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Agree with TI1 that more context would be helpful, but based on the lack of context, I would suggest data engineering.
Why?
1. Because there are more jobs (companies inherently need more engineers than scientists)
2. Your experience has fewer gaps for you to become a data engineer vs a data scientist.
3. Data science requires more creativity and in my experience, the best data scientists are people who can’t imagine doing anything other than data science, because it resonates deeply with the way they think and what sort of problems excite them. For me, if you even have to ask whether you should be a scientist or an engineer, the answer is ENGINEER.
If you aren’t convinced by 3, and you think maybe deep down you are a data scientist, then I would still say to start with engineering for reasons 1 and 2, but seek opportunities to do projects that are more related to DS and analytics, or which collaborate with DS teams. If that goes well, you can gradually move into that space, and the engineering skills will serve you well!
Chief
Couple of points:
1. The career path is an individual choice. Someone else's might be diff than yours.
2. So, what is it that you want to do. Why do you not like where it's headed right now? Where do you think it's headed. These questions are to assess your self-awareness
How many YOE do you have, and quals? Do you see yourself in consulting long run?
Chief
Great. First, you're too early in your career trajectory so it's okay if you don't know/like where it's headed. Very likley your goals may change. That said, my first recommendation would be to figure out what in tech you'd want to do. Say you're 15-20 years into your career. What would you want to do at that point? If you want to be a senior executive, what type? e.g. CTO? CDO? CRO? CAO? Or Director/Snr Director/Head of strategy, operations, governance of software engineering, data analytics, digital etc. While you never know what the career may look like so far in the future, that general sense of direction can influence your present day decisions. When I started my career I wanted to be in IB. Today, 15 years into my career I want to be a Chief Data/Analytics officer at some point. Starkly different trajectory. I'm still discovering the path forward, but along the way I've taken different routes to skillset development to get to where I am today, it was not a linear path. I was a credit analyst 2 years into my career. Today, I focus on all things data analytics (nothing credit or IB related)