{"id":4562,"date":"2025-05-20T11:37:54","date_gmt":"2025-05-20T11:37:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/editorial.buluttan.com\/?p=4562"},"modified":"2025-07-07T15:17:05","modified_gmt":"2025-07-07T15:17:05","slug":"kourosh-sharifi-small-talks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/editorial.buluttan.com\/?p=4562","title":{"rendered":"Small Talks with Kourosh Sharifi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Not Just a Forecast: The Work Behind the Weather\" width=\"750\" height=\"422\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8mtSxMG08IY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Buluttan Small Talks \/ Kourosh Sharifi<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>G\u00f6kmen:<\/strong><br>Today we\u2019re here with Kourosh. Hi Kourosh, we\u2019d like to get to know you as much as possible.\u00a0<strong>Who is Kourosh? How did he meet <a href=\"https:\/\/www.buluttan.com\">Buluttan<\/a>? What is his approach to weather intelligence as a data scientist or aspiring data scientist?<\/strong>Maybe you can also share some suggestions for those interested in the field. But first\u2014<strong>who is Kourosh, and what does his name mean?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Kourosh:<\/strong><br>My name is Kourosh. I was born in Tehran, Iran, and I moved to Turkey about four years ago. My name comes from Cyrus the Great, the Persian king. In Persian, it&#8217;s known as&nbsp;<strong>\u201cKurosh-e Bozorg.\u201d<\/strong>&nbsp;The name carries meanings like \u201cflowing from the source of the sun.\u201d My father admired Cyrus, so he suggested the name. After moving to Turkey, I enrolled in the computer science program at Sabanc\u0131 University and took mathematics as my minor. I\u2019m currently majoring in computer science and minoring in mathematics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I also co-founded&nbsp;<strong>Kai Sabanc\u0131<\/strong>, the university\u2019s first AI club. During my studies, I worked on several research projects. One of them was on reinforcement learning with professors from Yale. More recently, a friend and I published our graduation project on&nbsp;<strong>keyword spotting in Ottoman documents<\/strong>, focusing on image processing. I\u2019m now working part-time at&nbsp;<strong>Buluttan<\/strong>&nbsp;as a member of the data science team. We\u2019re focused on energy projects, using data science and our tools to forecast weather and power generation. We carry out various R&amp;D efforts to help our partners access more accurate forecasts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>G\u00f6kmen:<\/strong><br>So, how did the son of the sun meet the sons of the clouds?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Kourosh:<\/strong><br>Great question. One day while checking internship announcements in my inbox, I saw the name&nbsp;<strong>Buluttan<\/strong>. Funny enough, I had recently been talking with my friend&nbsp;<strong>Tansylu<\/strong>, who also works at Buluttan\u2014you\u2019ve probably seen her. She spoke very highly of the company and encouraged me to apply. At first, I actually applied for a data engineering role. But after my interviews with&nbsp;<strong>G\u00fcven, Alihan<\/strong>, and others on the data team, they steered me toward data science. And that\u2019s how I joined the team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>G\u00f6kmen:<\/strong><br>Great to have you here. How do you spend your time?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Kourosh:<\/strong><br>Outside of classes and work, I usually focus on physical activities. I do calisthenics, some MMA training, and I used to play semi-professional basketball. When I find time, I also enjoy artistic pursuits like sketching, painting, and sometimes graphic design. Balancing these with school and work can be tough, but physical activity and health are always a priority for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>G\u00f6kmen:<\/strong><br>Your work at Buluttan seems like a mutual relationship\u2014<strong>the happier and more successful you are, the more the company empowers you.<\/strong>&nbsp;How has your experience been so far?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Kourosh:<\/strong><br>I really enjoy working here\u2014not just for the sake of data science or being on the AI team, but because the challenges we tackle are genuinely engaging. At my age and experience level, it\u2019s rare to be exposed to this kind of work. If you\u2019re an undergraduate student looking to&nbsp;<strong>really test your skills<\/strong>, work on cutting-edge problems, and see your work make a difference for real users and companies, Buluttan is a great place. You have to get your hands dirty\u2014there are&nbsp;<strong>complex problems with no single solution<\/strong>. The projects aren\u2019t easy, but that makes them rewarding. It\u2019s far more satisfying than working on something easy but dull. So yes, I highly recommend Buluttan to those interested in this space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>G\u00f6kmen:<\/strong><br>What would you suggest to students at Sabanc\u0131 or other universities, or to anyone considering applying to Buluttan?&nbsp;<strong>Any advice for those interested in weather intelligence or climate adaptation?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Kourosh:<\/strong><br>First, you really need to be interested in the field. Just liking AI or machine learning isn\u2019t enough\u2014you can\u2019t just show up and reuse a model you applied once in a project. You need&nbsp;<strong>domain knowledge<\/strong>, you need to&nbsp;<strong>understand the problem<\/strong>, and you need to be able to&nbsp;<strong>reason through how to solve it<\/strong>. All of this requires passion and commitment. Whether it\u2019s weather forecasting, energy prediction, or another subfield\u2014if you&#8217;re not genuinely interested, this might not be for you. But if you\u2019re passionate and determined to keep learning, then the path opens up for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>G\u00f6kmen:<\/strong><br>Sounds challenging, but definitely not intimidating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Kourosh:<\/strong><br>Yes, at first the workload may seem overwhelming. But once you dive in, you realize it&#8217;s not as difficult to navigate as it looks from the outside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>G\u00f6kmen:<\/strong><br>Kourosh, thank you for joining this episode of&nbsp;<strong>Small Talks at Buluttan<\/strong>. It\u2019s great to have you on the team. And as we always say to close\u2014<strong>&#8220;Havan\u0131z yerinde olsun!&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Kourosh:<\/strong><br>Thank you, I really appreciate it.&nbsp;<strong>Havan\u0131z yerinde olsun!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>G\u00f6kmen:Today we\u2019re here with Kourosh. Hi Kourosh, we\u2019d like to get to know you as much as possible.\u00a0Who is Kourosh? How did he meet Buluttan? What is his approach to weather intelligence as a data scientist or aspiring data scientist?Maybe you can also share some suggestions for those interested in the field. But first\u2014who is&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/editorial.buluttan.com\/?p=4562\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Small Talks with Kourosh Sharifi<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4558,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[6],"class_list":["post-4562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","tag-en","entry"],"acf":{"h1_tag":"Small Talks with Kourosh Sharifi"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Small Talks with Kourosh Sharifi - Buluttan Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In this episode of Buluttan\u2019s Small Talks series, we spoke with Kourosh from the data science team about his journey from education to weather intelligence, his experience at Buluttan, and his advice for aspiring data scientists.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Small Talks with Kourosh Sharifi - 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