Automated data integration can significantly improve machine learning efforts by reducing the time spent on data munging tasks such as obtaining, cleaning, and preparing data for analysis. By utilizing The Modern Data Stack, which consists of third-party ingestion, a cloud data warehouse/data lake, an in-warehouse data modeling layer, and a BI tool, data scientists can streamline their ML modeling workflow and spend more time on value-adding tasks. This approach also ensures that business concepts are pre-calculated and readily available for ML modeling, reducing the need for custom software and promoting consistency across the organization.