I’m currently a PhD student in infectious disease trying to pivot to a career as a data analyst. I’m not bound to remaining in the non-profit sector. What are some of the hard skills I should master to be taken seriously as a candidate? SQL? advanced excel skills? Python? data visualization? others?
I just want to emphasize I don’t have my PhD yet. I’ll have my masters in 6mo and if I find a great position, I’ll make the career switch before getting my PhD My impression is going through with my PhD will make me overqualified and perhaps undesirable? Not sure if this is 100% true though.
If you really aren't sure if your PhD, then may be not a good idea to pursue it. Also tech companies regularly hire STEM PhDs, so why would you be over qualified?
If PhD in infectious disease is as rigorous as a STEM PhD (and not those BS social sciences), you are capable of more than data analyst. Data analyst is a relatively low skilled job. Perhaps, with some machine learning knowledge you could pivot to a something better, especially at a company like Verily
Most PhDs do data science IME. However, if you are a business-minded person then PA role might be more enjoyable.
It sounds like you are at the very beginning of a phd program. If you are not interested in getting the most expert knowledge in your field, don't do the PhD. It's hard to imagine someone keep thinking about jobs while doing a phd (it's not for a job...). In any case, you have to learn python/SQL and maybe some statistics. If you do get your PhD, you can check out Insight Data Science Program that helps PhD to make the transition (to data scientist). But technically you can prepare yourself much earlier..
SQL and python. Based on your background you’re too intelligent and qualified to be wasted on a data analyst role. You want to aim for a data scientist / applied research scientist role. Heavier on the math. You’ll need to know how to query and manipulate data.... it will be easy for you to learn.
Completely agree with this. A data analyst is completely different from data scientist. Be careful and do your research. Maybe as a data analyst all you are doing is excel work. Generally data scientist has more valuable responsibilities.