'Average data scientist' — Digest 19, 2026
Your weekly overview of interesting reads, events and jobs for the experimental mind.
Hi folks, a couple of days late this week, still finding my rhythm. Thanks for your patience. Voting for the Experimentation Thought Leadership Awards closes this Friday. If you haven't yet, I'd appreciate your vote. Now, on to this week's reads. Enjoy!
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🔎 Interesting things you might have missed
A decade of being an average data scientist
Random Reddit user — Honest perspective of someone not at FAANG, no PhD, not working with cutting-edge tech. Just a decade of real impact through clear communication, curiosity, and bar charts. A refreshing reminder that being useful beats being brilliant. READ
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What changes when you run more experiments?
By Jakub Linowski — Jakub created this interactive simulator showing how test volume compounds into cumulative lift. More experiments means more winners get a chance to ship. PLAY
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Live user-on-page activity
By Randy Au — I have had my share of debates with colleagues on why they needed real-time data with live user tracking. Looks impressive in demos but never really delivered value. READ
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Taken
A web page that tells you what websites can track and often will, without asking.
EXPERIENCE
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Submit Your Case: Experimentation Heroes 2026
Three categories: Conversion, Experimentation Culture, and Beyond Web. New quick-entry process takes just 20 minutes. Shortlist deadline June 26. SUBMIT
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A review of experiments with synthetic users
By Jim Lewis & Jeff Sauro — 12 peer-reviewed papers, show one thing: synthetic users correlate with humans but fail on variance, subgroups, and depth. Use it for directional signals, not critical decisions. READ
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Last week’s favourite:
Experimentation Thought Leadership Awards 2026
By Kameleoon — Voting is open until May 15th across five categories: Thought Leader of the Year, UX Expert, Cultural & Community Architect, Data & Analytics Innovator, and AI Evangelist. Winners announced May 27th. VOTE
🚀 Job opportunities
Find 681 open roles on ExperimentationJobs.com. This week’s featured roles:
Senior Front-end Developer (Experimentation) at Creative CX (London, United Kingdom)
Director of Conversion Rate Optimization at LawnStarter (USA - Remote)
Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) Specialist at Glass Atlas (Manchester, United Kingdom)
Product Manager – Experimentation & Growth at Conversionista! (Stockholm or Gothenburg, Sweden)
Digital Conversion Manager at Rabobank (Utrecht, Netherlands)
📅 Upcoming events
A running list of upcoming events. Subscribe here. (👋= join me, 🎁= discount)
20 May: Experimentation London #11 (London, UK)
22 May: TLC | NoHacks panel: Brand trust, AI, and what’s breaking with Wil Reynolds, Juliana Jackson, Sani Manić, and Kelly Wortham (online)
🔥26 May: Deadline entering entry for Experimentation Elite Awards
👋28 May: Optimization Meetup Utrecht (Utrecht, Netherlands)
🎁1 Jun: Accelerating Innovation with A/B Testing with Ronny Kohavi (online,
$1,999$1,749 USD)10 Jun: Best in Test Awards (online)
🎁15 Jun: Advanced Topics in Practical A/B Testing with Ronny Kohavi (online,
$1,199$999 USD)🆕23 Jun: Causal Summit (online)
16 Jul: Experimentation Culture Awards (online)
24 Sep: Experimentation Elite Awards (London, UK)
🆕5 Nov: Experimentation Heroes (Amsterdam, Netherlands)
😃 Something that made me smile
This live experiment by Chris Gibbins clearly shows that you need to focus ideation sessions on actual problems. Don’t start with solutions.
When you’re ready, here’s how I can help
If this newsletter sparked something and you want to talk it through, a few ways I help:
Scale experimentation
Strategy, setup, metrics, and ways of working for teams that want more impact.Careers and hiring
Support with your next role, or help finding and hiring strong experimenters.Quick sparring
A fresh outside perspective on your ideas, roadmap, or experimentation setup.
Interested?
Just hit reply and tell me what you’re thinking about.
Have a great week — and keep experimenting.
Thanks, Kevin