23 y.o Data Analyst - Lost and would appreciate your thoughts/advice
Hi everyone,
I'm just hoping someone can point me in the right direction, or if anyone could empathize if they have been in a similar situation.
I'm a 23 y.o data analyst working in Charlotte, N.C. I took the job right out of college, pretty much out of desperation because I could not afford to live without income and did not take job applications seriously in my senior year. I had 18 months of full-time internship experience as a BA, and studied Finance & Info Systems. I know I deserve to be where I am at mentally right now.
Basically, i'm frustrated with my pay (50k yearly,) lack of my technical progression, (I use Google Analytics, DOMO, SQL, and Excel,) and me feeling like I'm behind after realizing what I could have been doing in my career if I had spent time in college learning how to code, or figuring out what I actually wanted to do. The good part is that I have been able to provide value to my current organization by providing insights from Google Analytics that have improved their web stats significantly over the past year. I enjoy the analysis, and coming up with different ideas and plans using data and presenting it, but I feel desperately late in the game in terms of Python/R/Matlab/Hadoop/ - all the other things that the big and high paying companies require. I believe I'm a very social person, and I would say I'm really well liked by my coworkers, but I feel like I'm not progressing anywhere; and feel that I have just been clinging on to a few good personality traits, and have fallen behind on actual things I need to work on.
I've tried to force myself to learn the above technical skills, but I keep failing to make any progress. I think the following are the possibilities, and I can't seem to figure it out.
- Me being lazy and quitting 2 days in
- The material and method I'm using is wrong (I learn best when I watch someone do something) and I'm the only data analyst at my company so I have no one to learn from professionally
- This stuff isn't for me
I know this is kind of a rant, but I'm hoping anyone could provide any insight, even if it's anecdotal (your career path story/ if you were in a similar situation,) a road map for me, resources, or even telling me this stuff may not be for me.
I've considered joining the military just for a sense of direction, and thankfully did not go down that path.
Anything helps, and thanks so much. #data #dataanalytics #datascience
comments
A - personal development required. Patience. Something our society isn't teaching. Look up simon sineks videos. He highlights how we're wired for instant recognition. Answer: (I know easier said than done - personal change always is) Don't learn to code for higher pay or even better job. Enjoy bits and pieces. Learn to learn. This'll cause you to love the journey not the result, something none of us can control anyways. I've seen my peers cry through 4yrs of med school and say "I'll get it all back when I make 400k/yr". That's not the way.
B - lol how can you know that if you give up in 2 days? Go on Udacity and just FINISH a course. Just 1. I'm left handed. Just out of boredom, I started practicing with my right hand one day. Big small alphabet twice. 1-10 twice. Filling half a pg a day. IDK if that's 'the best method' but after 6 months every day for 20min, now I'm ambidextrous.
C - ya... Maybe. It legit may not be. I'm in no position to say it is or not. But you at least gotta try. If you don't love it after 3-4 months, ya quit and learn something else. As Microsoft said, self realization at 23 is a blessing my friend. :)
@OP - search Simon Sinek TED talks. His work, so enlightening and easy to consume, I think is foundational/fundamental in your journey forward.
And “it’s the journey, not the destination” is not just cliche, but something to really be thought about and understood, if you ever want meaning in your life. Use your “low income” years to grasp these concepts and you’re wisdom and wealth will grow with your ability to help others.
First I’d reconsider and develop some gratitude for your current position. $50k in Charlotte’s is equivalent of over six figures in NY or SF. That’s not a bad position to be in at 23. At 23 I was wasting time in grad school making negative money. At 28 I was making like $70k on contract with no benefits in SF (equivalent of like $35k in NC).
I don’t know you, so might well be Data isn’t for you. That’s fine. Data frankly isn’t for a lot of people who’ve chased the hype and the money. Try other things. Plenty of weird niche jobs out there you’ve never heard of that might be a fit. Won’t ever know without trying it.
Be kinder to yourself, be continually committed to incremental self improvement, and don’t index so much on achievement and status. If you have other lingering issues (depression, anxiety, etc.), seek out help. Material success won’t fix the things that are broken in you, you need to put in work for that.
Speaking from my own experience, when I stopped worrying so much about external success and just focusing on just generally being better, that’s when I started a path that eventually culminated in success. My path to Twitter was basically grad school 👉underemployment 👉 contract data job 👉 shitty startup with multiple hats 👉 good startup with two hats 👉 Twitter with data hat. ($200k TC since you’re probably wondering, but that’s not really the point). In my mid-30s and just generally mellowed the fuck out.
I am confused because SQL they require for like BAs and data analyst.