The L&D Guide to

Data Fluency
 1 The march to data fluency

Data transformation is at the heart of digital

transformation
Over the past two decades, digital-first startups such as Uber, Amazon, Airbnb, and Stripe
have disrupted vital industries such as transportation, commerce, travel, and banking.
Organizations across all industries have recognized the need for digital transformation to
compete in the new information economy. This is especially true of the COVID-19 economy,
which has been accelerating the digitization of their processes and services (PwC). Despite
massive digitalization investments, the painful truth is that approximately 70% of digital
transformation initiatives fail to reach their stated goal (McKinsey).

While there may be many culprits for why digital transformation programs may fail, a key
reason is not recognizing that having sustainable organization-wide data skills is a
prerequisite for successful digital transformation. Gartner finds that fewer than 50% of
documented corporate strategies mention data analytics as a critical lever for delivering
enterprise-wide value.

‘‘Leaders need to look at data first to succeed in their digital

initiatives, rather than treating them as an afterthought to help
with ad hoc projects.”
Mike Rollings, Research Vice President at Gartner

The underutilization of data science and business analytics dooms digital transformation
initiatives from the start—to improve digital services and processes, you must have insights
into the data they generate. Forrester estimates that an average of 60 to 73 percent of
organization data is untouched for analysis. The key differentiators between the disruptors
and the incumbents is not technology-based but in their data-driven culture, the insights they
draw from data while examining and iterating upon their services, and the data fluency skills
they foster.

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Many organizations have tried to bridge the data gap by creating data science and analytics
teams and investing in data tools. But merely laying out a data infrastructure and hiring data
scientists isolates data science as a service center, and won’t usher in organization-wide data
fluency. In a data-driven organization, data science—and more broadly, data fluency—is an
inclusive methodology for answering organizational questions where everyone is equipped to
answer questions with data. For example, a marketing analyst would be able to use data to
optimize their marketing spend, and a business analyst would visualize and describe data to
prescribe actionable insights. The success of your digital transformation pivots on having the
appropriate data skills across the organization.

The data fluency skill gap

While hiring data scientists and investing in data infrastructure and tools are key components
of data transformation, companies are recognizing that they need to address data fluency
skill gaps within their organizations. A McKinsey survey of over a thousand businesses from
various industries found that the most pressing skill gap to be addressed was data analytics—
with 43% of respondents believing it to be the most urgent priority when it comes to upskilling.
Similarly, PwC’s 2019 annual CEO survey found that 34% of CEOs believe skill gaps in data
analytics are the most crucial threat for their organization. This skill gap exists across all
organization levels—an Accenture study found that executives are almost twice as likely as
middle managers to value their “gut feeling” over data-driven insights.

Addressing data fluency skill gaps has become even more important, especially when
considering the cost of not doing so. Organizations digitizing their processes and services
expect their employees to work with data, despite not having the necessary skills to do their
best work. This results in employees who aren’t empowered to act on their data and a culture
where, according to Accenture, about 50% of employees avoid data-related tasks or find
alternative methods to solve tasks without relying on data. All of this hurts the organization’s
decision making process and ability to iterate, and diminishes the opportunities for career
growth across teams.

Organizations suffer when there is a clash between well-meaning digital transformation

initiatives and a lack of necessary data skills to accommodate them. The same Accenture
study found that 61% of employees believe that not having the required skills to extract
insights from data has contributed to their workplace stress. When accounting for data-
related procrastination and stress-related sick leave resulting from data and technology
issues, organizations are losing around five working days per employee. This costs the US
economy around $100 billion yearly. 2
Upskilling is the only way to become data
fluent
Upskilling is the only way forward. Forward-thinking organizations are already pouring in
investments to upskill their people to compete in the digital age. For example, Marks &
Spencer created a retail data academy to upskill over 1,000 employees. Amazon launched a
Machine Learning University to equip their engineers with the skills needed to deploy machine
learning at scale in their products and services. Airbnb developed its own Data University to
provide every level of the organization with the skills to make data-driven decisions. AT&T
embarked on a $1 billion, 10-year long project to upskill more than half of its 250,000 people
workforce.

‘‘This is our biggest digital investment in our people to date and

the creation of the M&S Data Academy will upskill colleagues
and provide them with an in-depth level of digital literacy as
well as a Data Analytics qualification. Transformation of our
business is key to survival and a huge part of this lies with our
colleagues. We need to change their digital behaviors, mindsets,
and our culture to make the business fit for the digital age.”
Steve Row, CEO of Marks and Spencer

These companies are ushering in a new era for upskilling in the digital age. A McKinsey study
found that more than two-thirds of organizations have or plan on having an upskilling initiative
to address skill gaps. More importantly, the same study found that 70% of organizations that
invested in upskilling efforts are reporting positive business impacts that exceed the initial
investment in upskilling. For example, 48% of organizations have reported moderate to
significant positive effects on bottom-line growth due to upskilling—and 73% of organizations
have reported moderate to substantial improvements in employee satisfaction. A Deloitte
survey asking executives about the data maturity of their organizations found that 88% of
organizations who have undergone organization-wide analytics upskilling have exceeded
business goals.

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The challenges in upskilling for data fluency
Data fluency is a methodology for answering business questions rather than a singular skill to
be taught and learned, like traditional learning and development initiatives. Learning journeys
will vary depending on the level of interaction different individuals may have with data. For
example, a marketing analyst who regularly works with Excel may need to learn R or Python
to succeed at their job, while a manager or leader may only need to know how to make
educated decisions using data.

This is why a role-based, persona-driven learning journey is more effective at scaling data
fluency training programs. Every persona has a different relationship with data and would
need to acquire competencies in different tools, and grow different skills to thrive in the digital
age.

Creating scalable and personalized learning paths for data fluency across the organization
requires familiarity with the broad landscape of data tools, and a nuanced view of the
different types of data personas found in data-driven organizations. In short, there’s no one-
size-fits all when it comes to data fluency.

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 2 A breakdown of data tools
and data personas
A breakdown of crucial data tools
While programming languages are at the forefront of data fluency upskilling initiatives, it’s
also essential to consider the entire landscape of data tools. Just like data science—or more
broadly, data fluency—can be considered a means to an end to solve business questions,
data tools can be considered a means to an end to perform data-related tasks.

1 Programming Languages

Open-source programming languages have skyrocketed in popularity over the last two
decades for data workflows. Apart from being free to use, open-source programming
languages provide a plethora of tools and packages that allow practitioners to hone skills
and perform data tasks across all data fluency competency areas. The most relevant
open-source programming languages for data science are Python, R, and Scala.

Python is an open-source programming language used for statistical and data

analysis, big data processing, data engineering, and machine learning. It’s considered
one of the most popular programming languages for data work and is replacing
legacy tools like SPSS and SAS.

R is an open-source programming language most commonly used in research and

development, statistical analysis, data analysis, and dashboard creation.

Scala is an open-source programming language—it’s especially used for maintaining

and processing big data and big data applications.

2 SQL

SQL is a structured query language that allows data professionals to query, access, and
manipulate data inside of database management systems. Just like one human language
can have many different dialects, there are many different dialects of SQL (i.e.,
PostgreSQL, Oracle SQL, SQL Server) that are used by different organizations. The
differences are generally minor as they share many commonalities in syntax and features.
3 Business Intelligence Tools (BI Tools)

BI tools have gained momentum over the past decade. Business intelligence tools are
essentially supercharged spreadsheet tools made for the digital age. They allow for the
organization, aggregation, and visualization of data in easy to use point-and-click
dashboards, with no coding required. While there are many business intelligence tools,
commonly used tools include the following:

Tableau offers a robust, flexible, and intuitive interface to connect to raw data and
create beautiful and interactive visualizations that allow teams to get an overview of
their data.

Power BI offers seamless connectivity with various raw data sources and an easy
point-and-click interface to visualize and process data. A key feature of Power BI is
that one version of it comes with Office 365 for the Enterprise and has an interface
that is slightly reminiscent of Excel.

4 Spreadsheets

Spreadsheets have always been the go-to tool for data practitioners. They allow for easy,
intuitive, and drag-and-drop interfaces for manipulating, aggregating, and visualizing
data. However, they fall short when processing large amounts of data and often produce
bottlenecks when creating reproducible shareable analysis. The most popular spreadsheet
tools are Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets.

5 Big data tools

As organizations started collecting more and more data, it became imperative to efficiently
structure, organize, and store big data. Many solutions have emerged that accommodate
manipulating big data and orchestrating big data workflows. Notable examples include:

Spark is a framework that allows for large-scale data processing and manipulation. It
can be used using Python, Scala, or R.

Airflow is an open-source workflow management tool that allows you to schedule

data pipelines to ensure consistency and reliability across data workflows.
6 Command line tools

Command line tools are used to systematize file handling, enable version control, work
with cloud tools, execute data pipelines developed using other data tools—especially
programming languages—easily and scalably. The two most notable command line tools
are the following:

Shell is a command line interface that allows running programs, automating tasks,
and accessing file directories.

Git is a version control tool that allows for easily tracking and experimenting with
changes done to code repositories.

7 Cloud platforms

Cloud platforms provide tools for organizations and teams to store and process data, host
applications, and deploy data pipelines all using remote computing resources hosted by
cloud providers. They have become the de-facto solution for data infrastructure for many
organizations as they are easier to maintain, scale, and more resilient. The most widely
used cloud platform providers are Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and
Google Cloud.

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The different relationships with data
While each organization and the data they produce is different, there are commonalities in
the different relationships individuals have with data. A useful way of thinking about and
scaling data-focused upskilling efforts is with data personas. Each data persona has a
different relationship with data and requires different data fluency competencies to become
empowered to do their best work. Organizations can then map different roles within the
organization to that persona and create a curated, personalized learning experience
depending on what they need to learn.

1 Data Consumers and Leaders

Data Consumers and Leaders often work in nontechnical roles, but they consume data
insights and analytics to make data-driven decisions. They often need to have
conversations with data professionals and should be able to distinguish when data can
and cannot be used to answer business questions.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Understand what data • Draw common • Have a strong grasp of
scientists, machine visualizations and the fundamentals of
learning scientists, and extract simple business intelligence
data engineers do. descriptive statistics and BI tools.
• Know which questions from data.
can (and can’t) be
answered with data.
• Interpret the results of
data projects, including
calculations and
visualizations.

COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND

• Spreadsheets: Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel
TOOLS:
• Business Intelligence: Power BI, Tableau

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Chief Marketing Officer, Human Resources Manager, Head of Sales
2 Business Analysts

Business Analysts are responsible for tying data insights to actionable results that increase
profitability or efficiency. They have deep knowledge of the business domain and often
use SQL alongside non-coding tools to communicate insights derived from data.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Draw common • A deep knowledge of • Democratize access to
visualizations and the business domain and data insights by
extract simple the ability to report and creating dashboards
descriptive statistics communicate insights and organizing data to
from data. using data. answer organizational
• Understand the business questions.
applications of data.

COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND

• Spreadsheets: Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel
TOOLS:
• Business Intelligence: Power BI, Tableau
• SQL: PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Oracle SQL

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Business Analyst, Supply Chain Analyst, Operations Analyst, Financial Analyst

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3 Data Analysts

Similar to Business Analysts, Data Analysts are responsible for analyzing data and
reporting insights from their analysis. They have a deep understanding of the data
analysis workflow and report their insights through a combination of coding and non-
coding tools.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Can draw common • A deep understanding of • Democratize access to
visualizations and the data analysis data insights by
extract simple workflow, which includes creating dashboards
descriptive statistics importing, manipulating, and organizing data to
from data. cleaning, calculating, answer organizational
• Understands the and reporting on questions.
business applications of organization data.
data. • A strong grasp of
business intelligence
and BI tools.

COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND TOOLS:

• Programming languages: Python, R
• Spreadsheets: Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel
• Business Intelligence: Power BI, Tableau
• SQL: PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Oracle SQL

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Data Analyst, Business Analyst, Supply Chain Analyst, Operations Analyst, Financial Analyst

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4 Data Scientists

Data Scientists investigate, extract, and report meaningful insights in the organization’s
data. They communicate these insights to nontechnical stakeholders and have a good
understanding of machine learning workflows and how to tie them back to business
applications. They work almost exclusively with coding tools, conduct analysis, and often
work with big data tools.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Deeply understand the • Understand fundamental • Can apply analyses and
data analysis workflow, statistics, including machine learning
which includes distributions, modeling, workflows to business
importing, manipulating, and inference. applications such as
cleaning, calculating, • Understand supervised finance, marketing, and
and reporting on and unsupervised healthcare.
organization data. machine learning • Work with non-standard
workflows. data types, such as time
• Can create dashboards series, text, geospatial,
using coding tools such and images.
as Python and R.

COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND TOOLS:

• Programming languages: Python, R, Scala
• SQL: PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Oracle SQL
• Big data tools: Airflow, Spark

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Data Scientist, Data Analyst, can include a “citizen data scientist” (i.e., someone who
performs the tasks of a data scientist, but does not have the title “Data Scientist”).

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5 Machine Learning Scientists

Machine Learning Scientists are responsible for developing machine learning systems at
scale. They derive predictions from data using machine learning models to solve problems
like predicting churn and customer lifetime value, and are responsible for deploying these
models for the organization to use.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Deeply understand the • Perform supervised and • Perform deep learning
data analysis workflow, unsupervised machine workflows.
which includes learning workflows • Work with APIs and
importing, manipulating, including feature coding best practices.
cleaning, calculating, engineering, training
and reporting on models, testing
organization data. accuracy and making
predictions.
• Can apply analyses and
machine learning
workflows to business
applications such as
finance, marketing, and
healthcare.

COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND TOOLS:

• Programming languages: Python, R, Scala
• SQL: PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Oracle SQL
• Big data tools: Airflow, Spark
• Command line tools: Git, Shell

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Data Scientist, Research Scientist, Machine Learning Scientist, Machine Learning Engineer

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6 Statisticians

Similar to Data Scientists, Statisticians work on highly rigorous analysis, which involves
designing and maintaining experiments such as A/B tests and hypothesis testing. They
focus on quantifying uncertainty and presenting findings that require exceptional degrees
of rigor, like in finance or healthcare.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Deeply understand the • Perform statistical • Design more complex
data analysis workflow, modeling workflows, experiments and
which includes including feature understand Bayesian
importing, manipulating, engineering, training statistics.
cleaning, calculating, models, testing • Understand specialist
and reporting on goodness of fit, and models, such as survival
organization data. inferring significance. models, generalized
• Test hypotheses and additive models, mixture
design simple models, and structural
experiments such as A/B equation models.
tests.

COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND TOOLS:

• Programming languages: Python, R
• SQL: PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Oracle SQL

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Quantitative Analyst, Inference Data Scientist, Data Scientist

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7 Programmers

Programmers are highly technical individuals that work on data teams and work on
automating repetitive tasks when accessing and working with an organization’s data.
They bridge the gap between traditional software engineering and data science and have
a thorough understanding of deploying and sharing code at scale.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Write functions to avoid • Deeply understand • Develop data pipelines
repetitive code. coding best practices. and work with parallel
• Benchmark and • Work with web APIs and programming.
optimize code to develop packages for • Understand
improve performance. sharing code. programming
paradigms, such as
functional programming
and object-oriented
programming.
COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND TOOLS:
• Programming languages: Python, R, Scala
• Command line tools: Git, Shell

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Software Engineer, Data Scientist, Dev-Ops Engineer

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8 Data Engineers

Data Engineers are responsible for getting the right data in the hands of the right people.
They create and maintain the infrastructure and data pipelines that take terabytes of raw
data coming from different sources into one centralized location with clean, relevant data
for the organization.

DATA SKILLS:

Beginner Intermediate Advanced

• Efficiently extract, • Process data and • Manage and optimize
transform, and load automate data flows databases and process
data from raw data using the command line. big datasets.
sources into • Process data using
organization databases. cloud platforms.

COMMONLY USED TECHNOLOGY AND TOOLS:

• Programming languages: Python, R, Scala
• SQL: PostgreSQL, SQL Server, Oracle SQL
• Command line tools: Git, Shell
• Big data tools: Airflow, Spark
• Cloud Platforms (e.g., Amazon Web Services)

EXAMPLE JOB TITLES:

Software Engineer, Data Engineer, Dev-Ops Engineer

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 3 How DataCamp scales
learning and development
for data fluency
While clear understanding of data roles
and tools are essential to scaling learning
and development programs for data
fluency, not every organization can create
its own data university like Airbnb has
done. Depending on your organization’s
data roles, the tools your employees use,
and the data skills they have, a variety of
educational programs, both online and in
person, can get your team up to speed.

At DataCamp, we create persona-driven, personalized learning journeys for each role based on
their skill set and desired learning outcomes. With DataCamp Signal™, learners can assess their
skills in various data competency areas, including data literacy, programming, data analysis,
and more—and receive personalized course recommendations based on their skill gaps. These
courses were created by the best instructors and industry professionals in the world. Unlike
other platforms, DataCamp features a modern learning experience with bite-sized videos and
hands-on-coding exercises, so employees learn by doing and stay engaged. Our mobile app
makes it easy for learners to hone skills on-the-go with short practice sessions to reinforce what
they’ve learned. And with DataCamp projects, they can tackle real world problems in a risk-free
environment and apply their new data skills right away.

This entire learning experience is easy to implement and manage for teams of any size, with an
administrator dashboard that allows custom learning paths based on roles and departments,
advanced analytics and insights to measure the impact of online learning, and seamless SSO
and LMS integrations. Teams benefit from our Customer Success Managers, which partner with
organizations to accelerate learning adoption, and provide valuable recommendations to help
achieve organization-wide data fluency. We have more than 6 million learners around the world
—and we’re just getting started. Close the talent gap. Visit datacamp.com.
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