How to get a job in Data Analytics
I’ve been asked some variation of “What can I do to get a job in Data Analytics?” many times from folks of all different backgrounds — people who have yet to learn their first relevant skills, students pursuing a degree, new grads, people trying to pivot from another field. (Keep scrolling for advice specific to each group.)
Here is the advice I give them.
For everyone
Read on for more tips specific to your background, whether you haven’t started to learn the skills or you are still a student or a new grad or you are trying to pivot from a different career.
If you haven’t started yet
You’ve heard that “data science is the sexiest job of the 21st century” or “it’s easy to get a high-paying work-from-home job as a data analyst if you just learn a few skills.” (I disagree that it’s easy.) Whatever piqued your interest, you want or are considering a career in data. But how do you get there if you have no relevant skills, experience, or training?
I would start with spreadsheets. Excel or Google Sheets. Try to solve some of your own problems with data: Build a personal budget. Track your debt or investments. Create a fitness schedule and log your workouts. Download the data from your smartwatch and try to answer questions.
If you can figure out how to get value from data for yourself, then that’s a good sign. Next step, check out my roadmap for data analytics.
If you’re a current college student
In terms of majors, statistics, computer science, and mathematics are generally the ones recruiters and hiring managers target the most, although they’ll usually consider students from any STEM, quantitative, or even business-focused major. Regardless of your major, I recommend taking a statistics course, a programming course, and a course focused on databases, including querying (via SQL).
In addition to taking the right courses, make sure you take them seriously. Try to learn as much as you can and make sure you understand what you’re learning. Don’t just try to get good grades, try to get true knowledge.
Also make sure you are doing your best work during projects — not just for a good grade, but for your portfolio.
Do something else in addition to your coursework. I’ve interviewed intern candidates — they are all taking the exact same courses, learning the exact same concepts, and sometimes doing the exact same assignments and projects. Even if you have straight A’s — that’s not going to stand out. You need something outside of the classroom: Join a student organization and get a leadership role. Do research with your professors. Even getting an unrelated customer service or campus job can help — it will give you opportunities to solve problems and demonstrate initiative, which is what will help you to stand out.
And when the time comes — do an internship. This is the best way to get relevant experience before you graduate. Also, any internship is going to be better than no internship, so if you have to settle for something that doesn’t have “data” in the title, do it anyway. You’ll learn other skills that are going to be valuable when you land your first full-time role.
If you’re a new grad
If you finished your college degree, and you’re struggling to land a job because you lack experience, what options do you have? You could go get another degree, but you’ll likely find yourself in the same spot — well-educated, but lacking experience.
If you can’t get experience via a job, look for other options to get experience.
- Do your own projects and build up a portfolio.
- Attend “hack nights” where you can work on projects in groups. (Something like this.)
- Contribute to open-source projects.
- Participate in competitions (like the WiDS annual datathon or check out Driven Data).
- Participate in community projects like Tableau Community Projects.
- Reach out to your past professors to see if you can do research with them.
- Reach out to your university to see if they have any projects partnering with local businesses or non-profit organizations that you can contribute to.
- Join the National Student Data Corps and participate in projects.
- Volunteer with a group like DataKind or Delta Analytics or Viz for Social Good.
Also, consider a job that isn’t “Data Analyst” or “Data Scientist” or has “Analytics” in the title. For one thing, companies use all sorts of titles for the same type of work, so also search for things like:
- Decision Science or Decision Support
- Business Intelligence
- Reporting, Insights, Metrics
- Experimentation
- Machine Learning
- Applied Scientist or Research Scientist
- Also search by skills — SQL, Python, Tableau, Power BI, statistics, predictive modeling, hypothesis testing, etc.
But you might need to expand your search beyond that as well and consider starting your career in a role that isn’t 100% focused on data. It is still an opportunity to develop other relevant, transferable business skills (that you are likely lacking which is why you’re struggling to land a job). The upside is, there are tons of corporate jobs outside of the analytics and data science teams that still have access to data and thus opportunities for you to develop experience solving problems with data. Consider targeting roles in Client Support or Account Management or IT Project Management or Tech Sales.
If you’re trying to pivot from another job
This was how I made my way into data. I used to work in marketing.
If you currently have a job, look for opportunities to get your hands on data. Use that as an opportunity to learn tools like Excel or Tableau/Power BI or even SQL or Python, and also as a way to gain experience extracting value from data. What questions do you have? Try to answer them. What problems is your company or team trying to solve? Try to use the data for guidance or insights. It doesn’t have to be anything advanced at first. Before I was moved into my first analytics role, I was really only using Excel. But I was able to answer questions and provide value to my boss and my departmentf.
Even if you think your lack of credentials will be an issue — having real-world experience using data to solve problems, no matter the tools you use, is the most valuable thing you can have on your resume. However, if you are employed, you can look into employer benefits like tuition reimbursement or a continuing education budget to get training in the skills you lack.
Next, update your resume and LinkedIn profile for the job you want, not the job you have. Focus on the relevant skills and experience that are necessary for the roles you’re going after.
Need more help?
I occasionally do resume and LinkedIn reviews as well as mentoring & coaching.
I also have lots more career advice in this blog as well as my newsletter and social media listed below.
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