I enjoyed watching True Detective. The issue with movies and similar content is that they provide you the information as the story progresses. Detectives’ main issue was the lack of information, which they discovered by investigating deeper. In each iteration they included the new information and used their hunches to proceed further. Data analytics consultants and other data professionals need to have a detective’s mindset, though the steps and approaches are different to some degree.

Detective work usually resumes in finding the time and cause of death, the suspects (who crossed the path with the victim during the time the crime occur), finding their motives and which relationships have a boiling point, respectively finding signs that bring the suspect close to the victim during the last moments.

There’s no free lunch, so one needs to know how to adapt the questions to the problem at hand. Getting the facts and the overall picture right is the first step. Being able to formulate and test hypotheses would be the next step. Being able to mix both approaches can help in certain situations.

It’s hard to believe that the quote is from Einstein. It’s too complex formulated compared to other verified quotes (see: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein#Disputed)