Hiring data scientists is hard. They’re hard to find since there are fewer trained than can meet demand, and it’s challenging to properly interview and vet them (especially the first in your organization). These challenges have been written about in several places, but I’ve often found a different set of concerns that have been less discussed, that are at least as challenging. 

What Kind of Data Scientist Should You Be Hiring? Data science is a broad field, encompassing individuals who spend all of their time iterating on large-scale production machine learning systems to people who primarily do offline work and visualization. They can report up through to VP Engineering, VP Product, or their own organization (up to a VP Data Science or Chief Data Officer).

Source: insidebigdata.com