To me, an MBA is more about business strategy. Knowing the relevance of data to the operations of a business is vital to being an effective data scientist. Know

To me, an MBA is more about business strategy. Knowing the relevance of data to the operations of a business is vital to being an effective data scientist. Knowing when to make the call to lay off 500 people is the job of somebody with an MBA. Data scientists prepare and present the evidence in the language of business. There is crossover, of course. What many data scientists (myself included) find is that they often are excluded from meetings and conversations that provide the context for the analysis they are doing. I always tell my supervisors that it is very helpful for me to sit in on as many business strategy meetings as possible, just to listen, because it builds context around the work that I do and helps keep me properly focused. On the flip side, many involved in business strategy do not understand the nuances of analysis performed to support their business questions. There can be many reasons for that, from not being directly involved in the analysis to being excluded from data science meetings. Effective business analysis and data science requires trust between the players and that trust is built through showing an ability to deliver focused, relevant, and accurate results that support decision making. As somebody who likes to write code and dislikes sitting in tons of meetings, I tend to avoid climbing the career ladder to management positions. I'm happy in a Senior Data Scientist position. At my last job, I was being groomed for management and I never got to do any actual data science work. It was boring as hell. I made a lateral move to a different company so that I could be more hands on and work in an industry that is more fun. Now, I get to write code and build and run models every day. I also get to present the results and have a trusting relationship with the managers. As your daughter finishes school and gets some job experience, don't be too quick to suggest routes leading to business strategy and management. While it's the "top of the career ladder" at many companies, so to speak, it's not for everybody.