The PRQL: Bridging the Gap Between Messy Data and Sophisticated Analytics with Jay Henderson of Alteryx

Eric Dodds 00:05
Welcome to The Data Stack Show PRQL. This is a short bonus episode where we preview the upcoming show. You’ll get to meet our guests and hear about the topics we’re going to cover. If they’re interesting to you, you can catch the full length show when it drops on Wednesday. We’re here with Jay Henderson from Alteryx. Jay, welcome to The Data Stack Show. We are thrilled to have you. Well, give us a quick background. And then tell us what you do today at Alteryx.

Jay Henderson 00:36
Hey, everybody, really great to be on the show. I’m the SVP of products here at Alteryx. I lead product design and strategy across all of the different Alteryx products. I’ve got 20 years of product experience at mostly analytics companies. Before this, I was at IBM and I ran the Watson marketing division. I worked at SPSS, predictive analytics company, clear forest, a text mining company. So really spent my whole career in the analytics space, being a product guy. And so pretty excited to talk you guys through some of the things we’ve got going on here at Alteryx. And to talk about analytics, and you know, what’s happening today, and some of the things that are coming in the future.

Kostas Pardalis 01:19
That’s awesome. By the way, Jay, like, honestly, ways that I think about, like Alteryx is that it’s kind of like one of the most successful examples of like, tool like, product that’s like, no code or local code, right, as we call it, like today, but others has been doing with these, like for a while. And I think it’s like a great opportunity for us like to get deeper into that, like, why we need that? How it plays well with or doesn’t play? Well, maybe we’ll see with other tools out there, right. And those are what’s what the future looks like, in the AI world where it’s probably like, you know, like kinda like the definition of like, no code at the end, you just, you don’t even have to type. Let’s say, you can speak to your assistant there and like, do something magically. And I think we have the right person here today like to talk about these things. So I’m really, like excited about it. But how about you like what’s in your mind? And what are like a few topics that you’d love like to go deeper and go today? Yeah, I

Jay Henderson 02:28
mean, I think you said it, I think no code analytics will be really fun to talk about, particularly as a way to democratize analytics to hundreds or 1000s or 10s of 1000s of people in your organization. The scale can get really interesting and really impressive. I’m also really interested in talking a little bit about how analytics can be a team sport, and how the different people doing different types of analytics, maybe can work together. And then I’d love to dig in a little bit around generative AI and some of the exciting things that are coming down the pike based on you know, all of the crazy new algorithms that seem to be getting updated on a pretty regular basis here.

Kostas Pardalis 03:09
That’s awesome. What do you think? I think we should go and stop talking. What do you think?

Eric Dodds 03:13
Let’s do it. Let’s dig in. Alright, that’s a wrap for the prequel. The full length episode will drop Wednesday morning. Subscribe now so you don’t miss it.