The Art of Analytics Team Building
The Two Islands of Data Analytics
Imagine two islands lying side by side, yet worlds apart. On one island reside the domain experts - forestry specialists who understand the subtle rhythms of tree growth, financial analysts who can sense market movements before they materialize, or medical researchers who intuitively grasp the complexity of the human body. On the adjacent island are the programmers and data engineers, wielding powerful technical tools but often lacking the deep domain understanding needed to apply them meaningfully.
For years, organizations have attempted to bridge these islands with translators, project managers, and endless requirements documents. Yet the gap persists. Ideas get lost in translation. Mental models remain trapped in the minds of experts. And powerful analytics capabilities sit underutilized.
At Eichen Lernen, we’ve discovered a different path - not building a bridge between islands, but teaching inhabitants of both to venture into new territory together.
When Domain Experts Become Creators
Thomas, a senior forester at the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, had grown frustrated. He needed to add additional capabilities to the carbon budget model, but the IT team’s implementation lacked critical nuances.
“I would try to explain the complexities of forest carbon dynamics,” he told us, “but somehow those details always got lost.”
Through our coaching program, Thomas learned to translate his expertise directly into code. Within three months, he created a prototype that captured complexities his team had been unable to implement for years. But something even more remarkable happened—the prototype became a communication tool. When technical teams saw Thomas’s work, they immediately understood his mental model in a way that meetings and documents had never achieved.
Today, Thomas’s prototype has evolved into a robust operational system managed jointly by domain experts and programming teams. The code he wrote serves as the “constitution” around which expanded capabilities are built, maintaining the integrity of his domain expertise while leveraging the engineers’ ability to scale and optimize.
Key Elements of Successful Analytics Teams
While every organization’s journey is unique, we’ve identified core elements that enable effective analytics team building:
- Skill Development with Purpose – Technical training for domain experts must be immediately applicable to their specific challenges
- Small Wins First – Initial projects should deliver quick value while building confidence
- Psychological Safety – Creating environments where experts feel comfortable as novice programmers
- Technical Partnership – Engineers must see domain experts as collaborators rather than “clients”
How We Help Transform Your Teams
We begin with simple pair programming sessions—sitting alongside your domain experts as they take their first steps into coding. These sessions rapidly evolve into more sophisticated development as confidence builds. Throughout this journey, we:
- Help domain experts translate their mental models into appropriate code structures
- Guide engineers in collaborating with and supporting domain expert developers
- Advise leadership on fostering this collaborative culture
The results go beyond better analytics. Organizations develop a new shared language—one where domain knowledge flows freely into technical implementation, and where the artificial barriers between “business” and “technical” teams dissolve.
Ready to transform how your organization builds analytics capabilities? Let us show you how domain experts can become creators, and how your technical teams can amplify rather than translate their expertise.