ggsql

Job Market Realities for Data Professionals in 2026 | Career Panel | Data Science Hangout

ADD THE DATA SCIENCE HANGOUT TO YOUR CALENDAR HERE: https://pos.it/dsh - All are welcome! We’d love to see you! This week we hosted a special career panel with three data science leaders: Gabriela de Queiroz (founder of R-Ladies, former AI Director at Microsoft, now running her own consulting company), Dan Boisvert (Senior Director and Head of Data Stewardship at Biogen), and Makarand Malu (data science manager with 15 years of experience, formerly at Google, Zynga, and PayPal)! Some topics covered in this week’s Hangout were AI’s impact on the job market, navigating career transitions and layoffs, technical interviews in the age of AI, and building trust as a data professional. One community member asked: “Can you give us a summary of your recent blog post about high-impact individual contributors, and what can organizations do for people who are high-achieving, high-skilled individual contributors?” (Gabriela’s substack is linked in the resources section, by the way!) Gabriela’s paraphrased answer: There’s a huge discussion happening about high-impact individual contributors, with companies cutting management layers and making everyone become an IC. This trend makes sense for small, AI-native companies, but for big organizations, it’s very hard. Managers still play a crucial role in orchestrating work and supporting the human side of organizations. If you’re moving from a successful management position back to an IC role, make sure your company is ready for that transition, because the metrics and expectations are completely different. Resources mentioned in the video and chat: Gabriela’s Substack on Being Laid Off → https://gabkroz.substack.com/p/one-year-after-microsoft-laid-me Gabriela’s Substack on being moved from manager to IC → https://gabkroz.substack.com/p/the-ic-comeback-is-real Gabriela’s Maven Courses → https://maven.com/gabriela Present of Coding Substack → https://presentofcoding.substack.com/ Ted Laderas’ Article on Networking in a Non-Slimy Way → https://laderast.github.io/articles/2021-09-13-how-to-network-in-a-non-slimy-way/how-to-network-in-a-non-slimy-way.html Jobscan Resume Tool → https://www.jobscan.co/ R in Pharma Conference → https://rinpharma.com/ R/Medicine Conference → https://rconsortium.github.io/RMedicine_website/ New York R Conference → https://nyhackr.org/ Boston R User Meetup → https://www.meetup.com/boston-user/events/314885181/?slug=boston-user&eventId=314885181 ggsql Package → https://ggsql.org/ Shiny Accessibility App Example → https://github.com/ajstamm/shiny-a11y-app ArXiv Paper titled AI Self-preferencing in Algorithmic Hiring: Empirical Evidence and Insights → https://arxiv.org/pdf/2509.00462 Guardian Article on OpenAI Whistleblower → https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/dec/21/openai-whistleblower-dead-aged-26 ► Subscribe to Our Channel Here: https://bit.ly/2TzgcOu Follow Us Here: Website: https://www.posit.co Hangout: https://pos.it/dsh The Lab: https://pos.it/dslab LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/posit-software Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/posit.co Thanks for hanging out with us! Timestamps: 00:00 Introduction 09:17 “Can you summarize your blog post about high-impact individual contributors, and what can organizations do for high-achieving individual contributors?” 14:23 “What are your thoughts on generative AI, agentic workflows, and their effect on the job market?” 21:03 “How do technical interviews look these days for data scientists or data engineers? Are we allowing AI tools?” 28:48 “How would you recommend pivoting into statistical programming in pharma?” 31:53 “My position is in the department that data aims to help, not the data department itself. How can I get over the mistrust from the data department?” 37:10 “What are tips for selling yourself to a hiring manager when your work overlaps with data science but wasn’t called data science in your previous role?” 42:47 “Since layoffs seem to be happening all the time and it takes longer to find a job, are any of you looking at independent consulting or self-employment?” 45:19 “It seems like a lot of resumes are immediately rejected by AI. Any tips for getting past that point?” 47:25 “What do you think of the ethical implications of using AI, given companies have been caught violating copyright?” 50:20 “Do you think there’s going to be a hiring boom or at least a low humming buzz of hiring in the foreseeable future?”