Everything I Did to Become a Data Analyst (overview)

Thousands of people have followed my journey to go from zero experience, to hired in the tech industry. I started in the beginning of February, and in the end of July, accepted my first full time position as a data analyst.

Along the way, I spent less than $100. There are so many influencers out there selling their expensive courses, resume writing services, and every other paid thing. I'm not knocking them, but I am saying that I was able to do it without any of them- and I did it while working full time.

Now, I have a remote job that I love, and it pays me well. I love my company, it has a great culture. I literally could not be happier. So, what everyone wants to know is- how did I do it?

First of all, I have already created a lot of content on this, in real time. Please, please check out all of the content I have already created. I am on Tik Tok @anniesanalytics, and that is where it all began. I have gone very into depth on there. I am also on LinkedIn, where I have shared a lot of my story, and advice. Right now you are reading my blog- I have kept track of my journey along the way on here, on my blog! Finally, this blog is nested within my website. On my website, you can find my portfolio, which is all of the projects that I have made public!

The Roadmap

In order, here is what I did:

1. Google Certificates Course in Data Analytics- I completed this in one month- February. It cost me $40. Many people finish it in 6 months. This course was an excellent foundation, and really lit the data analytics fire for me.

2. Creating a Tik Tok and documenting my journey: February - present.

3. Building a portfolio (check it out here, on my website, which is what this blog is hosted on!): March - Present

4. Starting a LinkedIn and growing a following there- and creating content about becoming a data analyst: March - Present

5. 100 Days of Code- I did take this course (did not finish it) in April. I loved the course, but I thought it was very non-essential to becoming a data analyst, and I would have still gotten this job I have now, without it.

6. Continuing to build a portfolio

7. Optimizing my LinkedIn, Resume, and Cover letter: April - July. I did this mostly on my own just by looking up the pages of numerous Tik Tokkers and LinkedIn creators who were knowledgeable on the topic. I also found later on in the search some very helpful resources. Teal is a free job tracker and also puts out a lot of great content about job searching- I only wish I had found them sooner! Maven Analytics has a course called Launching Your Data career. They not only include actionable steps on how to become a data analyst from 0 experience, but also did an excellent job going into LinkedIn and resumes in the course.

8. Job searching: April - July

9. Maven Analytics Tableau Course- June. I realized while job searching that I was really interested in getting a position where I used Tableau, but I felt like I was not very good at it, and after building several projects, I was still missing some umph. So, I took this course and it absolutely helped me! It was a great course and I honestly do not think I would have the job I have now if I had not taken it.

10. July 21st: Accepting a job!

If you would like to hear more about any of these steps, I surely either made a video about them, a LinkedIn post, or wrote a blog! Since I gave you this in order, all you would need to do is go down my feeds in time to find the moment in time that I was actually going through these experiences in order to find content I made about it.

I also complied a TON of resources and brought them all together into one free GitHub page. Found here.