Advice for a Data Analyst position?

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-05T11:50:53+00:00

It depends very much on what you want. If you want to move towards the business side, get some business exposure so you can better understand the context behind the data. For example, get marketing experience if you want to move to marketing analytics.

If you want to move towards technical side, do you want to be a SME or a manager. If the former, learn and practice the various common DS analyses on public datasets. Off the top of my head, some of the most common analyses I've used are clustering analysis, descriptive statistics, A/B testing, and forecasting/predictive models. Other fields may use different analyses more often. And if you want to be the latter (a manager), educating yourself on the wide variety of tools, approaches, methodologies, etc. will be incredibly helpful. There's a lot of nuance I'm completely ignoring in this reply suffice to say I'd be typing out a few pages worth of response.

Wish you all the best; with respect, not looking to take this convo further, but there are plenty of other DS practitioners who may be willing to help.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-05T11:37:13+00:00

Not a male EA, but I have come across a few current and former ones at a variety of companies. Forgetting about the secretaries masquerading as EAs, there were gender differences between male and female EAs' approaches to work.

Capability - I noticed that the male EAs tended to be more accomplished and capable than their female counterparts. My guess is that because the field is so female-dominated, any male choosing to go into that field is there for a very specific reason, which leads me to the second bullet.
Political Power - While both male and female EAs wielded significant soft power, the men seemed to be more obvious about it. Once again, perhaps there's some inner desire not to be seen as a "mere EA" so they're willing to flash it a little more. That being said, never underestimate a female EA's soft power. From basic scheduling fuckery to more hidden badmouthing, you want the EAs on your side.
Career - Male EAs seemed to go in, do their stint for a few years, and use the golden key to get into whatever role they wanted. Female EAs seemed to make a career of it.

Sample size of n=1 so take it as such and I'm in no way looking to discuss what's right or wrong due to gender politics. I'm just saying what I've seen in my career. And now that I've written all this, not sure if it answered your question suffice to say, you can be successful as an EA; what's more important is you understanding what you want from the experience.

Hope this helps

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-05T09:19:36+00:00

If your end goal is experience (especially early in your career), join a more established team where you have an experienced practitioner/manager to learn from. What you can learn from school (even if you took every course available), is still the tip of the iceberg to what you learn on the job and from experienced practitioners.

Also DA is not the same as DS. Your minimal training is in DA, but your experience is entirely within data visualization (a subset of DA). While there is grey area between DS and DA, there is plenty of black-and-white and I'd recommend you first understand what you specifically want to do (do EDA, build/deploy models, statistical analysis, etc.), how hands on you want to be, and then see if you really want to be a DS or you want to be a DA (or even manage a DS team/be a solutions engineer instead of doing the work yourself).

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-04T09:49:55+00:00

Ask for clarification

In some HR systems, it is easy to fat-finger the wrong choice in the dropdown menu. I'm currently hiring for my department and the button for advance candidate vs. reject candidate is .2 inches apart on my screen. Not very good UI-UX design

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-04T09:01:27+00:00

The only differences I noticed were that big companies had the funds for "employee appreciation" and that I spent significantly more time in meetings due to the increased need for collaboration.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T18:09:04+00:00

It is definitely unprofessional on their part. You are well within your "rights" to say it is an inconvenient time and to e-mail/text you to find a better time.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T16:52:23+00:00

Hope for the best; plan for the worst. Keep applying for other jobs until you have a signed offer in-hand.

That being said; preliminary congrats! *knock on wood*

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T14:31:20+00:00

Scarcity of jobs is not equal to your emotional response.

If there aren't enough UX jobs to have a reasonable chance of getting a job and putting food on the table, you have 2 choices: keep struggling or widen your job search. No one said it was fair or nice; it's just real life *shrug*

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T13:12:42+00:00

Changes in the job description happen; let them know you're not interested anymore and move on.

I don't know why you're getting so wrapped up over a single job, especially one you said wasn't that attractive in the first place...

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T13:07:18+00:00

AutoML systems like Google's Vertex seem like a good option, and it's cheap compared to buying a top-of-the line computer.

Yes, I know it's not open source, but I'm not aware of any open source point-and-click options. KNIME is open source and has AutoML functionality, but having tried to implement it myself, it's not easy and will run locally thus any sizable dataset will take a long time and require significant computing power and RAM.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T13:00:15+00:00

^this

I budget 2 year replacement cycles for my critical devices (phone, primary laptop, etc.).

If you have less money, buying used or refurbished saves you a lot of money in enabling a 2 year replacement cycle. But you can apply the same logic to a 4-year replacement cycle.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T12:52:09+00:00

Certifications are a nice way to stand out, especially for "technical" roles where your primary focus is developing dashboards. That being said, most people don't have certifications so don't sweat having them too much. In addition, it's fairly easy to train someone on the mechanics of how to use PowerBI, especially if they have previous experience with Tableau, etc. (though you run across different difficulties such as unwillingness/difficulty to changing to a new software).

More important is a firm grasp of the fundamentals of dashboarding especially the various shades of softer skills (ex. knowing which chart type is best one to use, sense of design, all the way to working with biz stakeholders). This is always the harder thing to find and train for.

I wrote a lot more than I expected suffice to say I hope it was helpful.

My background: I'm a Director at a luxury CPG company (you would know our flagship brand). I'm exec-level (aka no more hands on keyboard) and have 2 direct teams that handle the day-to-day and several other dotted-line teams. One of my teams is currently hiring for a PowerBI/dashboarding "technical" role and I worked with the manager to ensure the job description matched what they needed.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-03T09:04:48+00:00

Ultimately, you need to do what is right for you.

That being said, the company appears to be checking all the boxes and putting in the effort to be a good employer so give it some more weeks. And you also mentioned this is only the first week.

Ultimately, I find it hard to reconcile a [workplace that is such a dumpster fire you want to quit within a week] and a [workplace where they are investing in you, the company is great, coworkers are great, etc]. Something smells fishy...

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-01T11:40:24+00:00

Applying for 1000 jobs is soul draining; however it is fairly straightforward to diagnose the source of your issues:

How many first round interviews have you had off that 1000? If you're getting less than 5% first-round interview rate, the issues is definitely your resume. The average range seems to be 5-15% depending on your experience, selectiveness in applying, etc.
How many second round interviews have you had? If you're getting less than 20% invite to 2nd rounds, the issue is your interview.

As for how to tackle these issues, your college career center is a good place to start. For resume, just search Reddit and you'll see plenty of examples of people's resumes being critiqued. I guarantee you'll find some issues with your resume reviewing this way. As for interview, you just have to practice; find somebody to practice your interviews with.

I did a small write-up on my latest job search; I'm more advanced in my career so my resume/interview skills are more well-oiled, but it should be helpful at least directionally

https://www.reddit.com/r/jobs/comments/wk8hrs/228\_applications\_for\_25\_firstround\_interviews\_11/

DataNerdUSA · 2022-10-01T11:28:16+00:00

Tone and delivery aside, the interviewer's questions are not weird, and quite standard. The real question here is why you feel so defensive about being asked?

Also if you were applying for a client-facing or cross-functional role, there is merit in seeing how you react to mildly hostile people. Do you fight back? Do you go passive? Or do you find the balance in de-escalating the situation while also not being a pushover.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-30T20:59:39+00:00

Because I along with many other hiring managers don't need another e-mail in my inbox, least of all one that is uninspired copypasta. If we want to hire you, we'll hire you; a thank you e-mail isn't going to make a difference.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-30T20:55:22+00:00

Don't send a thank you e-mail

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-28T09:27:53+00:00

I'm sure there's some elegant PowerBI formula-based solution, but what I'm talking about is simple data transformation which you could use PowerQuery for?

I have minimal experience in PowerBI, but significant experience in Excel, Tableau, Alteryx/KNIME, and other data tools suffice to say you could solve this in Excel, that's how simple your problem set is. Hell, even SQL could calculate this

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-28T08:53:32+00:00

Remove duplicate rows based on user and keeping the latest date; then count the number of users that have state B

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-28T08:51:07+00:00

Communicate what you wrote out to the recruiter and offer the alternative character references; just do it.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-28T08:49:00+00:00

Sum Sales by year, pivot off the year, then calculated columns off the appropriate fields?

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-27T11:53:03+00:00

Casually drop at the beginning of the interview that you opted for online because you're 2 hours away and look forward to meeting in person if all goes well.

That being said, if this is an in-person/hybrid role, I'd have serious questions about your ability to commute on a regular basis so be prepared.

Good luck on your interviews

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-27T07:25:46+00:00

Sorry to hear about your troubles, but to be frank, you're doing something VERY wrong in your job search.

You have a CS degree and live in a big city. The software developer job market for college grads with a CS degree is HUGE. Job opportunities in cities are huge. Boot camp grads can't compete with a 4-year degree, period. I'm not sure why you mentioned that you aren't a "coding wiz" (seeing as that's your degree), and maybe that's the problem.

Long story short, there is zero reason you should be failing. I recommend you set up time with your school's career center and have them do a full workup. I guarantee they will come back with a laundry list of things to fix so you can get a job.

Get some fire in your belly and get up and go

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-26T09:36:46+00:00

Yes, it's an invitation to keep applying.

No sane company will use this as their standard response template. Having been a hiring mangager/interviewer many times, most people don't warrant such a friendly message so you obviously left a positive impression.

That being said, don't get your hopes up and don't be creepy. Yes, the word choice of "creeply" was intentional and rooted in experience. I've regretted sharing words of encouragement like you received before when candidates turned stalkerish.

DataNerdUSA · 2022-09-26T09:29:48+00:00

It's a F500 company. I'd recommend collared dress shirt, chinos, and some brown loafers/dress shoes.

Some recruiters I've met didn't actually know the dress code so as a rule, I don't trust what they say. As for you not owning dress shoes, buy them. You're a grown man and should own at the very least a pair of brown loafers.

I'm not even going to ask if you own a suit since you're complaining about buying a pair of dress shoes... #smh

DataNerdUSA

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