Kamil is an Econometrician by trade, turned Quant, turned Data Scientist. He started in the asset management industry, then made a transition to Uber to finally join Tidio. Although his day-to-day tasks are very diversified, he likes to emphasize that "a piece of analysis is as good as its understanding by product and business stakeholders." In his spare time, he would either watch a Formula 1 GP or try to make a profit on his algorithmic trading side hustle.
What does "Grow with Tidio" mean to you?
Tidio has a very unique approach to people. Unlike most companies, it gives you a lot of freedom and ownership since day one. In my case, it means that I am accountable for the final decision on the approach, methodology, or algorithm to use to solve the given problem. More senior people act as sparring partners, but they do not own the decision. Such an attitude motivates people to learn and explore the frontiers of their respective domain expertise.
What do you do in Tidio? What does your day look like?
Certainly, there's no typical day at Tidio, but if I were to approximate, it usually starts at 10 a.m. or later (as I am a night owl) with a cup of coffee and a quick review of my Team tasks for the day, together with updating rest of Data peers on what I am up to. We care about efficiency, and we do not run daily stand-ups; instead, we update each other in an asynchronous way via Slack thread (which is super flexible). I would then dive into one of my day-to-day activities, which are connected with causality and experimentation. This usually involves either literature review or hands-on data investigation. I am also in charge of driving AB tests, which consists of daily monitoring or writing a review for product stakeholders.
At Tidio, we can work 100% remotely, and we also have access to our two offices in Szczecin and Warsaw. What is your favorite way of working?
What I believe is really important in Tidio is a remote-first approach and (what often could be missed by people outside the company hearing about showers or meditation sessions between daily meetings) the approach to accountability. At Tidio, you are encouraged to work whenever and wherever it suits you best, and you are evaluated by the outcome instead of the "face time" or attendance to unnecessary meetings. That said, although I love going to our office in the heart of Warsaw, I often feel the urge to stay home for a late morning or a brisk walk in the park at 3 o'clock, and it is totally manageable.
What 3 words would you use to describe Tidio to someone?
Growth, ownership, impact - growth is the single most important thing peers and managers would emphasize when it comes to personal development, while the impact and ownership generally describe two most important dimensions of our work here.
What is your favorite part of your role?
My favorite part of the role is the ability to affect the product and the strategy by keeping a very high technical bar for the work I do. It is often the case that technical skills are hard to translate into a decision-making process affecting 500 million people per day, and when you work as Data Scientists, it is part of your job. I like the perspective that the role is where science and digital product strategy meet.
What's a common myth/misconception about your professional field that you'd like to bust?
The most common misconception of Data Scientists is the way in. To be exceptionally good and impactful at your work, you have to master the statistical fundamentals first. When you do not know how to code - you can always make your way through the brute force approach, but if you are missing the intuition or knowledge of key statistical concepts, you will code a working prototype, but based on the wrong assumptions, which is definitely more severe to business, than no solution at all.
