Letter From Jacky

“We meet in an hour of change and challenge,
In a decade of hope and fear,
In an age of both knowledge and ignorance. 
The greater our knowledge increases, the greater our ignorance unfolds.”
— President John F. Kennedy, “Moonshot” Speech, 1962

When I started Data With Style in 2020, the goal was to leverage my skills to consult on interesting projects and help missions and organizations and ideas that align with my values. I have the privilege of being selective about what type of projects Data With Style takes on, and so I think it’s important to be upfront about where I stand because it’s a two-way street.

I love what I do because I feel like I’m doing my part to build a more representative world.

Data With Style will always be a tech consulting company for zero-to-one projects, R&D, startup solutions, data-driven decision making, executive advising, and more.

As someone who grew up feeling invisible in the data because my categories were never an option, I think of the full spectrum and project end-to-end when guiding programs and cross-functional teams.

If your organization has similar values and would like to hire Data With Style, I have a project team I can call upon for both creative and technical work.

• I believe that people are sometimes given incomplete data to make decisions on–but they might not even realize it because the nuances of that data were not even captured to begin with. We need to help each other understand the nuances of data for a complete story.
• I’m a feminist. Somewhere along the way, it feels like this word became bad, and so I think it’s important for me to call that out here. Equality takes all of us.
• I’ve always advocated for gay marriage and LGBTQIA+ rights. The harmonious world we could have if we didn’t spend energy trying to disenfranchise each other due to our own internal discomfort.
• I believe that you can be against anti-Semitism and against the dehumanizing treatment of Palestinians in Gaza; that caring about Ukrainians doesn’t make you care about Sudan or Afghanistan or other human rights violations less.
• I believe that diverse teams are strong teams. Diversity makes us stronger, and diversity can come in the form of diversity of life experiences–it’s not just about how visible we appear on the outside. We all have skills to contribute to harmonious teamwork but might need some help realizing it.
• I believe in reproductive freedom and education, independent journalism, rank choice voting, universal healthcare, a livable minimum wage, collaboration not competition, that immigrants do not exist in a silo, climate change and environmental protections cannot be ignored, anti-racism, anti-hate, anti-genocide–you get the idea by now, hopefully!

• That building relationships and improving your communities won’t happen overnight. Our society is a constant work in progress, and it can feel defeating or even exhausting when it seems like we’re in a sprint with no end in sight.
• That there’s so much to fix, it might seem easier to disconnect from the impacts of what’s going on or accidentally fall into a trap of misdirecting blame. Data With Style will always try to connect the human component to the technical.
• That none of us are experts in everything–but we could at least be committed to learning, working together, and improving each day. As long as we prioritize understanding over “being right”, we should be able to grow better together.
• We each have skills to share that can help others, and Data With Style’s blog is going to share exploratory project work that could help someone else with something they’re trying to do.
• That by sharing all of this, you might not want to hire Data With Style for your project needs anymore–and that’s totally okay! You deserve to know where I stand so that you can make your own best-informed decision on whether datawithstyle.com is going to be a site you’d want to spend time on or support. If we are not the team for you, I wish you lots of luck in your search and hope your projects are kind to you!

If you’re still here and you’re still down with me, thank you for being you!

Good leadership is about communicating authentically and serving as a profile of courage–especially when others do not have the privilege to do so. 

We are ending 2024 in our hour of change and challenge, and there is much uncertainty on the horizon. While I will still gladly share exploring data concepts using the love and joy of Eurovision on the blog, Data With Style will always be ready to pivot and meet the moment as needed. I will do my best to communicate through chaos, and I’m grateful for your support.

Love,
Jacky