As I reflect upon this past year, there have certainly been both great times and times of struggle. All in all, I can’t help but to realize how lucky I am. I’ve been fortunate to work with many talented and inspirational people in the community and on the job. While I can’t list out every great opportunity, below is a list of some of my top experiences in 2021.

2021 in Review: Top 10 Career Experiences

1) Mother Daughter Data Viz Competition

My 8 year old daughter and I entered the 2021 Women in Analytics data visualization competition. We analyzed Pokémon stats and displayed our findings with a mix of custom drawings she made in Procreate and some 3D graphs. Read more about the experience here.

2) Working on the IBM Cloud Data Pipeline

2021 was a year of transformation for our pipeline. It was complex and and at times stressful to evaluate how we needed to change, but working with an amazing team made it seem fun. Thanks especially to: Santhosh, Christian, Tiffany, Swapna, Terry, Will, Kate, Chris, Sagar, Nina, Corinne, Todd and Nic.

3) Producing Data Insights With the IBM Cloud Data Science Team

We run a very large and interconnected business. Finding impactful insights can be like looking for a needle in a haystack. I’m thankful to work with a creative data science team who is as interested in digging for those golden data nuggets as I am. Thanks especially to Corinne, Langdon, Erin, Gino, Tiffany, Rob, Nic and Mark.

4) Jennifer Gibbs Coaching

I’ve been in the data and tech field for over 15 years now and I consider myself lucky to have had a very rewarding career. This year I made the decision to invest in myself and seek out career coaching. I reached out to Jennifer to engage in her coaching and it was a transformative experience. After a lot of very challenging self reflection, I think I’ve set a great foundation to start tackling the next 15 years. I highly recommend Jennifer and formal career coaching programs. Learn more about Jennifer’s coaching here.

5) Launching Data Mishaps Night

This past year, Caitlin Hudon and I launched the first inaugural Data Mishaps Night! We gathered virtually on a magical Friday night with hundreds of data nerds to share data mistakes. We featured a lineup of curated data mistake stories with a focus on the human aspect of data work and lessons learned the hard way. The event was incredibly fun and it was exciting to see how many data folks would be interested in spending their Friday night commiserating and learning from our collective data mistakes. The next Data Mishaps Night will take place in February 2022, please stay tuned. Learn more about Data Mishaps Night here

6) Starting the Chief Data Officer Program

As part of my career reflection this past year, I’ve spent time considering what my future career path would look like. The role of Chief Data Officer has always been exciting to me due to the large end to end scope and the ability to greatly impact the business with data.

Through my friend Peggy Tsai, I became aware of Carnegie Mellon launching the University's Chief Data Officer Certificate Program (CDataO) in 2021. The program provides current and future CDOs with the critical strategic insight, management techniques, and analytical capabilities you need to set up a 21st century data governance program.

I’m now part of the second cohort of CDataO students to go through the program, completing in April 2022!

7) Presenting at the Women in Analytics conference

In 2021, Tiffany Cross and I were selected to speak at the Women in Analytics Conference on the subject of "Data Democratization: Enabling Citizen Data Scientists". The event is truly inspiring and the speaker experience is first class. The conference organizers created a supportive and engaging end to end speaker environment to let speakers know that they are valued and appreciated. Learn more about the conference and how to be a speaker here.

8) Co-Chairing the Science and Technology Patent Board

IBM has a very robust internal patenting program. We are a leader in US innovation with the most US patent grants for 28 consecutive years. As part of our internal innovation program, I’ve participated in patent boards for the past three years, reviewing internal patent applications before we decide to file with USPTO. In 2021, Kaitlin McGoldrick and I became co-chairs for one of our internal boards. It was a rewarding experience which enabled me to learn more about the patenting process and a number of bleeding edge technology inventions.

9) Joining the IBM Academy of Technology

Thanks to the sponsorship of Boz, I was introduced to the IBM Academy of Technology (AoT) in 2021. The academy was formed in 1989 as a community of the best technical minds in IBM to provide innovation, technical advice and conscience. The community supports cultural change across all business units and across the globe.

Joining the AoT community, I was shocked and inspired to see how many talented and motivated IBMers were working to drive ethical change in the technology industry. I consider myself lucky (and humbled) to have been able to participate in a few projects this past year.

10) Exchange of Ideas with Other Data Leaders

Lastly, I feel incredibly grateful to have been able to engage with many inspiring people in the data community this past year. I can’t name them all, but a few standout experiences were with Peggy Tsai and Ramesh Dontha on the Data Transformers Podcast, Gabriela De Queiroz on the AI Inclusive youtube series and chatting with Fred Wordie and Santiago Taberna, author and illustrator of Big Data Girl.

Thank You

Thank you for reading about some of my 2021 highlights. I’ve had great fortune to be a part of this vibrant and growing data community. I hope that y’all had some great experiences this past year to reflect upon. Please share them with me by commenting or reaching out via twitter. Wishing you happiness in 2022!