Big Data Specialists, Big Data Engineers, and Big Data Scientists are becoming increasingly important to businesses today. Larger enterprises like the Fortune 1000 have been filling these roles either by hiring expensive inhouse staff or contracting with high priced consulting and outsourcing companies for at least the last decade plus. Mid-sized companies and small businesses frequently have not filled this role. However, many are realizing the value of Big Data and are looking for solutions. Valenta exclusively serves SMB clients and is seeing a dramatic uptick in the requests for Big Data Specialists.
American writer, poet and civil rights activist Maya Angelou once wrote, “We are only as blind as we want to be.” Maya Angelou may not have been thinking about technology or business when she wrote that, but there is wisdom in those words that can applied to both. Businesses are flying blind when they are not analyzing and monitoring their business data. Companies today generate ever increasing amounts of data. That data needs to be mined for opportunities, trends, and threats on a regular basis so that companies can stay healthy and be nimble.
In the remainder of this article we will examine, the role of a Big Data Specialist, when a Big Data Specialist is needed, outsourced Big Data Specialist services, and Big Data Specialist staff augmentation.
Job Description of a Big Data Specialist
The role of a Big Data Specialist is to design, implement highly scalable systems to ingest and process massive amounts of data every day. A Big Data Specialist will design and develop applications for data pipelines and data management. They will also help to set processes and policies for data governance and the data pipeline. Big Data Specialists will architect and implement best practices of tools such as Hadoop, Spark, Airflow, Kafka, and Presto. Big Data Specialists, Big Data Engineers, and Big Data Scientists will set and define the standards and best practices for the data and IT team. They will also be a key point of contact for solving any challenging technical and data analysis issues.
Big Data Specialist Requirements
A key requirements for Big Data Specialists, Big Data Engineers, and Big Data Scientists is a bachelor or master’s in software engineering and computer science. Additionally, several years of experience in design and development of large-scale data platforms is desired. Expertise with containerization, including Docker and Kubernetes is also key as well as skills with tools such as Hadoop, Spark, Airflow, Presto, and Kubeflow. Programming and software engineering experience, with Java, Scala, and Python is also something to look for.
When is a Big Data Specialist needed by an SMB?
There are many excellent reasons and situations for when a Big Data Specialist is needed by an SMB. We will review of few of them here.
Acquire Needed Skills
Lack of experience with Big Data is perhaps the biggest reason for when an SMB needs a Big Data Specialist, Engineer, or Scientist. Big Data is a newer field and one that is changing fast. Many established mid-sized companies do not have these skills in house. Yet many of them have tons of data that lends itself to analysis. Rather than try to convert staff and train them for this role or hire someone expensive from the outside, outsourced Big Data Specialist services can often fill the need and bridge the gap. Getting these skills in the door can also benefit companies in other ways and unlock growth and business optimization potential.
Focus on Core Business
Another common reason for when we find out clients searching for Big Data Specialists, Big Data Engineers, or Big Data Scientist services is so that they can focus on their core business. Whether they are an insurance company, healthcare provider, manufacturer, consumer product company, retailer, or any of the other types of clients we serve, native specialization in Big Data is typically not present. What is present is knowing their core business inside and out and needing to focus all their energy and concentration on it.
Gain Better Insights
Mining data for new business opportunities and getting to market before the competition is a benefit of good data analysis. Identifying threats before they can ruin a business is also an excellent reason to mine data and have Big Data Specialists under contract. Making sure the customer journey is a smooth one is also something that can be aided by data analysis and will greatly help with customer and client retention. All of this boils down to getting better insights … and choosing not to be blind to data.
Better Productivity and Accuracy
Once trends and opportunities are identified often the next step is to improve business processes and workflows. Good data analysis can identify where there are inefficiencies in an organization so that people and resources can be deployed to where they are needed the most. Good data analysis can also identify areas to improve accuracy which will in turn lead to more efficiency, plus top line, and bottom line growth.
Save Money
Being able to act smarter and make better decisions nearly always result in saving money within a business. Being able to operate a business with the better visibility gain with big data analysis can drive costs down in addition to driving sales and revenue up. Large enterprises gain efficiencies even when they are choosing the most expensive routes to implement Big Data activities. SMBs can get those same benefits with outsourced Big Data Specialist services and Big Data Specialist staff augmentation.
Staff Augmentation for a Big Data Specialist
An outsourced Big Data Specialist can create significant cost savings and also typically comes with contractual flexibility. Regarding the cost savings, Glassdoor a website we like to research companies and salaries finds that a Big Data Specialist earns 109K USD a year in Newark NJ, Houston TX, and Kansas City MO. In Ottawa Canada the salary is less but still significant coming in at 50K CAD annually. These salaries are just the average though. The best performers will earn more. These annual salary averages that Glassdoor provides do not reflect the cost of taxes, benefits, overhead, and infrastructure. When you add all of that together you get the full costs. Outsourced Big Data Specialist services can often fill these roles for 30% of those total expenses. Combining those costs savings plus all the other benefits of Big Data, it is easy to see why an outsourced Big Data Specialist is increasingly an attractive option for SMBs.
Want to Learn More
Hopefully, we have covered sufficiently why RPA Developers are a critical and key role in today’s business environment and have given a good overview of the role of a RPA Developer, plus how an RPA Developer can help a business. We believe that all businesses should have access to this vital role. Often for SMBs that means having access to quality outsourced Data Security Analyst services, like ours.
At Valenta we are focused on serving SMB clients exclusively. We provide new economy and information economy roles in addition to Big Data Specialists such as Python Developers, Cyber Security Engineers, Cloud Engineers, RPA Developers, DevOps Engineers, Data Security Analysts, and more. Valenta provides traditional BPO services like accounting, bookkeeping, administration, billing staff, paralegals, paraplanners, medical scribes and assistants, digital marketers, IT staff, software administrators and more. In addition to providing staff augmentation and outsourcing we also provide business process consulting plus digital transformation services that include automation, RPA, and conversational AI.
We have Managing Partners located in cities across the US, Canada, the UK, the EU, and Australia. Our Managing Partners work with other onshore consultants, plus offshore consultants, developers, and managers of outsourced staff to deliver the best services to our clients. Please find this link to our page about Big Data Specialists. To contact us on this topic or any other please reach out to us here.