Data Science Hangout | Erin Pierson, Charles Schwab | Advocating for the Role you Want
We were joined by Erin Pierson, Sr Manager of Trading Operations at Charles Schwab. There was a great conversation about networking within your organization on the hangout with Erin and also tips for the question: How do you have the conversation with your manager that...this isn't the job that I was hired to do? 🤔 11:57 - ⬢ Talk to people and let them know what you’re capable of doing and what you’re interested in doing. Hopefully you have someone who’s in your corner that will help you get to where you want to be. ⬢ Start talking about what your skills are and what you had discussed your position being. ""You have technically hired me for this job and I’m not doing that job."" ⬢ You have to have a little finesse about it and can’t be super negative but you can say, “You know, I’m really interested in doing X, Y, Z. I appreciate this job. I’m doing this and I’m learning this but I could also be doing more. I’m interested in doing more.” ⬢ Try phrasing it as what can I do for your leadership, even if it’s really more for you. ⬢ Make your manager aware of where you are and what you want to do. You need to have a good manager to have this happen but in some cases they may even be thinking about hiring someone for that role you actually want to do. ⬢ The bottom line is, if you’re not happy in your job you’re not going to stay in your job. They don’t want you to be unhappy because they don’t want to lose you. If you’re not happy, you’re not going to be doing good work. Be honest and let them know how you’re feeling about it. Where to find more? ► Subscribe to Our Channel Here: https://bit.ly/2TzgcOu ► Data Science Hangout site: rstudio.com/data-science-hangout ► Add the Data Science Hangout to your calendar: rstd.io/datasciencehangout Follow Us Here: Website: https://www.rstudio.com LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/rstudio Twitter: https://twitter.com/rstudio
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Transcript#
This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.
Welcome to the Data Science Hangout, everybody. But welcome back to those who have been here before. And a special welcome to those of you joining for the first time. For anyone who is joining for the first time, just to let you know how it works. There's a few ways you can ask questions here. So you can jump in live, maybe raise your hand on Zoom. You can put questions into the Zoom chat and just put a little star there if you want me to read it out loud. And then you also can ask questions anonymously with Slido.
Just want to reiterate that we love to hear from everyone regardless of what industry you work in, or your level of experience. Just a reminder that this session will be recorded as well. So we'll share up to the Data Science Hangout site in RStudio YouTube.
So excited to have you all here with us today. And thank you so much for joining us, Erin. Excited to have you as my co-host. Erin is joining us from Charles Schwab.
Erin's background and career path
Erin, I'd love to have you just introduce yourself and maybe share a little bit about the work that you do on your team. Yeah, so I'm Erin Pearson. I currently work for Charles Schwab. I've been there for almost two years. Prior to that, I was with TD Ameritrade, who have been purchased by Schwab. So I've been in financial services for most of my career.
I mostly was in trading primarily up until a few years ago. I moved to a data analyst position at TD and then moved over to Schwab. So now my current position at Schwab, I'm a senior manager in trading operations, which is kind of a general term. My job is kind of to be the kind of go-to person for my boss, who oversees multiple departments within trading operations, like fraud and trading. I've kind of been tasked to be his kind of go-to person just for random data-related things, different dashboards, ad hoc queries, looking at different data sets, trying to identify patterns and things like that. So I'm still fairly new to the position, so I'm still kind of figuring it out, honestly. We're kind of just kind of going day by day and seeing what comes up. So still in progress.
I know you were a trader before and moving into this role, so I'd love to hear a little bit about that transition as well. Yeah, that was actually what got me interested. I was a trader for many years. I was a trader on our block trading desk, so I dealt with large trades, did a lot of, used a lot of algorithms to do block trading. And through that process, I kind of started looking at the different algorithms and kind of got interested in how they worked and kind of thought, well, it'd be cool if I could do one of my own, so maybe I should study coding. So that's kind of what started it. So I started looking into coding, started learning SQL and Python and R, and through that, my boss at the time on the block trading desk, he was incredibly supportive and he said, yeah, you should run with this, so let's take you off day-to-day stuff, and give you some room to study that stuff. So he allowed me to do that, so that's kind of what got me into it, and I just kind of, you know, kept going with it.
That's amazing. Was there a certain moment where you said, oh, I should do this, or I can look into my own algorithm? I mean, yeah, it was just, through trading, we would get exposed to more and more algorithms because different firms have different algorithms, proprietary algorithms, and so I was just like, I could probably do this. I could do my own, maybe, you know, I don't know. I don't know how hard it is. Let's give it a try. So I just kind of started taking classes and just, you know, free online classes, just whatever I could get, and then our guy over in data analytics at TD, who was kind of under the same umbrella as me, who I'd known for years, I kind of started talking to him a little bit about what he did and what I was doing, and it just kind of worked out that he actually had somebody on his team leave, and my current boss actually reached out to him and said, hey, you should hire Aaron. That would be a really good fit, and so I kind of started talking to him, and he actually hired me, so that was kind of how I got my first job in data, because I honestly don't know if I would have otherwise, because I didn't know anything. I was still learning. I was very new, very green, but luckily he actually saw that. Again, he knew me for probably 10 years at that point, so he knew me. He knew I was hardworking. He knew I was smart, and because I had all of that trading business knowledge, you know, he saw that value that, you know, you can teach your teacher to code, but she understands, like, the underlying data that she's looking at and what she should be looking at, and so luckily he recognized that and gave me kind of a shot, so I was really lucky that I had really supportive people.
Networking within large organizations
That's great, and that kind of brings up a point I know we talked about a bit earlier is how you actually navigate huge companies like Charles Schwab or Ameritrade, and I think that's one opportunity of doing that as well, like networking within the company to get you to the role that you had. Yeah, that was huge. I probably would not have gotten that job otherwise, you know. I don't know, just freshly applying for something that, you know, where the people don't know you, just looking at my resume, I don't know that any hiring manager would have taken a chance on me. Maybe, but I don't know.
Yeah, it's definitely making those contacts was exactly how I got that job, and even my current job when I was, so I was very happy at TD. I was a data analyst in advanced analytics doing a lot of trading data, loved it, but I spoke with somebody from the Schwab side who, again, realized that I had some technical knowledge, and I had all that trading knowledge, and that I would be a really good fit for their team, and so a friend of a friend kind of hooked us up and talked about a position, and that's kind of how I got my current position. So now I'm in a, it's one company, you know, because we are merging or in the process of it, but it's still two very different companies, two very different data structures and organizational structures, so I'm still kind of navigating the Schwab side because I'm not in a traditional data position, you know, I'm not on a data team. I'm on a trading operations team, the data person within that team, so it's kind of like on my own island. I don't have colleagues directly that do what I do, so it's been a journey trying to find those people. I'm slowly learning, you know, you just, you kind of have to find this person and kind of pick their brain and let them know what you're doing, what you want to do, what you're thinking about, and then maybe they can refer you to somebody else who has this knowledge, and this person has this knowledge, and you just kind of have to be patient and kind of, you know, keep all those contacts open and be open to talking to people you don't know and put yourself out there.
How do you find the first people to go reach out to? Well, I knew a little, the TD side, I knew a lot of people, so I did kind of ask a few people, like, have you talked to your counterparts on the Schwab side yet, you know, do you have any names, and I did, you know, just ask my manager, because my manager knows that I, you know, came over and I'm relatively new to the Schwab side, so he actually gave me a couple names, he gave me a couple intros that kind of started that, so just recently, within the last couple weeks, I've been introduced to a couple people that I think will really kind of start to get me on the right path.
But Erin, as you start to, like, grow that community within Schwab as well, how does everybody kind of, like, stay in touch or, or keep growing that community? Well, we have, because we're a big company, we do have some set communities within, like, data communities within the firm, so there's, like, a Tableau Monthly Group that meets that does, like, presentations and contests, and things like that, and we also have a Data Science group that focuses more on, like, Python and R, and again people present things, and we have chats in Teams, so you can always reach out, you know, hit something up in the Teams and ask a question, or, you know, say, I'm working on this code, and it's not working right, does anybody, you know, can anybody take a look, or, you know, how do I download this package, or install this, or, you know, we have those kind of channels where we can kind of communicate with each other, which is really helpful.
Tools, languages, and career disruption
That's awesome. There was an anonymous question that came in a bit earlier that was, what ratio of R, Python, SQL, or other do you use, and what about most other data scientists, traders that you know? Well, right now, I personally use SQL a lot, but I know that it just kind of depends on what kind of team you're on, and what you like to use, because mostly you can use anything for most projects, but primarily, in my current position, I'm using SQL, like, 90 percent of the time, because most of it is data mining, trying to find where the data is that I need, and then trying to put it together.
I kind of took a break from data in a way when I moved from TD to Schwab, because my position, the first year, well, let me back up, so I was hired, and then my boss quit. She actually went to a different firm six months into my tenure at Schwab, so that kind of threw a wrench into my entire career progression. So initially, when I was hired, I kind of was hired into the team to start learning what the team does, the day-to-day stuff. I was on the regulatory reporting team, so I was learning everything that they did, and so I wasn't really working with data much, like, a few queries here and there, but nothing data-focused, so then once my manager left, I was kind of stuck in that spot for a year, so I didn't really do a whole lot with data, and then eventually, we kind of found the right place for me, so then I got back into data, so now I'm kind of actually going back and kind of taking classes to refresh myself on, like, Python and R, because it's been a while since I've actually used them.
I know that that is a topic that had come up before on a hangout, and someone else had experienced that, where they joined a company, and then, like, 30 days later, their boss quit. Yeah, yeah, so I know we didn't get a chance to get to that question a few weeks back, so I'd love to maybe hear if other people have experienced that as well, or if people have any advice for others to get into that situation.
I don't have any advice. All I know can really be, like, the ground just shifting under you, and in retrospect, thinking about when that's happened before, you know, I guess I would really ground myself more to, to a higher, the sort of next echelon of purpose and, um, not, you know, knowledge, so that you're not, you don't feel any kind of codependency there, which obviously, I mean, with your boss, it's clearly a thing. It's just to keep ourselves independent is definitely a mission and a constant struggle.
Advocating for the role you want
Definitely. Thank you, Allie. Erin, going through this now, do you have advice for us as well? Um, I think the only thing that I did that I'm really grateful that I did was, when my manager left, I was, I was like, what am I gonna do? Like, I mean, the biggest mistake of my life, why did I move? I was so happy my previous job, like, what did I do? Um, and I was pretty freaked out, to be honest. Um, but they slid over my, my now manager over our team. And so he, I was reporting to him and I just kind of started talking to him about, like, this is not what I was hired to do. I could do a lot more, um, kind of bored, you know, um, I just kind of started talking to him about what my skills were and what, um, I had, what we had discussed my position being. And he was like, okay, let me work on that. Let me, you know, talk to people. And luckily he cared enough to, um, figure out the position that I should be in. Um, and so he was kind of thinking about hiring somebody to be kind of his data person. Um, he was already kind of thinking about that. So then when I approached him about that, he was like, oh, this could be perfect. And so yes, would you want to do that? And I said, yeah, of course.
So, um, just making him aware of exactly where I was and, um, what I wanted to do, like that was huge. If I wouldn't have done that, I don't know. Uh, I probably just be doing regulatory reporting, I guess, which is fine, but it wasn't, you know, what I was hired to do. So I think that was the biggest thing you just have to, um, talk to people and let them know, um, what you're capable of doing, what you're interested in doing. And hopefully you have somebody that's in your corner that will, you know, kind of help you get to where you want to be.
So I think that was the biggest thing you just have to, um, talk to people and let them know, um, what you're capable of doing, what you're interested in doing. And hopefully you have somebody that's in your corner that will, you know, kind of help you get to where you want to be.
Yeah. I think it's a hard conversation to have to like, this isn't, this isn't what I was hired to do. Yeah. When I talked to them, I didn't want to sound ungrateful or like, oh, I hate my job. You don't want to be negative like that. So I tried to approach it and, you know, like I'm learning a lot, you know, straight, but like I could do more, you know, you hired me technically for this job and I'm not doing that job. And right away he understood. He's like, yeah, that's not what we hired you for. So we need to get you to do what we hired you for. So luckily he recognized that. Again, I've been very lucky to have a lot of really great management over the years that have really kind of recognized what I can do. Um, and I've been really supportive. So very lucky.
Yeah. And, and well, as Nick just said in the chat too, good for you for speaking up about that too.
Sure. I was just wondering about, uh, side projects within wall street, uh, technologically based that are more focused on community development and education. If you knew anyone who's engaging in that, or if there's a department that looks over that for Schwab specifically, I know within the finance wall street community. Um, I mean, I don't know of anything specific. Um, there are different groups out there that host things here periodically, like different firms will host, you know, kind of data meetups and, um, uh, presentations over things, but I'm not thinking of anything specific. Nothing's coming to mind.
And if other people know about other events, do feel free to share them in the chat. I know there's the R for finance conference, and they, I think there was a call for speakers that might still be open.
Having the conversation about role mismatch
Um, I see, and Nessa, you had a comment and a question here on that last conversation about what to do when you say this isn't what I was hired for. Would you want to jump in and ask that? Yeah, sure. Um, I mean, that's the only thing I'm asking really, um, more like, yeah, what I'm kind of curious as to whether you do know any advice for what might happen if, you know, you have that conversation about roles about not, not quite what I was expecting, not quite what I was initially told, and yeah, I guess I'm asking if it's sort of less accepted possibly because, you know, I guess there could be many reasons for that. Possibly if whoever hired that person was, you know, overselling a little, maybe like how to have that conversation. If, yeah, no, I'm just kind of curious if you have any advice for that sort of situation.
I mean, really the best advice is just to be honest and let them know how you're feeling about it. Um, I mean, the bottom line is if you're not happy in your job, you're not going to stay in your job and they don't want you to be unhappy because they don't want to lose you. You know, if you're not happy, you're not going to be doing good work. So, I mean, kind of like what I said earlier, like you have to have a little finesse about it. You can't be super negative and, you know, just say, I hate my job and give me a better job. Um, but you can say, you know, I'm really interested in doing X, Y, Z, you know, and I appreciate this job. I'm doing this, I'm learning this. That's great. Um, but I could also be doing more and I'm interested in doing more and just, just kind of have to phrase it, you know, to where kind of like, you know, what can I do for you? Even though it's really more for me.
That's very fair. Yeah. That's a great answer. Thanks.
Statistics, resources, and staying motivated
There was another question that just came in that was apart from SQL R and Python, how important was a role of statistics to you? Um, it is, it's, I did, so I had, I studied statistics a little bit in college. I was a, my undergrad was in a psychology major. So I did do some research and some statistics classes. So it helped to have like a foundation. It's not, I mean, I wouldn't say it's a deal breaker, but I think it's definitely helpful to just help you understand things when you're looking at them. Um, I mean, I feel like it came more into play when I was doing like graduate work, um, with classes, but my day to day, um, having just a basic foundation is good because you're just doing kind of, you know, looking at like averages and, you know, just the basic statistics stuff. But I mean, I honestly, I haven't really found an occasion to really dig into like my old stats books and refresh things. Um, but again, that very much depends on your job. I'm not heavy in the weeds of the data world yet. Um, I might get there, um, as I grow my position, but right now, you know, um, that's not something that I'm, I've had to focus on.
Erin, there was a question earlier as well that was, what are your favorite professional resources, podcasts, websites, or newsletters? Um, I mean, I've, I look at everything. I mean, I took courses through Udacity, Udemy, LinkedIn Learning, um, um, you know, Code Academy, everything. I've taken everything. Um, so I mean, I don't know that I really have favorites. I just kind of, um, will search for something like, oh, I want to, uh, you know, brush up on doing this, or I want to learn how to do this. So I just look for a class and find one that kind of fits what I'm, you know, looking for. Um, yeah, I can't, I don't really have like a go-to that I always, you know, go to for sources. Um, yeah, I kind of just look to see what's out there, um, see what speaks to me.
How do you keep yourself motivated when you decide like, I'm going to learn this? Um, it's difficult. I think the biggest thing you can do is just, um, kind of schedule yourself a little bit, um, and take a break when you need to. Um, so like this week, for example, I was going to take a new class because I don't really have much on my calendar this week. There's a lot of people out for spring break and stuff. So I was like, well, I'm going to take some, you know, some classes. Um, so just start scheduling things. And, you know, if I'm reading through something or taking a class and I'm just getting burnt out, just take a break, walk away, go walk my dog, do something, you know, just to step away from it. Um, I think that what I used to fall into the trap of like, okay, I got to take this class. This is a four hour class. I can knock this out in a day because it's four hours, but you don't realize the mental, um, stamina you have to have to really sit through that class and actually learn it. Um, so that's, I mean, I think that's the biggest thing is just taking breaks and, and, um, doing, going at your own pace to make sure that it's actually helpful to you. Don't just, you know, get through something just to get through it because you're not really getting anything out of it at that point.
Domain knowledge and the translator role
I'm just scrolling through to make sure I haven't missed questions. I think that you had one earlier, Mike, if you want to jump in around domain background. Yeah. And it's kind of a, a balancing act. I was thinking about, I mean, clearly you've come into this role with a lot of domain knowledge, right? Um, and so if you were sitting with someone who's producing a model, or producing some predictions and stuff, you know, you must apply, I'm assuming you apply some domain knowledge to what you're hearing and, and then kind of balance up. Well, does that sound right? Does that not sound right? Um, and I'm interested in, you know, it seems to me a great fit to bring domain knowledge and then put modeling and data techniques and, and, you know, experience on top. The other way though, is harder, right? Because then, you know, someone could sit and torture the data for hours and hours and days and days, and you could come in with your domain knowledge and go, well, why are you doing it like this?
So, you know, how do you balance up domain knowledge? I think that's, that's why it's really important to have a well-rounded team or colleagues that you can go to that have that, you know, that compliment you. Um, we had, I can't remember the details, but I remember when I was a data analyst, um, there was something that we were working on, um, me and a colleague who was not that business savvy, he was newer to the company. Um, and I remember we were going over something and we pulled, you know, we queried some data and I was like, well, that's not right. And he's like, why isn't it right? I'm like, cause that's not right. It was, it was like, um, I think it was like trading volume related or something. Um, it was something that I knew that that didn't look right, you know, um, but he didn't know it didn't look right. And so we had to, you know, we had to kind of, um, pull our talents to try to figure out like, why isn't that right and how to get it right. Um, so yeah, I mean, I think nobody knows everything, you know, I'm certainly more business knowledge than technical knowledge, but I'm still working on my technical knowledge and there's people that are the opposite, but yeah, you just have to find those people that compliment you to try to work together to, to get that, um, you know, ultimate goal reached.
Um, but yeah, I can see how it would be much harder coming, knowing, um, being very highly technical, but not knowing what you're talking about, um, in real life. Um, that was actually another thing that kind of, um, initially made me want to get into kind of a tech world, um, because I would talk to these tech guys and they just, they didn't seem human. They didn't know how to speak to me. Um, and I thought, well, I'm smart. I could probably learn this stuff. Maybe I could like translate between the two groups of people, you know? Um, I think we need more of that in, um, in all industries because I think they are very segregated, um, those two kinds of worlds. And I think the more people that we have that can speak to both sides, I think that's where, um, that's where we need to be going.
Maybe I could like translate between the two groups of people, you know? Um, I think we need more of that in, um, in all industries because I think they are very segregated, um, those two kinds of worlds. And I think the more people that we have that can speak to both sides, I think that's where, um, that's where we need to be going.
I wonder whether it, having that background in the domain leads you to kind of not go down the more complex model rabbit holes and rather you're kind of looking for, um, simpler, more explainable models, let's say like that. Yeah, that could be, I mean, um, yeah, you're gonna, you know, shift to where you're comfortable. So yeah, which again, I think is another reason why you need, um, people that compliment you that can push you, um, outside of your comfort zone to get the best result.
No, it's, it's good to hear that. I think it matches my feeling that you need both in a data team to kind of counterbalance each other. Yep. I think it's definitely helpful no matter what you're working on, no matter what industry and I think it's made beneficial for whatever you're doing.
I really like that idea or the point about needing more people that can be the translator in between the very technical and business side. And how do people like that? Yeah. But are there a lot of companies hiring for roles like that or what, what are those roles? I don't know, you know, that's, that's just kind of what I think there should be. I don't know if it is out there. I don't know if that exists, but I think it should. Um, and that's kind of what I would like to do, um, or, you know, eventually be, you know, to be the expert on both sides, you know, like, oh yeah, she can talk technical, go talk to her or yeah, she can explain like, you know, the logistical side and, you know, the business side, you know, um, yeah. I mean, I don't know if there's an actual position that, um, that is called like a, you know, technical liaison or something like that. I don't know, but I think it definitely should exist.
That's one of the reasons I've called myself professional geek, you know, because I find myself in that translator role or in that kind of in-between role and it's tough because I've never fit a machine learning model in my life, you know, and yet I'm kind of sitting alongside data scientists. But you can, you can understand them and you can speak to them, which is very important.
I see Melody said product managers are generally this translator type position. Yeah, can be.
I see Eric, you commented in that you can relate to this as well. Do you want to weigh in? Yeah, it's always been one of those things where it's never in a typical like statistician or data scientist job description where I work, but because like Mike said, I'm definitely a fellow geek of many things in tech and made a lot of great relationships with our research IT group. So I'm often helping people connect dots or translate concepts from the stats side to the IT DevOps side and vice versa. But I personally think that should be recognized more, but that's a much broader discussion that we don't have time for here.
I love Tatsu's analogy. Well, I love all restaurant analogies. Tatsu, you said I would translate between the front of the house and the back of the house.
Ismael, I see you have your hand raised. Sorry, Rachel. I was just gonna. Yeah, I think I love this conversation because I think that it happens everywhere, right? It's not just, you know, this industry, it's across the board. And yeah, it's funny because people can't talk to other people. I worked as a sushi chef on the line and you would not believe, you know, how heated things would get when your server needs to get this order out immediately. But you've got a stacked line of orders and these chefs are, you know, working their tails off. They don't want to hear that. But you have to go about it in a way that you can actually serve the customers, right? Like that's the end goal. And yeah, it takes a little bit of finesse. I definitely think it takes somebody that can, you know, understand, you know, the big picture and like take input and actually, you know, make it into something actionable, right? And actually produce a result that is going to be, you know, the best outcome for everybody. So yeah, I love this conversation.
And I've just thought of the job title for these people, these translator people. If they're internal to your company, they don't have a name. If they're external to the company, they're called consultants and they make 5x your salary.
Aaron, I was just wondering, what's the best way for people to get in touch with you, if they have follow-up questions or want to connect? LinkedIn's great. Okay, cool. Thank you so much, Aaron, for sharing all your insights with us and experience. This was great.
