Tuesday Seminar Series - Think Like a Consultant: Business Strategy for Data Scientists at Dubois Center at UNC Charlotte Center City

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Company Description: Sia is a global, next-generation management consulting firm that helps organizations navigate transformation through the integration of strategy, data science, technology, and creativity. Founded in 1999, Sia serves clients worldwide with more than 3,000 consultants across 48 offices in 19 countries. Guided by its "Consulting for Good" philosophy, the firm is committed to delivering measurable business impact while advancing climate action, social responsibility, and ethical business practices. Speaker Bio: Joe Keating is a Charlotte-based Manager in the Data, AI & Quantitative business at Sia with 7+ years of experience in management consulting, banking, and financial planning. He graduated from Elon University with a degree in Applied Mathematics and has earned the Azure Solutions Architect Expert and Scrum Certified Product Owner certifications. Joe brings experience in leading cross-functional teams to design, develop, and deliver data-driven solutions for several of the largest international financial institutions. He has worked closely with stakeholders ranging from C-level executives to back-end engineering teams to collaboratively design solutions and bridge the gap between business and technology teams. Joe is a technically skilled data scientist with strong proficiencies in time-series forecasting, non-linear modeling, and natural language processing. He brings a unique combination of financial, banking, and technical knowledge to deliver innovative solutions to his client teams. Abstract: Data scientists are trained to find answers. Consultants are trained to find the right question. This seminar bridges that gap. In practice, the most consequential skill in any data-intensive engagement is not modeling or engineering. It is the ability to diagnose a business problem, identify what decision actually needs to be made, and work backward to determine what analysis is worth doing at all. Most data science programs do not teach this. Most data scientists learn it late, if at all. This session draws on consulting methodology to give data scientists a practical strategy toolkit. We will cover how to deconstruct a vague business problem into a structured, answerable question; how to identify the real stakeholder need beneath the stated request; how to assess whether a data solution is actually the right solution; and how to communicate findings in a way that drives decisions, not just informs them. The underlying principle is simple: data without strategic context produces insight without impact. Organizations do not suffer from a shortage of analysis. They suffer from analysis that does not connect to action. Students will leave with a repeatable framework for approaching any data engagement the way a consultant would, starting with the business, the decision, and the stakeholder, before ever opening a dataset. For data scientists who want a seat at the table, this is where it starts. View on site | Email this event