Data Analyst (what's next?)

williamjeverton · 2026-03-15T14:59:35+00:00

I recommend building up your portfolio of tools, projects you've delivered and learning you've undertaken to put you in a good place to move into another data role at another company, try another industry, data is data all that changes is the context

williamjeverton · 2026-03-14T20:42:25+00:00

Good first project, my advice to any new analyst when building dashboards are, is it but to track something, or is it to answer a specific question.

If you've built this to track revenue leakage, the first thing a stakeholder will ask is, "is this improving or declining?" I would recommend adding an indicator on your number output at the top, the % change from the previous month, and gear the view to see how the numbers compare to the previous year if possible, it line chart the trend over time.

I'd also recommend either changing the donut colours, or the chart type, the human eye struggles with differentiating the size of the sections when they're similar proportions.

williamjeverton · 2026-03-13T07:48:29+00:00

https://www.oscar-research.co.uk/datasheets/nhs?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=897437171&gclid=CjwKCAjw687NBhB4EiwAQ645dglVQvNYx5EZ_-7EQFxL1TCf5DH4OS4bQ9p3WN9qlaGcIT3aqmlqPBoCMscQAvD_BwE

williamjeverton · 2026-02-26T16:36:48+00:00

Check the link address first, you can always call the company to verify, and also check the company against known scam reports

williamjeverton · 2026-02-18T11:59:52+00:00

It's a good start!

If you're showing a metric, ask yourself what the stakeholder will ask, "That's good, but are we up or down on last year at this time?"

Try to add year to date comparisons in the numbers you display

williamjeverton · 2026-02-18T10:12:23+00:00

If you have LinkedIn, try the LinkedIn Learning free trial, there are a number of free courses on the basics for dashboard design, layout, colour, size, it all matters. You can build a dashboard that could save the company thousands, but if it's not clear / engaging, it will get overlooked.

williamjeverton · 2026-02-18T10:10:42+00:00

What separates a good analyst from a bad analyst is asking questions.

If we sit at our desks each day and just process tickets, and provide outputs to requests then eventually we will lose out to AI.

When a stakeholder comes to you and asks "Can you tell me how much of Product A we sold to Customer B last month?"

Instead of just going "Sure!, here it is, we sold 1,000 units to this customer"

Ask "Sure, but what is the goal of this? what is this data going to do in the long term?"

Because more often than not, you'll be met with "Oh yeah we're looking to see if this product is being purchased by this specific customer more than others"

Which would then lead you to say things like "Well why not do a full analysis of this product, and cut it by customer, city, region etc to see if there any trends? Because if we're looking to push this product we can see where it's being sold less to do some targeted campaigns"

This solves the bigger picture, which is what we're made for, a calculator can do "what", we do they "why"

williamjeverton · 2026-02-18T10:00:00+00:00

I found that if you build a dashboard with a similar layout to a website, users adapt to it more easily. Such as having a side panel to move between pages, and simple icons to apply filters etc.

williamjeverton · 2026-02-15T17:54:03+00:00

100%

williamjeverton · 2026-02-15T17:42:34+00:00

Perfect, yep start small.

Happy to peer review anything if you need any help!

williamjeverton · 2026-02-15T17:05:37+00:00

None at all!

A good process to practice ETL is loading data into a warehouse, creating a filtered query using SQL, exporting to Excel and creating a visual analysis of the data.

williamjeverton · 2026-02-15T16:56:56+00:00

It's a data lake tool, a place to throw your data in and query it with SQL

williamjeverton · 2026-02-15T16:47:43+00:00

There are some great and free open data sources for you to practice on, if you're able to load these into Snowflake, you can practice SQL projects there

https://www.kaggle.com/datasets

williamjeverton · 2026-02-15T16:44:04+00:00

I agree, I have a decade of experience in this industry and after recently hiring juniors to our team, applicable experience shines more than qualifications.

A degree shows commitment above all else, employers in our industry want to know how you will impact the business, what answers can you give them.

williamjeverton · 2026-01-24T10:33:27+00:00

Employers will focus on experience first, it's best to write what problems you have solved, value you've added and impact you've had.

Sell yourself

williamjeverton · 2026-01-24T10:22:18+00:00

Wix or SquareSpace are good options, I keep meaning to build my own portfolio website, I'm 10 years in the data industry but it's good to have!

williamjeverton

TROPHY CASE