Let's Bring Mondays Back With A New Deal

Thank you all for subscribing and being part of the community. I miss starting every week with those words. I stopped the Monday posts a few months back because engagement was low. After talking with hundreds of community members, I understand that the content got stale. Monday is back with a new purpose.

These posts are where I talk with you directly about essential parts of the field that don't get enough coverage. I'll also tell you a bit about what I'm working on and why it's important. Last week, I worked on deciding the future of this newsletter.

I was building content for most of the week at IBM Think. I told myself I didn't have time for this newsletter, but that's not true. I had the same number of days in the week but allocated them to other work. My priorities were the conference and my clients, so this newsletter slipped to the bottom.

In data science, we must also prioritize ruthlessly. If the data team doesn't control its prioritization, someone outside the team will step in and fill that role. If the data team doesn't make prioritization decisions that deliver value to the business, again, someone outside the team will step in to fill that role.

The Purpose Of Data And AI For Businesses

Data and AI product managers are critical for this reason. Data scientists and engineers must see some of the bigger picture and have business literacy. However, those roles' primary focus is on delivering data and model-supported products. It takes a team with diverse capabilities to succeed in data science. Technology is just one of the problems to solve.

Early in my career, I worked at businesses that prioritized by fire drill. The largest crisis got the largest share of resources. People optimize for whatever prioritization metrics are imposed, so FDDD (Fire Drill Driven Development) makes stakeholders optimize for drama and fear. The result is chaos.

One of the most pivotal moments in my career was when a VP of product management faced down FDDD by asking a simple question. Is this how we should be making decisions? The word "should" is a powerful strategic term. Its modest word embedding doesn't convey its implications on our mindset.

The business has options, and when FDDD rules prioritization, those options are not evaluated intentionally. The word "should" implies the existence of alternatives to the way we operate today. Strategy informs decision-making across the enterprise and helps people make decisions intentionally.

People at every level are faced with daily decisions about tradeoffs. Strategy arms them with a critical tool to face those decisions and make them in a way that best serves the business's common interests. Alignment is strategy-driven, and you could even say that strategy is purpose-driven. The business's purpose filters into every team through strategy awareness and implementation.

For simple decisions, strategy alone is enough. However, businesses are increasingly complex and uncertain. Next week, I'll speak at SAP Sapphire about data and AI's superpowers, managing complexity and reducing uncertainty. Data and AI are strategic by nature, so, by extension, the data team is strategic by nature. Data and AI strategists are critical for this reason.

Job one in prioritization is helping the business decide how it should leverage the data team for competitive advantage and delivering new value to customers. Data and models should help C-level leaders and front-line organizations identify high-value opportunities. It should help to assess and validate costs and returns. The business and the data team are partners by the nature of what we deliver and its impacts.

What Should The Business's Purpose And Aligning Principles Be?

Last week, I deprioritized this newsletter in favor of client meetings, deliverables, and the conference. I spent time deliberating on the future of this newsletter because I risked repeating that decision this week. Two weeks with little to no content isn't acceptable.

I don't prioritize by fire drill, but the knowledge of loss is always present. Evaluating tradeoffs means optimizing for gain, but there is opportunity cost. By choosing to spend my time as I did, I lost delivering content to you. From a monetary value perspective, it was the right decision. This community is rapidly approaching 5000 members, but less than 5% are paid subscribers.

I optimized current and future revenue by prioritizing and focusing on three activities at the expense of this one. From a revenue optimization standpoint, this newsletter will never be the best way to prioritize my time. I spent some time evaluating the future of this newsletter after realizing that it would always be pushed aside.

If maximizing or optimizing revenue is a business's only purpose, then the strategy is a simple tenant. The data team has one KPI to rule them all, and models are all designed with a single desired outcome. Decision-making has a singular objective across the enterprise. In companies like this, AI is more than capable of handling even C-level decision-making.

What's the point of leadership in a business that optimizes for a single KPI? There isn't one. People aren't needed to make decisions if that's the business's purpose and aligning principle. In the coming years, leadership will be forced to come to terms with this reality.

People are afraid of AI taking over and replacing them. We will be replaced if we don't find ways to differentiate ourselves from automation. One unique characteristic that people possess is the ability to define purpose and aligning principles. AI can't do that because it cannot learn that ability from data. A deeper intelligence is required to determine both.

The decision I came to last week revolved around defining my business's purpose and guiding principles. The tradeoff of writing for this newsletter is optimizing for revenue. At the current rate, it's unlikely to ever be my most profitable activity. I have chosen to keep the newsletter going, but we must make a new deal.

Will You Support This Newsletter?

Any publication's level of support and engagement is connected to the quality of writing. I'm on the hook for delivering high-value content every week. I will support this newsletter by writing 3 times per week and choosing the highest-value content topics I can find. If you want to see different content, please comment, or send me an email with topics. As in the past, I will be responsive to the community's suggestions.

In return, I need your support. It doesn't need to be financial, and I'm not demanding that everyone convert to a paid subscription. Hitting the like button on content here is a great way to support the newsletter. When only 5-10 people hit the like button, I get the impression that only 5-10 out of almost 5000 people consider that post to be high-value.

Since revenue optimization is no longer my guiding KPI, I need a new one. I have chosen community value. Likes and reshares are one of my only metrics for community value, so I need your support. Without it, I don't have a data point to guide my understanding of how well I deliver community value.

I also need your support on social media. Likes and resharing help me monetize my content on Twitter and LinkedIn. Support there is an easy way to help financially at 0 cost to you.

I need to earn your support, and I know that. I commit to putting in the time and effort over the next month to deliver content that's worth hitting the like button for. I'll craft posts to meet your needs as you express them and based on your likes. Let's build this community up together around a uniquely human purpose and aligning principles.

Have a great week. I'll send an update from SAP Sapphire with interesting developments and important trends to follow.

Vin Vashishta