Noticing the buzz around Data Science and machine learning algorithms amongst professionals, S R Aditya Gundu or Sai Raghavendra Aditya Gundu looked up the internet to know more about Data Science and got instantly hooked. Intrigued by its diverse applications across industries, he finally decided to calm his curiosity and enrolled for the Global Certificate in Data Science & AI (GCDAI) program at Accredian.
In this interview, let’s what interested Sai the most in data science and how his learning experience has been at Accredian.
Question 1: Which program & batch are you part of at Accredian & tell us more about your current work profile?
Sai: I am part of a Global Certificate in Data Science & AI (GCDAI) program, April 2020 batch. After my graduation, I got an opportunity to join Verizon through campus hiring. Verizon is an American telecommunications company, which offers wireless products and services. My core responsibilities mainly include troubleshooting network issues.
I have 9 years of experience in development and programming languages like C, C++, Java, Python, Perl, and Shell. My current role in the organization is MTS IV Consultant System Engineering. I have a team of five where my part is to design and develop the process that communicates with different interfaces using rest, soap socket, etc.
Question 2: Walk us through your career journey & what got you interested in Data Science & Machine Learning?
Sai: After completing my graduation, I joined Verizon through off-campus training. It’s been an incredible nine-plus years of a successful journey with Verizon, in which I got promoted thrice and received many recognitions for the efforts I put in. When I saw people discussing data and models, I got curious and started Googling on topics relevant to AML. My interest in data science and machine learning algorithms lies in its functionality within recommendation systems and predictive analytics.
Question 3: What all tools and packages in Data Science & Machine Learning have you mastered in your Data Science & AI program at Accredian so far?
Sai: I got an opportunity to master data analysis packages like Pandas and Numpy and visualization packages like Seaborn. This helped me find useful insights from the data set. When it comes to machine learning algorithms, I got a good handle on the Python packages and plan to dive deep into it, as I’m still pursuing my ML course. Apart from that, I have also got a good grasp on Flask, Plotly Express, and Auto ML packages.
Question 4: What are some initial challenges when you got started on your Data Science journey, and how did you overcome them?
Sai: I follow various blogs to keep myself updated on data science trends and focused more on attaining domain knowledge and getting more information related to AI and machine learning algorithms. Coming from a development background, I felt it’s all about coding and developing various models. But, the truth is, it’s not; we need to do more than just coding here.
Question 5: Who is your favorite faculty at Accredian, and what did you learn from him the Most?
Sai: Whatever we learn, we need to learn from the best. Accredian has the finest faculty where everyone has a unique way of teaching. So far I had classes with two mentors. Deepesh is excellent in teaching the machine learning algorithms and concepts both technically and practically. The best thing about him is that you can ask him any number of questions, basic or tough, and he will answer you and explain the concepts till you understand them completely. I am glad to have such mentors.
Question 6: What is the goal of Data Science?
Sai: Data Science is extremely important for making decisions and predictions for business growth. Understanding the importance of AI and machine learning algorithms, many sectors have already started building and deploying ML models and seeing better results.
Question 7: In your view, how has Data Science evolved in the last few years?
Sai: Data Science has evolved a lot in the last few years. Previously, companies used to store data and draw some stats out of it and see where they can improve. In today’s world, everything is data-driven. We started conveying the results in numbers rather than just text. Data analysis even helps predict the approach required for businesses to grow.
Question 8: What are the current trends in Data Science that you are most excited about?
Sai: Forecasting chatbot applications, Data Fabric, and augmented analytics are a few current data science trends that I am really excited about.
Question 9: Which are some of the blogs that you follow?
Sai: Some of the blogs I follow are Medium, AnalyticsVidhya, KDnuggets, Toward Data Science and Kaggle. The content of these blogs are fantastic.
Question 10: What is your advice to anyone wanting to start a career in Data Science?
Sai: If you want to start a career in data science, be prepared to spend at least two to three hours per day to explore what is happening in the space of AML. Focus on your core priorities and practice as much as you can. If you face any generic issues, look for different videos or blogs and find different approaches to solve them rather than resorting to a tunnel vision.
This was a conversation with one of our GCDAI students – Sai Raghavendra Aditya Gundu.
To discover more interesting student interviews, go to Accredian Spotlight.
