From Academic Associate at IIM (Indore) to a Project Manager: My Journey with Data Science

By - Himanshu Khale, Board Infinity Alumni

1. Early Career Background

Himanshu Khale is Self Placed at Shraddha Impex as the Head of Project Management, International Marketing Indore.

I didn’t start as a bright student in school. It was more like I knew all the concepts but could never put them on paper, especially in an examination hall. I graduated with a degree in Electronics & Communications Engineering from Acropolis Institute of Tech & Research in Indore, which is also my hometown, and secured a job at Shraddha Impex in the same city as an International Marketing Executive. After having worked there for 2 years, I decided to pursue higher education. I enrolled myself in Devi Ahilya Vishwavidyalaya in Indore to pursue an MBA in Foreign Trade and upon completion of my degree, I joined the Indian Institute of Management (Indore) as an Academic Associate. That has been my career journey so far which was mostly on the right track but I felt there was something that needed to be done.

During my Internships & Freelancing jobs in College, I worked in the domain of Digital Marketing & Project Management which exposed me to Data Science. Upon researching the subject I found out that with the help of tools, which come under the umbrella of Data Science, like Python, Advance Excel, SQL, etc., we could automate a lot of work and save us a lot of time & effort. I scouted through a lot of websites to find a full-fledged course in Data Science and that’s how I landed upon the Data Science course offered by Board Infinity. I compared the curriculum from other websites and I finally enrolled myself in BI because of the course syllabus and of course the coaches. I knew some of them beforehand, so that helped me make my decision.

Data Science, Machine Learning, Deep learning, etc., are very powerful tools, and more often than not business owners have no idea as to what to do with their data scientists. The application of the field is not always straightforward. An important part of a Data Science Professional's job is also to find avenues where their skills could generate value for the business. Incorporating AI ML and learning from Data Science in non-tech-based industries gives us great opportunities. These times of our lives are the age of exploration in the discipline of Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning

2. Learning Experience at Board Infinity

Learning Data Science helped me in landing some freelance jobs, which I was able to convert into a full-time job at my previous company Shraddha Impex, and joined them as Head of Project Management, International Marketing & Trade, in January, while I was still pursuing my course from Board Infinity. Having pursued this course, Advance Excel, SQL & Tableau came in handy which have been extremely helpful with the day-to-day work. My learning with BI has helped me with building models to predict certain trends in the International Market, digitize data through OCR applications of Deep Learning and I am giving impressive business solutions to my employers, which has increased the efficiency of day-to-day operations by 30%.

The webinars organized by BI were great too in enlightening us, especially the one around EDA using various technologies, introduction, and application of various tools & new developments in the field of Data Science such as web development, Chatbots, and especially Chaupal Sessions. With BI comes security in terms of jobs. If I somehow want to apply for other companies, I can do that with BI within one year. Apart from placements and projects, the provision of lifetime access to free resources with good content is really appreciated since we can always go back and browse through these resources.

I don’t think I qualify to tell anyone what to do but Data Science is basically Decision Science. Sometimes, we can’t identify the invisible line between right and wrong. If I am letting go of a big firm for a mediocre one, it was the right thing but how do I come to this decision? The handsome number of jobs in this field is a secondary thing but the way Data Science solves these confusions for us is extremely helpful because we learn how to make matrices and classify problem statements and then we come to certain conclusions that we can apply to life problems as well. We all can use a different perspective & a scientific approach to the problems haunting us and also to the issue at hand.

Data Science, Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, and all its subsets are the technologies of our time. And I am glad I am a part of this Data Revolution.

I have also built my own website. Where I used to post my projects and work from time to time. You can check it out here

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