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IBM Watson Explorer Consultants

If you found this post then you are probably thinking about hiring an IBM Watson Explorer Consultant. There are a few considerations you need to make before deciding which consultant you would want to hire. First, you could always go to IBM for consulting. I've seen IBM charge up to $320 per hour for a Senior WEX Architect though. So I don't want you to get the idea that you will find someone for $60 an hour. You're not looking for a typical java or web developer, you want someone with real-world experience with IBM Watson Explorer projects.

So what kind of skills are we looking for when it comes to a Watson Explorer Consultant or Developer? Well, it does help to have a little bit of a web development background, especially if you are deploying Watson Explorer Application Builder. First, you need to think about which components from IBM Watson Explorer you would like to deploy: Foundational or Analytical components. When you search for skills you will likely find that these two skills are not really that interchangeable. There are experts at foundational or analytical components because these two components were actually separate products before IBM put them together under the IBM Watson Explorer moniker.

IBM Watson Explorer Foundational Components Consultants

I'm going to talk mostly about the skillset needed for WEX Foundational components. That would cover the IBM Watson Explorer Engine and IBM Watson Explorer Application Builder. There are numerous considerations you could make but always start out with experience. There are consultants out there that worked for IBM and managed hundreds of WEX projects. Then there are the ones who have taken a few online courses and call themselves consultants. You really want to work with someone who has experience with the actual product you will be deploying.

Besides experience, there are some skills that you will want to look for on a resume. I'm going to give you a bulleted list so you can quickly grab these and scan for them.
  • XML
  • XSL
  • XSLT
  • XPATH
  • HTML
  • CSS
  • Ruby and/or Ruby on Rails
  • SQL
  • JavaScript (front-end/client-side)
  • Experience with your specific data sources (example: SharePoint) 
  • Advanced search engine functionality 
  • Understanding of data structures and taxonomies
  • Windows/Linux experience (based on your architecture)
  • Experience with multi-server architecture
  • Experience with highly available infrastructure (if needed)
Those are just some of the skills you will want to look for but I cannot stress enough that experience is the major factor you want to look at. WEX is a highly complex software and the only way to really get good with it is years of practice. That's why we typically recommend trying to find someone with 10 years of experience if you can. We've worked with consultants that have built massive Watson Explorer implementations in a variety of industries with great success.

Just keep in mind the figure we mentioned before: $320 per hour. You can go to IBM if you want to pay that rate and you will receive quality consulting at a cost. However, there are other highly experienced Watson Explorer Consultants out there that have worked with IBM for multiple years and can get you started for as little as $120 per hour. These consultants may even have more experience than the current IBM team does. Don't pay double just for the brand name.

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