Book Review – Humanizing Data Strategy by Tiankai Feng

This book was making its rounds on social media, and the concept seems interesting enough to make me want to read it. It’s a very short book (only 106 pages), but a pleasant read. It focuses on the people side of a data strategy, instead of focusing on technology and tools as sometimes many of us do.

The author introduces the 5C model: Competence, Collaboration, Communication, Creativity and Conscience. Each “C” gets its own chapter, where the first three make up the bulk of the book.

There are certainly some interesting concepts in the book, such as the follow the pain methodology. You can use it when you interview people when you’re looking for problems your data strategy might solve. People with the biggest pains will be very pleased to work with the data team, as it will mean their pain will be reduced.

The book finishes with a questionnaire, where each topic gets its own set of questions that you can ask yourself or your organization, to assess how well you are implementing the “human side” of your data strategy.

I can definitely recommend this book, as it’s refreshing to read and it’s a nice change of pace from all those technical books.