Database qualification to study

[Gornall]

Within 8 years of graduating I was earning six figures in an architecture role after working through various BI developer positions (consultant/lead) etc.

Had to jump at some opportunities that came up and relocate but it's easily doable. It's one of those jobs that is very easy to demonstrate your ROI in. A report you knock up in an hour can save a business millions.

Exactly. By it's very nature you present impacts, it's not very difficult to switch mindset and report on 'your' impact on the business. Coupled with the fact that my roles have never been write a report and send it on email, there was always a big requirement to present the reports and work with the business to build upon and further add value.

Particularly if that report you 'knocked up in an hour' was completely of your own volition. Business user asks for X, you present X but also went on to deep-dive in to Y and Z.

 

[Gornall]

As per the above its working with SQL and SSRS however its a hybrid role involving business analyst skills too, if you're interested I'll send the advert in trust.

Send in trust, I'd be fairly interested to see it.

50k is top end round here, but it's crazy competitive to find the right person right now.

 

[dowie]

50k is top end round here, but it's crazy competitive to find the right person right now.

where about is 'round here' out of interest?

I've gotta say I was under the impression that data science roles paid at least 50k if not 60-70k as starting salaries - though I understand 'BI' type roles aren't quite data science there is presumably going to be some overlap?

 

[Gornall]

Data Science is a completely different world as far as I'm concerned and does typically fetch a higher salary. The overlap is there for sure, core languages such as SQL and a general appreciation of warehousing, data delivery etc is fundamental to both. The vocations and day-job of both is very different in my experience.

Data Science push analytics and behaviours that influence change going forwards (these are the customer we want, these behaviours are a risk etc), BI team look backwards and measures the impact of changes as they happen.

Gross oversimplification and in many businesses them roles will be one person without a doubt.

I'm based in Leeds. Starting salary for a BI developer/junior wouldn't be much above 20k, and many of our data scientists have a tonne of job experience in BI/Data roles so I've not got much knowledge on what a fresh grad would be looking at. The DS roles definitely have a much much higher ceiling. Many of our DS guys are on more than the BI Head Of/Seniors.

Personal experience only.

 

[Gornall]

snip

 

[sigma]

As per the above its working with SQL and SSRS however its a hybrid role involving business analyst skills too, if you're interested I'll send the advert in trust.

Where it based? What you've described sounds a bit more than just report writing. I am interested in hearing about the role, though I won't be applying.

Within 8 years of graduating I was earning six figures in an architecture role after working through various BI developer positions (consultant/lead) etc.

Had to jump at some opportunities that came up and relocate but it's easily doable. It's one of those jobs that is very easy to demonstrate your ROI in. A report you knock up in an hour can save a business millions.

Out of interest, were you on a grad scheme? I've seen people end up on crazy £ in less time so I know it's certainly possible.

Yes, wouldn't say it was monumental trajectory? I appreciate it was likely faster than most though.

Agreed, it's not monumental, but a good effort regardless of the time frame I was just seeking clarification.

 

[sigma]

Data Science is a completely different world as far as I'm concerned and does typically fetch a higher salary. The overlap is there for sure, core languages such as SQL and a general appreciation of warehousing, data delivery etc is fundamental to both. The vocations and day-job of both is very different in my experience.

Data Science push analytics and behaviours that influence change going forwards (these are the customer we want, these behaviours are a risk etc), BI team look backwards and measures the impact of changes as they happen.

Gross oversimplification and in many businesses them roles will be one person without a doubt.

I'm based in Leeds. Starting salary for a BI developer/junior wouldn't be much above 20k, and many of our data scientists have a tonne of job experience in BI/Data roles so I've not got much knowledge on what a fresh grad would be looking at. The DS roles definitely have a much much higher ceiling. Many of our DS guys are on more than the BI Head Of/Seniors.

Personal experience only.

A lot of data science jobs I see require a PhD (well, the job spec says that, and we all know what job specs can be like), although not as often for Big Data Architects.

 

[tom_e]

Where it based? What you've described sounds a bit more than just report writing. I am interested in hearing about the role, though I won't be applying.

It's based in Tamworth.

 

[Gornall]

Out of interest, were you on a grad scheme? I've seen people end up on crazy £ in less time so I know it's certainly possible.

Agreed, it's not monumental, but a good effort regardless of the time frame I was just seeking clarification.

No grad scheme.

The first company I was part of the collections team, they had zero reporting / BI capability and it started out as me building things on lunch purely out of interest. They gave me access to some data extracts etc as part of the role so I started doing more with them. Proved the concept and then they gave me a couple of hours a day for a month to build some reporting, this got presented to a wider part of the business, demand increased and it became my job. I was lucky that they invested in me, putting me through some SQL training, ETL development etc. Brought on a very experienced SQL/BI dev to mentor and push me along.

Sounds big headed, but it all came pretty naturally and within 3 years I was team lead for a team of 5 developers at another company which went extremely well, and the trajectory has just continued.

I started here about 18 months ago as a result of my previous employer going in to administration, very well paid ETL developer job with less responsibility...3 months ago they gave me the Data Architect role after my predecessor (who suggested me) was promoted to Head of Enterprise Architecture.

It's been pretty good going, like I say not meteoric but quick while sustainable.

 

[mid_gen]

Out of interest, were you on a grad scheme? I've seen people end up on crazy £ in less time so I know it's certainly possible.

Nope.

1 year doing tech support for ERP systems on 16k
Next year doing consultancy work on ERP/BI for same company
Next year jumped ship to startup BI firm doing consultancy
Next year joined BI team at a mobile Telco senior BI analyst developer
Next year promoted to BI lead dev.
Next year took a contract role at a bank and worked away for six months
Next role contract in the City near home for six months.
Then got offered a BI developer role contract at JPMC in HK.
Next year turned that into permanent AVP role there.

Earning pretty good money at that point, something like 120-130k in UK net terms.

Then wanted a change and went into games. Cleared all my debts and got a nice chunk of change in the bank in the process though.

Only qualifications I've had is some Business Objects Enterprise certified professional. I'm not a **** hot SQL programmer or anything, just good at bridging the gap between business and tech. If you can know the tech side and talk to director level people about their metrics you're golden.

 

[Amplus]

Bumping an old thread but interested in this.

I have a degree in Supply Chain and enjoy the data side of it. However have no experience in SQL, Python or anything other then Excel. Looking at analyst jobs they all require experience in those which I don't have and won't get through my company.

Is there a way of getting my foot in the door to get a job in this or data science?? The courses seem mega expensive as well.

 

[tom_e]

Bumping an old thread but interested in this.

I have a degree in Supply Chain and enjoy the data side of it. However have no experience in SQL, Python or anything other then Excel. Looking at analyst jobs they all require experience in those which I don't have and won't get through my company.

Is there a way of getting my foot in the door to get a job in this or data science?? The courses seem mega expensive as well.

Move sideways would be my recommendation, basic SQL is pretty easy to pick up you can get SQL server express for free and then play about in your own time. Once you've got a decent grounding start to look for mid level BI jobs then you can progress up to the more involved analytics side or into more senior BI dev roles.

 

[dowie]

I have in the past looked at doing a Master's course in computing (My degree is not in computing) it's just too costly though.

While not specific to your main query it might be worth pointing out that there is an MS Computer Science qualification available via udacity/Georgia Tech and as a result of that various modules/lectures are available freely if you want to study some aspects of it in your own time without handing over the $$$$

https://www.udacity.com/georgia-tech

and perhaps more relevant to your interest in databases and analysing data they do offer nanondegrees and there are some other short courses that might be of interest to you covering MongoDB, Hadoop etc..

https://eu.udacity.com/course/data-wrangling-with-mongodb--ud032

https://eu.udacity.com/course/intro-to-hadoop-and-mapreduce--ud617

MongoDB offer courses themselves too:

https://university.mongodb.com

see also the general Stanford databases course here:

https://online.stanford.edu/courses/soe-ydatabases-databases

this might be relevant for you too:

https://lagunita.stanford.edu/courses/course-v1:ComputerScience+MMDS+SelfPaced/about

this too perhaps:

https://www.coursera.org/specializations/gcp-data-machine-learning


Essentially there is a lot of stuff out there on MIT open courseware, Stanford online, Stanford engineering everywhere, edx, coursera, udacity etc..etc..

 

[dowie]

Bumping an old thread but interested in this.

I have a degree in Supply Chain and enjoy the data side of it. However have no experience in SQL, Python or anything other then Excel. Looking at analyst jobs they all require experience in those which I don't have and won't get through my company.

Is there a way of getting my foot in the door to get a job in this or data science?? The courses seem mega expensive as well.

ah didn't see that this was bumped so replied to the OP, the above sites are probably still relevant to you albeit you might want to look at the various programming courses and stats/ML ones too for data analyst roles (it is quite a broad term) - for "data scientist" you might well need a relevant grad qualification like MSc in Stats, MS computer science with a focus on machine learning/data science (or indeed a PhD in any quantitative subject). You'll probably find you're missing some undergraduate level knowledge too - did you cover much calculus and linear algebra in your undergrad?

 

[FishFluff]

Bumping an old thread but interested in this.

I have a degree in Supply Chain and enjoy the data side of it. However have no experience in SQL, Python or anything other then Excel. Looking at analyst jobs they all require experience in those which I don't have and won't get through my company.

Is there a way of getting my foot in the door to get a job in this or data science?? The courses seem mega expensive as well.

If you can't get experience of those technologies through your job, then my advice would be learn them using the resources Dowie posted and then think of a project to make using them. Get the code posted on Github and you can then use that to prove your knowledge/experience.

 

[Amplus]

If you can't get experience of those technologies through your job, then my advice would be learn them using the resources Dowie posted and then think of a project to make using them. Get the code posted on Github and you can then use that to prove your knowledge/experience.

Sorry to sound dumb but what do you mean the code posted on GitHub? Seen it's a programming site but how do I use that to prove my knowledge??

 

[Amplus]

While not specific to your main query it might be worth pointing out that there is an MS Computer Science qualification available via udacity/Georgia Tech and as a result of that various modules/lectures are available freely if you want to study some aspects of it in your own time without handing over the $$$$

https://www.udacity.com/georgia-tech

and perhaps more relevant to your interest in databases and analysing data they do offer nanondegrees and there are some other short courses that might be of interest to you covering MongoDB, Hadoop etc..

https://eu.udacity.com/course/data-wrangling-with-mongodb--ud032

https://eu.udacity.com/course/intro-to-hadoop-and-mapreduce--ud617

MongoDB offer courses themselves too:

https://university.mongodb.com

see also the general Stanford databases course here:

https://online.stanford.edu/courses/soe-ydatabases-databases

this might be relevant for you too:

https://lagunita.stanford.edu/courses/course-v1:ComputerScience+MMDS+SelfPaced/about

this too perhaps:

https://www.coursera.org/specializations/gcp-data-machine-learning


Essentially there is a lot of stuff out there on MIT open courseware, Stanford online, Stanford engineering everywhere, edx, coursera, udacity etc..etc..

Thanks for all that. a lot seems aimed at Americans. Can I do the courses if based in the UK?

 

[dowie]

Thanks for all that. a lot seems aimed at Americans. Can I do the courses if based in the UK?

They’re online courses

 

[FishFluff]

Sorry to sound dumb but what do you mean the code posted on GitHub? Seen it's a programming site but how do I use that to prove my knowledge??

GitHub is a source code repository and is used to host projects. If you give someone the link, they can view the code you've written. It can also be used for version control when you're collaborating on a project as part of a team. It's a good thing to learn about anyway if you do any kind of software development or data science.

Here's the Microsoft GitHub page for example where they post some code examples.

 

[AHarvey]

This is an interesting read.

I'm currently working as an application support analyst for a leading UK anti-fraud company, we have contracts with the government, Lloyds, HSBC, Coop etc as well as major insurance companies. My role is described as first line but we've had several people come in from first line roles recently and they are not doing well. It's a second line level and I'm self-taught.

It's mostly SQL based working with XML and touching on the web front end occasionally. It's 100% problem solving, people here 6 years still do not know the system fully. It's huge.

While I enjoy my team and the company is good the salaries are generally ****. The system itself isn't documented, some parts no one really knows how it works and I've had little to no training on anything, it's things I've picked up myself, either watching/listening/reading our ticket software or even googling in some cases.

I've been looking at ways to earn more, I'm 37, love solving problems and was thinking that data analysis would be an interesting way to progress. I've a little Python experience but at 37 I feel I need to be earning 50% more than I am. I could earn double answering phones at Vodafone with my brother but it's not my kind of job.