Machine learning (ML) has become indispensable across industries, with business leaders urging its widespread adoption for innovation and sustained growth. However, a disparity exists between the expectations of business leaders and the reality faced by engineers and data scientists in building and delivering ML solutions at scale and on time.
In a recent Forrester study commissioned by Capital One, business leaders expressed eagerness for enterprise-wide ML deployment. Nonetheless, data scientists reported a lack of essential tools for developing scalable ML solutions. Business leaders envision ML as a plug-and-play solution, but the reality is far more complex, considering data quality, compliance issues, and security parameters.
Addressing this expectation-reality gap begins with fostering open dialogue between teams. Democratizing ML across the organization is the next step, ensuring both technical and non-technical teams have access to robust ML tools and receive continuous learning support. Capital One has successfully implemented these strategies, scaling ML across its vast team.
To democratize ML, companies should:
- Enable Collaboration: Foster collaboration between technical and non-technical teams to ensure products are built from business, human, and technical perspectives.
- Tools for Success: Provide engineers and data scientists with the necessary tools for success, addressing the Forrester-identified issue of a lack of user-friendly tools hindering cross-enterprise ML adoption.
- Empower Employees: Grant governed access to data and offer no-code/low-code tools to empower every employee, turning the organization into a data-driven entity.
- Continuous Learning: Provide avenues for employees to learn new skills, addressing the lack of training identified by Forrester as a hindrance to ML adoption.
- Measure and Celebrate Success: Regularly measure the success of ML democratization initiatives, analyzing data-driven decisions’ impact on business results. Celebrate achievements and continually refine areas that need improvement.
By adopting these best practices, organizations can bridge the gap between business expectations and technical capabilities, resulting in a future-forward, data-driven, and innovative company.
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