Tips for Building an Analytics Team
Skip to content
Data AnalyticsStrategy Careers Dec 7, 2015

Tips for Building an Analytics Team

How to hire and keep data analytics superstars.

Building an analytics team will help grow your business.

Sorbetto via iStock

Based on insights from

Eric T. Anderson

Dan Wagner

Leslie Hampel

Scott Jones

What is the best way to hire top-quality data scientists? And given that they are so often in short supply, how do you prevent the superstar you hired from being poached by other companies?

Data-analytics experts offered advice during a recent session at the Kellogg School of Management’s Growth Forum. Below is an edited excerpt of their discussion about building an analytics team, led by marketing professor Eric Anderson.

ERIC ANDERSON:

Where do you find talent? What are you looking for?

DAN WAGNER: CEO and founder of Civis Analytics, formerly chief analytics officer for the Obama 2012 campaign

I’ll tell you the story of the smartest person I ever hired. I said, “Why do you want to work for me?” He goes, “I don’t know. I just think it would be fun or something.” This guy ended up being the top person that I ever hired, a complete genius. But he was not capable of expressing his thoughts in words. Now, in most companies, he would get screened out. What I’ve learned from the thousands of people that I’ve interviewed is I don’t have the intellectual capability of having the conversation with a human being and assessing whether or not they’re going to be good at this job. What you can do is simulate the job for them through an exam process. See how they do and rank them against everybody else. What you’ll find is that the introverts tend to do much better, and that is the classic person that you’re trying to hire. There is way less pedigree bias in that. There’s less, “I went to University of Chicago, I want these people. I went to Harvard, I want these people.” That’s stupid. There’s less gender bias in that. People have things going on in the back of their brain that you can’t control. You want to make sure you have an objective measurement of intellectual capacity.

LESLIE HAMPEL: Director of global strategies at Starbucks

What I am looking for is someone who can bridge the gap. Can you do the math? That’s important, but can you pull the story out of the math? Particularly for the next 10 years or so, as we work our way through this current generation of CEOs who don’t understand algorithms for the most part. They are making decisions from a very different place. How do you show them that you have applied the analytic rigor, then help tell the story so that they feel comfortable investing millions, if not billions, of dollars in this idea? It really becomes about storytelling.Finding someone who can do both coming straight out of school is almost impossible. I look for people who are curious. I need you to be so curious that you’re going to keep digging into that data until you find the nugget of insight that really unlocks the whole story.

SCOTT JONES: Vice president of mobile applications, analytics and personalization at Nordstrom

I’ve not found any predictability in terms of where really good, high-quality, and yet pragmatic people come from. We’ve had life sciences folks come on board. We’ve had someone from automotive engineering come on board. They hook on really quickly to how to sell fashion handbags. Don’t allow appearances or an expectation on background to drive it.As you find that great team of people, it is your job to make sure you’ve got bigger and more challenging problems to throw at them. Make it meaningful. People have to have a sense that, you know what, this company is understanding more, getting into the customer experience more, and making decisions based on what I’m doing. If you don’t do that, the best ones, they have 100 opportunities out there. Every single day, people are calling them.

“Whether people like it or not, the robots are coming and sometimes they wear glasses.”—Dan Wagner

ANDERSON:

How do you address the question of what’s my future? When they look up the ladder, they don’t necessarily see people that look like them today.

JONES:

I think you have to be very candid and honest with people and say, “We’d love to keep you here for the next 20 years and throw all kinds of stuff at you.” At a minimum, you’re handing them the ability to do meaningful work in this emerging space.Two or three years down the road, as the company evolves, we’d love to throw bigger and more exciting challenges [at them]. Some of these roles, as the company becomes more data driven, some of those roles will mutate. But at a minimum, I want to make sure that we help them make meaningful career progress and that they have great options down the road. I want to make sure that we don’t leave someone in the corner with no options when the time comes.

HAMPEL:

We have to convince people to create new [career] pathways. And part of that is by putting your head down, working really hard, and proving your value, so that two, three years down the road when you’re ready for that next step, someone’s willing to invest in you.

WAGNER:

If you are able to understand, create conclusions, and communicate those conclusions to a wide group of individuals, you have more leverage than pretty much anybody else in the organization. I think a lot of them, frankly, in 10 years are going to be CEOs. I have high faith in them. I think about that moment where Mitt Romney was sitting with his advisors at noon on Election Day and they were saying, “Things are so great. We’re going to win. Everything’s great. Look at this poll thingamajiggy.” Three hours later, the anxiety started to go up and then five hours later, they were the laughing stock of the planet. People have a choice, organizations have a choice: Are they going to be Mitt Romney?Organizations that decide to live like Mitt Romney are not going to exist in 10 years. Whether people like it or not, the robots are coming and sometimes they wear glasses.

For more insights on hiring and retaining data scientists, read our article on the topic with marketing professor Eric Leininger.

Featured Faculty

Polk Bros. Chair in Retailing; Professor of Marketing; Director Kellogg-McCormick MBAi

About the Writer
Emily Stone is the research editor at Kellogg Insight.
Most Popular This Week
  1. One Key to a Happy Marriage? A Joint Bank Account.
    Merging finances helps newlyweds align their financial goals and avoid scorekeeping.
    married couple standing at bank teller's window
  2. Take 5: Yikes! When Unintended Consequences Strike
    Good intentions don’t always mean good results. Here’s why humility, and a lot of monitoring, are so important when making big changes.
    People pass an e-cigarette billboard
  3. How Are Black–White Biracial People Perceived in Terms of Race?
    Understanding the answer—and why black and white Americans may percieve biracial people differently—is increasingly important in a multiracial society.
    How are biracial people perceived in terms of race
  4. Will AI Eventually Replace Doctors?
    Maybe not entirely. But the doctor–patient relationship is likely to change dramatically.
    doctors offices in small nodules
  5. Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition Is Still Entrepreneurship
    ETA is one of the fastest-growing paths to entrepreneurship. Here's how to think about it.
    An entrepreneur strides toward a business for sale.
  6. Take 5: Research-Backed Tips for Scheduling Your Day
    Kellogg faculty offer ideas for working smarter and not harder.
    A to-do list with easy and hard tasks
  7. How to Manage a Disengaged Employee—and Get Them Excited about Work Again
    Don’t give up on checked-out team members. Try these strategies instead.
    CEO cheering on team with pom-poms
  8. Which Form of Government Is Best?
    Democracies may not outlast dictatorships, but they adapt better.
    Is democracy the best form of government?
  9. What Went Wrong at AIG?
    Unpacking the insurance giant's collapse during the 2008 financial crisis.
    What went wrong during the AIG financial crisis?
  10. The Appeal of Handmade in an Era of Automation
    This excerpt from the book “The Power of Human" explains why we continue to equate human effort with value.
    person, robot, and elephant make still life drawing.
  11. 2 Factors Will Determine How Much AI Transforms Our Economy
    They’ll also dictate how workers stand to fare.
    robot waiter serves couple in restaurant
  12. When Do Open Borders Make Economic Sense?
    A new study provides a window into the logic behind various immigration policies.
    How immigration affects the economy depends on taxation and worker skills.
  13. Why Do Some People Succeed after Failing, While Others Continue to Flounder?
    A new study dispels some of the mystery behind success after failure.
    Scientists build a staircase from paper
  14. Sitting Near a High-Performer Can Make You Better at Your Job
    “Spillover” from certain coworkers can boost our productivity—or jeopardize our employment.
    The spillover effect in offices impacts workers in close physical proximity.
  15. How the Wormhole Decade (2000–2010) Changed the World
    Five implications no one can afford to ignore.
    The rise of the internet resulted in a global culture shift that changed the world.
  16. What’s at Stake in the Debt-Ceiling Standoff?
    Defaulting would be an unmitigated disaster, quickly felt by ordinary Americans.
    two groups of politicians negotiate while dangling upside down from the ceiling of a room
  17. What Happens to Worker Productivity after a Minimum Wage Increase?
    A pay raise boosts productivity for some—but the impact on the bottom line is more complicated.
    employees unload pallets from a truck using hand carts
  18. Immigrants to the U.S. Create More Jobs than They Take
    A new study finds that immigrants are far more likely to found companies—both large and small—than native-born Americans.
    Immigrant CEO welcomes new hires
  19. How Has Marketing Changed over the Past Half-Century?
    Phil Kotler’s groundbreaking textbook came out 55 years ago. Sixteen editions later, he and coauthor Alexander Chernev discuss how big data, social media, and purpose-driven branding are moving the field forward.
    people in 1967 and 2022 react to advertising
  20. 3 Traits of Successful Market-Creating Entrepreneurs
    Creating a market isn’t for the faint of heart. But a dose of humility can go a long way.
    man standing on hilltop overlooking city
More in Data Analytics Strategy