Interview: Jhakir Miah, Director of Engineering at Amrock - What are your thoughts on being a “data-driven organization?” Upon completing this newsletter edition, I can only think of one thing: I just stumbled across a hidden diamond in the data landscape that more people need to pay attention to. The type of organization that my guest, Jhakir Miah, described was nothing short of a dream company with respect to data maturity. For context, Amrock is within the Rocket Companies (previously branded as Quicken Loans) portfolio, and their work reflects the culture of the broader Rocket Companies ecosystem. Specifically, their relentless pursuit of automation and the lockstep between data teams and business leaders is next level— and they are one of the few companies that are truly “data-driven” throughout the entire portfolio. Below is a great example of what we aspire to accomplish with data!
As for your question about "what do you think about being data driven," I think companies aspire to be data driven but they should aim to be DECISION driven instead. I think the difference is:
Decision-Driven teams search for questions worth asking. They don’t settle for the ones on hand.
Decision-Driven teams look wide first, then dive deep.
Decision-Driven teams are led by data humanists, not data scientists.
Decision-Driven teams are data dogs: they figure out what’s missing and go get it.
Decision-Driven teams explore the unknown, not only the known.
As for your question about "what do you think about being data driven," I think companies aspire to be data driven but they should aim to be DECISION driven instead. I think the difference is:
Decision-Driven teams search for questions worth asking. They don’t settle for the ones on hand.
Decision-Driven teams look wide first, then dive deep.
Decision-Driven teams are led by data humanists, not data scientists.
Decision-Driven teams are data dogs: they figure out what’s missing and go get it.
Decision-Driven teams explore the unknown, not only the known.
I wrote about this in the Data Leadership Collaborative, one of my other favorite sources of good stuff, like Scaling DataOps, about data leadership: https://www.dataleadershipcollaborative.com/data-culture/5-tips-make-data-literacy-program-stick-your-organization