Will ChatGPT replaces Data Analysts?

ChatGPT is making waves in the past couple of weeks in the Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning domain. A week later when ChatGPT was made available for public forbes released a catchy headline "Will ChatGPT put Data Analysts out of work?". You will get trapped in the headline if you don't read the full article. Let me make it simple for you, I have been using ChatGPT every other day for weeks now, and here are my two cents on a dollar.

Can it replace Data Analysts? In my personal opinion,

Short Answer:

Yes and NO 😊

Before I give you my side of the story let's see what is ChatGPT and what it can do?

ChatGPT is an intelligent AI tool based on Natural Language Processing (NLP) that enables you to conversate and reason with the machine, developed by OpenAI a company that specializes in AI. ChatGPT runs on a Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT) language model architecture fine-tuned by OpenAI. This type of Generative model needs training on a ridiculously huge amount of text data from books, articles, and even the internet itself, and is not prone to bias. Initially, it was introduced as free of charge for the public and recently OpenAI introduced ChatGPT plus under a paid subscription model which is claimed to be an enhanced version of ChatGPT including:

• Uninterrupted access to ChatGPT, even in peak hours.

• Low latency.

• priority access to new features and enhancements.

which is available at the price tag of $20/month. You can still use the freemium version but there is no guarantee that you can have access all the time.

What it can do? It can 

• Answer all your questions (prone to bias).

• be your writing assistance (Essays, Emails, Letters, blog posts, articles, CV, Cover letters you name it).

• reason with you.

• solve complex math problems.

• act as a Linux terminal.

• write & debug code.

Even though it can do a lot of things for you, there are limitations to it. It can produce text based on the inputs but it can not create Ideas. It can not predict who's gonna win tomorrow's football match. It can not look up web pages (as of now) and many more.

Is ChatGPT a deal breaker?

Former founder of OpenAI - Elon Musk said "ChatGPT is scary good and we are not far off to a  dangerously strong AI". There is no doubt that ChatGPT can be a deal breaker, as many companies are integrating ChatGPT into their software tool and companies not using it currently have a fear of being left behind. According to an estimate, ChatGPT got a 100M user base in two months, which took 9 months for TikTok to reach.

My Verdict:

Even though it's true that Artificial Intelligence (AI) bears the potential to automate a lot of tasks including tasks that are performed by Data Analysts, it is far-fetched that AI will completely take over the Data Analyst role. There will be a lot of tasks that will require human intuition and interaction. Data Analysis is not only about crunching numbers but also about creativity, context, and intuition, and humans are so far the most creative and intuitive creatures that exist.

ChatGPT will certainly replace some task that Data Analyst performs i.e; repetitive reporting, graphing, and sending emails to stakeholders, but it cannot replace the part where critical thinking is required in a context of a specific problem set. The problems where creative ideas are required to improve the product.