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Recently, I participated in the NFL #BigDataBowl
As someone who struggles with anxiety and often succumbs to impostor syndrome, sharing and submitting our work publicly was intimidating and overwhelming.
Some reflections on this process and how it helped me learn and grow...
As someone who struggles with anxiety and often succumbs to impostor syndrome, sharing and submitting our work publicly was intimidating and overwhelming.
Some reflections on this process and how it helped me learn and grow...
Last year, I barely contributed to the Big Data Bowl. I found the datasets too large and unwieldy. I spent a week or two on a simple model (hello 1635th place) and made some plots of the field, but I came away feeling like I had failed.
This year, I made it my goal to enjoy it
This year, I made it my goal to enjoy it
Be kind to yourself. This data is hard to work with and we are in the middle of a pandemic. If you were able to put together a submission, great! If you didn't, but learned something that can build your skillset, enthusiasm, or confidence moving forward, that is just as awesome!
Start with questions that interest you!
This year’s open-ended prompt made it way more fun to just dig in to the data and look at things I was always curious about. (How many INTs come off of tipped passes?)
Looking into nuggets like this made the data less scary to work with
This year’s open-ended prompt made it way more fun to just dig in to the data and look at things I was always curious about. (How many INTs come off of tipped passes?)
Looking into nuggets like this made the data less scary to work with
Don’t be afraid to try new techniques. I wrote more tidyverse code for BDB than in my whole life previously. I still have plenty to learn, but building these skills on a project that was fun has made me more comfortable working with packages like gt and janitor in my actual work!
Surround yourself with good people. I cannot thank my Oh Snap teammates enough for making our project and process fun, teaching me new skills, serving as sanity checks, and general nerding out. Most importantly, together we made something cooler than I could ever have done alone!
If you are working alone, try showing your work to a friend first. See if they understand how it works, if your explanation is clear, if they find it interesting. Having some small approval from someone whose opinion you value makes it infinitely easier to share it with others.
Sharing your work can feel incredibly stressful and vulnerable. I typically get anxious before firing off a tweet about something I made (and during, and after). I don’t have a great solution to this one yet…but I've found that each time I do share, it gets a little bit easier
You don’t have to share everything you do! Probably 80% of what we tried was not included in our final BDB submission. You can curate it down to just your favorite plots, tables, or code chunks that you are most proud of. At the end of the day, it’s your story to tell!
Closing thoughts as BDB results come out soon...
If you didn’t get as much done as you wanted, that’s ok. If you don’t win a prize, that’s ok. If you want to get better, practice and try again next year!
And there is always more data out there - #BigDataCup is just starting!
If you didn’t get as much done as you wanted, that’s ok. If you don’t win a prize, that’s ok. If you want to get better, practice and try again next year!
And there is always more data out there - #BigDataCup is just starting!
