Authority Magazine: Merav Yuravlivker of Data Society

“Why you should hire based on potential, not just past performance”

Original article by Tyler Gallagher appeared in Authority Magazine

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Can you share with us the ‘backstory” of how you decided to pursue this career path in AI?

My career path was not traditional. I started my career as a teacher in New York City Public Schools and spent several years in the classroom. While I saw tremendous growth in my students, I wanted to make an impact beyond a single classroom. Next, I worked at the International Baccalaureate Organization, training teachers and developing online training programs.

A few years after that, I was thinking about broadening my impact again and that’s when I met one of my co-founders, Dmitri Adler. He had spent his career on Wall Street, drowning in data and Excel spreadsheets. In the process of looking at more efficient ways to do his work, he discovered a way to condense several weeks of work into an afternoon by building an automated script. I knew that I was looking to take my impact to the next level and this conversation sparked my interest. He had already been working with our third co-founder, John Nader, who is now our COO and general counsel, to build the strong foundations of our company.

Even though I didn’t know much about data science, I started coming in after work and on the weekends to learn how to program and design the best practices for our student experience, which is the cornerstone of who we are. Six months later, I quit my full-time job.

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