# Shopify's Unique Data Science Hierarchy Of Needs

DevFeed: [Shopify's Unique Data Science Hierarchy Of Needs](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/shopify-s-unique-data-science-hierarchy-of-needs-1610.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://shopify.engineering/shopify-unique-data-science-hierarchy-of-needs>)

Author: Phillip Rossi

Published: 2021-12-21T18:32:40Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Shopify Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/shopify-engineering.md>), [Shopify Engineering - Shopify Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/shopify-engineering-shopify-engineering.md>)

Topics: [Data Science](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/data-science.md>), [Shopify](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/shopify.md>), [Logging](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/logging.md>), [Artificial Intelligence](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/ai.md>), [Deep learning](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/deep-learning.md>)

Tags: [ai](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ai.md>), [data-science](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/data-science.md>), [deep-learning](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/deep-learning.md>), [logging](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/logging.md>), [shopify](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/shopify.md>)

## AI overview

Shopify presents a tool-agnostic Data Science Hierarchy of Needs that prioritizes business impact and simple solutions before more advanced technologies. The article explains how this approach helped Shopify use data science to understand and respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.

## Source excerpt

You've probably seen the "Data Science Hierarchy of Needs" (pictured below) before. Inspired by Maslow, it shows the tooling you would use at different levels in data science--from logging and user-generated content at the bottom, to AI and deep learning at the very top. While hierarchies like this one can serve as helpful guides, at Shopify, we don't think it always captures the whole picture. For one, it emphasizes particular tools over finding the best solution to a given problem.