Data analyst - where to start?

[Bloodrayne]

Hi all,

I've been spending a lot of time tidying/combining data from various sources and producing stats as a part of my role; using a combination of basic SQL, PowerBI and Excel to produce various reports on things (although nothing that had to predict trends, so more reporting on historic data than things for future planning).

I've found it quite interesting, and have always had a reasonable grasp of Excel, etc - so I wondered about moving into this as a more full-time career.

However, I need to retrain and get qualified in this area (as I do not have any qualifications, and have just picked up SQL, Excel, PowerBI, etc as a consequence of wanting to expand my role from it's day-to-day routine). Can anyone provide guidance on what qualifications I should be looking at, as well as any experiences of working as an Analyst?

Thanks!

 

[Bloodrayne]

Thanks all - that's really useful feedback to have; for either of the roles (business or data focused) I would be tempted to get some sort of formal recognition for my training as it's only a part of my current job, and the likelihood would be that I would have to move companies to pursue a career in this area - and it probably would appear better if I have something (regardless of level) that confirms training & competence in areas - from the feedback given it generally seems that SQL, Python & R would be useful.

On the two streams of analyst, this is also very useful to know - I had not thought much more than I would like to work with data more (it's a highlight of my working day currently), data science looks very intriguing - I'd be starting from scratch when it comes to qualifications (I asked recently about whether I should resit my Maths GCSE as when I did it many years ago I did not particularly cover myself in glory), but I see that the OU does an intro to mathematics concepts that then leads into data science related qualifications. I also like the look of the Udacity course - but need to work on my Python before I can go for that.

Certainly food for thought though!

 

[Bloodrayne]

Currently I take data from a few sources (internal systems, spreadsheets, databases), combine and validate these and present the findings in a clear and readable fashion with dynamic dashboards - so taking large amounts of data from various sources, ensuring that it's consistent and correct, and presenting readable/digestible summaries comes with a sense of achievement for me.

Beyond that, investigating data anomalies is of interest and certainly appeals, as does forecasting/planning based on previous data, but I've no actual experience in either so it's one thing to find things of interest, and another to see if it's something you could actually do.

 

[Bloodrayne]

That does sound interesting - I'm quite happy to be stuck behind a screen pushing out reports (it's probably a hangover from years of playing CM93/94), but developing understanding of businesses and then using that to predict potential future trends sounds fascinating too.

I guess it depends on how social the social side is, are we talking leading breakout groups/presentations? I'm comfortable when backed up by data, or with a process in mind, but less so when in more generic presentations (I prefer to think of it as I prefer to work collaboratively rather than speak at people...)

 

[Bloodrayne]

Thanks for all the feedback - I didn't realise it was such a broad term when first making the post, so this has all been very educational!

Lots to research further, but I really do appreciate the feedback given by all.