Sophie's Data Orchard

Data Scientist Job Market Research (2026) - by my first agent Compiled: 2026-08-06 1. Data Scientist Job Requirements: 2026 vs. 2025 — AI Knowledge on the Rise Clear, sharp increase in AI/GenAI requirements. Core skill shifts (2025 → 2026) SQL remains the #1 most-demanded skill both years — unchanged. Communication moved up to #2, now ranked above Python — companies increasingly want data scientists who can explain findings, not just build models. Python slipped from #2 to #3 in ranking (still essential, just relatively less differentiating). ML skills required in 77% of postings in 2026. The big AI-knowledge jump NLP demand : 5% of postings (2024) → 19% (2025) → NLP mentions up 155% year-over-year — one of the fastest-growing technical asks. Generative AI / LLMs / prompt engineering : mentioned in 31% of data scientist postings in 2026 , up from effectively 0% in 2023 . This is the single starkest change in the market. MLOps now appears in ~8% of postings, reflecting demand fo...

Intro I've been learning to use Claude Code for data science projects, and my first real test was building a simple agent from scratch — starting with a CLAUDE.md file that defines how the agent should behave. Along the way I hit a classic gotcha (files quietly saving to a temp folder instead of my project directory), fixed it, and then put the whole setup through a real research task. Here's what I learned. Building a Simple Agent with Claude Code (VS Code) The prompt is saved in a CLAUDE.md file, with the following content: # try to build an agent ## Project Context This is an AI agent playground. ## About me I'm a DS, I'm learning to use Claude Code for DS projects. ## Rules - Always ask clarifying questions before starting a complex task - Show your plan and steps before execution - Keep reports and summaries concise — bullet points over paragraphs - Save all reports to the output folder - Cite sources when doing research ## Project Structure - `resources/` -- r...