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James Smith, UK&I Country Manager, Tableau

Describe your career to date

I was very fortunate to fall into the world of data after university and had an excellent grounding at a boutique data strategy consultancy called Blueprint. It was there that I learnt how data could have a transformational effect on both organisations and people’s careers, and I have been hooked on helping make that happen ever since. Luckily, nearly nine years ago, a friend of mine put Tableau in my hands and I instantly felt that connection between people and the data that the software brings. I now run the UK&I business and feel very fortunate that every day I get be involved in some of the largest and most successful data transformations in the world.

What challenges do you see for data in the year ahead that will have an impact on your clients and on the industry as a whole? 

AI has shone a light on the world of data, and it is even more of a board level conversation that it ever has been. With that comes great opportunity, but also unique pressure as data leaders will be expected more than ever to deliver, or we will find someone who will. I think in terms of delivery it is really important to not get consumed by the technological innovations that artificial intelligence (AI) brings and instead focus on how to solve business problems. It is the application of the technology to solve problems, deliver value, and make people’s lives easier that is important, and that is where the focus of data teams and leaders needs to be.

How are you developing the data literacy of a) your own organisation and b) your clients?

I hope this is the year that organisations deliver data literacy programmes at scale because the impact is massive. We have been on a journey where we have helped a business take 6,000 of their employees from data novices to data fluent in six months, and from that work the organisation can point at over £500 million of benefits delivered from the ideas that have been created by the people on that programme. Lots of people look at tools training as the way to generate literacy, but we have found that alongside that it is as much about creating excitement, removing friction, and having a strong communication strategy that makes these programmes successful.

How are you preparing your organisation and your clients for AI adoption and change management?

I think the really exciting thing about AI is that it lowers the barrier of adoption for those people who may have not worked with data before. We think it allows us to deliver new experiences to new audiences to deliver contextualised, relevant insights into the flow of peoples work at the point of a decision. Really, what it is about is making data easier and more useful to consume and hopefully by doing so can engage the 70% of people not using data in decision making at the minute and take data to the masses.