
Useful. That's what I'm trying to say so.
00:37:31 Geo George
Yeah, there are these models.
00:37:32 Geo George
Already being implemented, which is just it's it's great to.
00:37:35 Geo George
Say one thing.
00:37:36 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I'm interested in things like data science and AI are seen as being the turf of the young generation, so Generation Z and whatever the generation is after Generation Z I've lost track of them.
00:37:48 Dr Genevieve Hayes
All. Yeah, that's.
00:37:51 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Are the people you're saying who are working in these spaces, members of that younger generation, or are you seeing them more spread out across the older generations as?
00:38:01 Geo George
Well, it's fascinating actually. Like I I do see a good bit of variety in in age groups.
00:38:07 Geo George
In the States and and.
00:38:08 Geo George
I I feel like.
00:38:09 Geo George
And science is.
00:38:10 Geo George
One of those spaces where you do.
00:38:11 Geo George
Have like life long learners.
00:38:14 Geo George
You you gotta see all age groups.
00:38:16 Geo George
Yeah, in, in this science space like you've, you've got those like really young generations. That's kind of getting into data science, but you've also got those little.
00:38:25 Geo George
And data scientist or you know, someone who's gonna how to kill you? Change it to data science once again.
00:38:31 Geo George
Like it's it's democratic in that way. Also it's it's acceptable to a large cohort of people but to always.
00:38:39 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I think one of the things we're seeing here with data science is pent up demand. So I think we're seeing it across.
00:38:46 Dr Genevieve Hayes
All the different age groups, because there are people who had this existed when they were going into university, would have studied this, but because it didn't exist back then, there now.
00:38:58 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Saying it and wanting to study it and after a while this will settle down and then it'll just become each generation flowing through.
00:39:07 Geo George
Yeah. Potentially. Yeah. You know, I think you can be right about that. Like there is a lot of like and demand that's kind of surfacing now and people are naturally kind of stepping in.
00:39:18 Geo George
Because there's opportunity in this space, there's there's a lot of demand for people with good data skills and also that there's a there's a whole bunch of content for for you to kind of like.
00:39:29 Geo George
Up school yourself in that.
00:39:30 Geo George
As well like.
00:39:31 Geo George
Like university content that's posted on YouTube and or you might not be able to learn everything.
00:39:37 Geo George
You will learn enough.
00:39:38 Geo George
To to like give you a.
00:39:39 Geo George
Real leg up and and kind of starting your journey as a as a data analyst or you know, data scientist. Yeah, it's very accessible.
00:39:47 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Yeah, I think the Internet.
00:39:49 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Has made the information and has democratised the information. Through my university I have access to the University Library online and one of the things they have a subscription to is O'Reilly Safari, which is basically a database of every single O'Reilly.
00:40:04 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Textbook and it you know, it's just anything I want to know in data science, there is an O'Reilly book on it and then I can just go to it and read it for free. That is worth so much.
00:40:16 Geo George
Agreed. And yeah, maybe it not. A lot of people won't notice, but your libraries have provide you access to O'Reilly Safari as well so.
00:40:25 Geo George
And maybe not all libraries do, but I know my local council library provides you an access to the oreilly prescription.
00:40:33 Geo George
There, there's just.
00:40:34 Geo George
So much resources available.
00:40:36 Geo George
Or it's like.
00:40:36 Geo George
If you if you really wanna learn something.
00:40:38 Geo George
Then you know you could go out.
00:40:40 Geo George
And get like I.
00:40:41 Geo George
I remember when I was going out, my father bought me this punk and wangle or something like encyclopaedias, like the old edition too, like, you know, like I had the full set.
00:40:52 Geo George
So I had like A-Z and I remember like if there.
00:40:55 Geo George
Was anything that I wanted to know?
00:40:57 Geo George
And and this is how I talk of calculus.
00:40:59 Geo George
While reading these encyclopaedias and nowadays it's even more accessible, it's like we've got the Super rich interactive encyclopaedias for free. You know, like anyone can access it.
00:41:12 Geo George
So it's it's. Yeah, it's it's.
00:41:14 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Got I. I remember when in Carter was a big deal. Can you remember that?
00:41:18 Geo George
Yeah, other CD's like just put the CD.
00:41:20 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Yeah, they say they rob.
00:41:21 Geo George
'S. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:41:27 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Is there anything on your radar in the AI data and analytics space that you think is going to become important in the next three to five?
00:41:35 Geo George
At the start of our conversation, I was talking about, you know, applying AI and and data science to like personal data like for example, personal health data, just like how there's like microservices and the text based and the big things, they're creating little APIs that the the, you know fairly niche defined solution for a problem.
00:41:55 Geo George
You think like there's gonna be a need or market for like personalised services to to analyse like.
00:42:03 Geo George
Health data, personal finance data I I think that could be like an emerging space that that that we're being able to action in like a number of startups that that we're talking to you or or actively tracking are doing some very cool stuff in the space.
00:42:18 Geo George
It's it's one of those things where we're all getting comfortable with this knowledge.
00:42:23 Geo George
But everything around us is generating data about us, so we should be able to get some rewards from the data that we generated.
00:42:31 Geo George
And there's going to be a demand for the tools to enable us to generate that that value. But I think that could be like a an emerging space.
00:42:41 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I like that idea.
00:42:43 Geo George
Yeah. Yeah and.
00:42:44 Geo George
As I said, like there's some people doing some very interesting stuff in the space.
00:42:48 Geo George
And and now that data science has become such a normal life concept, people I'm questioning like, oh, I don't know that.
00:42:54 Geo George
That sounds too techie for me. Well, like OK cool. I could download this app and it's gonna help me optimise my mood based on.
00:43:01 Geo George
My sleep data, my heart rate data, my.
00:43:05 Geo George
Light oxygen level.
00:43:06 Geo George
Like you know, a lot of these like.
00:43:08 Geo George
Different parameters, even my like web browsing history, right? And then translate that to like valuable information about some objectives that you might you might have the the underlying like driver. So there's like we're we're generating there's like vast quantities of data anyway and.
00:43:29 Geo George
And right now we're we're giving that data in exchange for like basic services that we might get from tech company. But the overwhelming value capture is on the side of the companies harnessing the startup.
00:43:42 Geo George
There's very few bits of value that that the user is getting back on the data, so I I do think there's there's gonna be better solutions out there that that help people realise some of this value for themselves.
00:43:54 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I can just imagine certain things like an app that can monitor your search history, decide that you're spending too much time doing scrolling on news sites, and then block you from your news sites until your mood picks up or something.
00:44:11 Geo George
Yeah, that's and that that's exactly right. Like. And The thing is like some of these models like getting so sophisticated where it's, it's almost like a black box.
00:44:20 Geo George
Like, yeah, you know, you you're just feeding these, boss. It's an input into a neural net. And and it's helping you optimise towards some objective. But as it is specific.
00:44:31 Geo George
Wonder is that it's optimising for like you don't really kind of have an understanding of that, but that's that's fine.
00:44:36 Geo George
You know, like as long as it's helping you achieve your objectives, then it's it's it's it's serving its need. So it's it's cool.
00:44:45 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And what final advice would you give to data scientists who are looking to create business value from data?
00:44:52 Geo George
Having a focus on the self skills like I'm I'm gonna keep coming back to the self skills because these these tools are becoming so common that it doesn't really provide you an edge to be able to utilise this sort of like you know one one way to think about it is like cheaper to you right because it's.
00:45:07 Geo George
It's on everyone's.
00:45:08 Geo George
Mind you, knowing how to use.
00:45:11 Geo George
Or or whatever. It's not really gonna provide you.
00:45:14 Geo George
An itch? But how?
00:45:15 Geo George
You utilise it and thinking deeper about like how you put a structure around, how you use some of these tools.
00:45:23 Geo George
That's that's gonna create a lot of value in in an era where everyone has access to the tools, but people might not have access to to know how or the.
00:45:33 Geo George
Ability to put.
00:45:33 Geo George
Together, a strategy that leverages these tools effectively. So I think developing like your socks, your developing your own strategic thinking.
00:45:43 Geo George
Skills is is gonna be critical into this new age where everyone has access to the forms, but people might not.
00:45:49 Geo George
Have the best idea?
00:45:50 Geo George
Of how to leverage all of these tools in concept to create additional value.
00:45:55 Dr Genevieve Hayes
I have a number of friends in the copywriting space and that's one of the industries where everyone's saying, oh, that's going to be eliminated by ChatGPT, but I don't think these people are going to get eliminated by ChatGPT because they're the people who are embracing ChatGPT and using that to do their jobs even better than they.
00:46:16 Geo George
It's it's the age old paradigm, OK? There's the automatic looms are are now a thing. Like where everyone's gonna lose their job.
00:46:25 Geo George
It's gonna be catastrophic for the economy, but what you end up seeing is like, OK, well, automatically the thing.
00:46:30 Geo George
But you need people to build the wounds, you need people to like service the *****. You need people to teach.
00:46:36 Geo George
People how to.
00:46:37 Geo George
How to use the loom? It's it's the same kind of paradigm that's playing out now, which is.
00:46:41 Geo George
Yeah, you've got this new disruptive technology that perhaps in Libya, it's one bit of mundane repetitive work, but at the same time, it's also creating new capabilities that you could realise in a lot.
00:46:53 Geo George
Of different ways.
00:46:54 Geo George
Now it it's obviously easy for me to say that because I'm.
00:46:57 Geo George
I'm I'm not a copywriter.
00:46:58 Geo George
Or in in particularly a space where ChatGPT.
00:47:02 Geo George
And now my lungs really threatened my my lovely hood. But something said.
00:47:05 Geo George
I wouldn't be.
00:47:06 Geo George
Worried about it? I think if you're, if you're lifelong learner and you're open to new ideas and and new ways of working and and exploring new tools, then there's plenty of other opportunity.
00:47:17 Geo George
Use. They will come as a natural consequence of these emerging technologies.
00:47:22 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And the fact is, we as a human race are a species of survivors.
00:47:28 Dr Genevieve Hayes
People aren't just gonna say ohh artificial intelligence took my job. Now I'll just sit here in the corner and cry. People are going to naturally look for ways to survive.
00:47:39 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And they'll come up with ideas and they'll utilise it and they'll end up doing things better than before.
00:47:46 Geo George
That's that's exactly right. I think there's one thing that he's being very good at is is to adapt and you know, we either adapt in in response to our own intrinsic drivers or we adapt as a result of necessity.
00:47:59 Geo George
But the reality is, if if we want to survive in this new paradigm of work, then.
00:48:05 Geo George
We have to add.
00:48:07 Dr Genevieve Hayes
So on that note, for listeners who want to learn more about you or get in contact, what can they do?
00:48:13 Geo George
So you could cheque out our website may flex or reddit.com. We're also recruiting for a number of developer roles for our venture studio.
00:48:23 Geo George
If you're interested in that, please share as a message to the website orstudio@mainbikes.com. Or if you're sort of founder, you got an idea for a.
00:48:33 Geo George
Start up or if you start founder with an existing style up and wants to grow it and scale it.
00:48:38 Geo George
Yeah. Reach out to us as well. We're always looking for incredible destructive startup to work with so.com.
00:48:46 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And with those roles you're recruiting for, are they Melbourne based or can they be anywhere?
00:48:51 Geo George
Ideally, if there were Melbourne based, that would be good. We do we we have a a hybrid workout model where two days in the office to promote collaboration.
00:48:59 Geo George
But that being said, you know we we do have one developer who's working for us that's currently sailing around the world and he's got high speed styling satellite on his boat and you know he's he's.
00:49:11 Geo George
Able to dial in from the Bahamas or where where he might be. So we're also opening open to remote work, but our first preference would be you know, a location where we can get a bit of office time.
00:49:24 Dr Genevieve Hayes
Thank you for joining me today, Gio.
00:49:27 Geo George
Thanks. It was a great card and and as I felt like, so topical and contemporary and it's evolved my own thinking about the space as well. But thank you.
00:49:36 Dr Genevieve Hayes
And for those in the audience, thank you for listening. I'm doctor Genevieve Hayes, and this has been value driven data science brought to you by Genevieve Hayes Consulting.
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