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Howard van Rooijen Howard van Rooijen

Data Week

New big data technologies bring new possibilities. Azure Synapse Analytics, Azure Purview, Azure Databricks, Spark, Power BI, DAX, and Machine Learning are transforming how organisation approach building and governing modern data platforms to unlock the potential of data, information and actionable insights.

Does this change mean that all previous skills, knowledge, IP, and experience has to be thrown away, or can existing investments be reused? What does the career pathway look like for DBAs, data engineers, Business Intelligence specialists? Does everyone now have to learn Python, Scala, Spark, Parquet and Notebooks, or is there some longevity with exiting SQL, PowerShell and C# skills?

Can business analysts use these tools to reduce time to insights and break free of the limitation of Excel and SQL Server Management Studio to obtain answers to business questions? Will these modern data platforms create entirely new job roles?

Do these tools help break down the silos across organisations to allow different personas to collaborate on data and insights in a way they haven't been able to before? And most importantly, will these advancements enable to better outcomes for the end users who don't really care about details, but just want information they can trust in order to drive decision making?

These topics and more are discussed by a panel of Microsoft MVPs including endjin co-founder Howard van Rooijen.