Every organisation collects data: sales, customers, transactions, website visits. A data analyst’s job is to turn that data into clear answers that help people make better decisions.
A typical day
- Meeting colleagues to understand the question they need answered.
- Pulling data from databases with SQL, or from spreadsheets and other systems.
- Cleaning the data: fixing errors, removing duplicates, filling gaps.
- Analysing it to find trends, comparisons and anomalies.
- Presenting the findings in a dashboard, a chart or a short report.
The core toolkit
- Excel or Google Sheets: still everywhere, and powerful with pivot tables and lookups.
- SQL: the language for getting data out of databases.
- Python (pandas): for larger or messier data and repeatable analysis.
- Power BI or Tableau: for interactive dashboards.
- Communication: explaining what the numbers mean to people who are not analysts.
Do you need to be a maths expert?
No. You need to be comfortable with everyday numbers such as averages, percentages and growth rates, and curious about why things happen. The statistics you need can be learned along the way.
How to start
Pick a public dataset you find interesting, ask three questions about it, and answer them with a spreadsheet and a few charts. Then learn SQL. When you are ready for structure and feedback, Virexa’s four-month Data Analytics programme covers Excel, SQL, Python and Power BI with real projects.
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