《《Statistics- A Key to Innovation in a Data-Centric World》.pdfVIP

The 2010 ASA Presidential Address Statistics: A Key to Innovation in a Data-Centric World! Sastry G. PANTULA Note : The video of this address is available at http://www. companies, and government agencies as examples. Please re- /meetings/jsm/2010/webcasts/index.cfm. member that these are only examples, and be assured that I have the appreciation for the hard work of diverse group of statisti- 1. INTRODUCTION cians everywhere. It is a great time to be a statistician; we are needed by every 2. THE DATA TSUNAMI scientist in the world! We have a lot to be proud of. It feels like just yesterday, I was introduced to statistics, when I entered the A couple of weeks ago, I was in Slovenia, giving a workshop Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) in Kolkata. ISI’s founder, P. C. to younger statisticians about careers in statistics, and about soft Mahalanobis, had passed away a few years before I joined ISI, skills needed to succeed in addition to a strong foundation in but his refrain that statistics is a key technology to solve real- core skills. It is like the three C’s Dr. Jim Goodnight, CEO of world problems, was still very much in the air and profoundly SAS and this year’s Presidential Invited Speaker, and I have impressed me. To this day, I retain my unwavering faith that been talking about that every statistician and problem solver statistics, or statistical thinking, is the real key to innovation in need: Core, Computation, and Communication skills! a data-centric world. We’