5 Types of Data Jobs

SHAN LIN
6 min readJan 2, 2020

*** Sharing common job functions in data field for job search tips

Hi job seekers and data folks!

Have you ever gotten lost in this?

LinkedIn Job Posts

So what’s the difference among these data jobs?

I believe there are 5 of them:

  • Data scientist/ Modeling
  • Data visualization / Dashboard
  • Data engineering
  • Reporting
  • Business requirement gathering

Welcome any feedback to make the list better!

Data Scientist / Modeling

You should find insights from data. Strong in statistic, data wrangling in R/Python/SAS/SQL, and communication.

Example: Data Scientist position in a info tech Company

( https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/1647849233/?alternateChannel=byview)

Responsibilities:
* Gathering Business Requirements and System Specification from business users
* Present and communicate data, trends, insights and recommendations
Identify & document data sources and transformation rules required to populate and maintain the data warehouse
* Research and develop statistical learning models for data analysis
* Work closely with teams to develop standards and tools to effectively manage the capacity experience of customer
* Analyze data from structured and unstructured data sources to derive business insights
* Develop and maintain new data sets and data pipelines thus ensuring data availability at all times Perform data validations and data quality checks to improve the reliability of the system
* Prepare design and technical documentation that describes the project workflow and processes involved

Required Skills:
* 5 years of IT experience working in data engineering and analytics projects
* Extensive experience with MSBI tools and Power BI
*Strong data analysis, data verification and problem-solving abilities
* Excellent pattern recognition and predictive modeling skills
* Strong technical knowledge in data mining, reporting tools, and statistical analysis
* Experience with common data science toolkits, such as R, Weka, NumPy, MatLab etc.
* Excellent understanding of machine learning techniques and algorithms, such as kNN, Naive Bayes, SVM, Decision Forests, etc.
* Effective spreadsheet modeling skills

Data Visualization / Dashboard

You build dashboards for clients by Power BI, Tableau, Looker, QlickSense etc. You also work with data engineering to feed in the right kind of data.

Example: BI Developer — Tableau in a info tech company

( https://www.linkedin.com/company/saama-technologies/life/de41686c-816a-46ed-80c3-4ffb6068ae01/)

Requirement

  • Bachelors or Master’s degree in computer science or related discipline.
  • 5+ years of relevant experience in software development

· Strong experience in creating visualizations and dashboards using Tableau.

· Considerable knowledge of SQL, PL/SQL and writing complex queries for data visualization.

· Strong understanding of multidimensional data.

· Experience capturing and translating Business Requirements into technical solutions.

· Experience working in an agile development environment.

· Familiar with data modeling and normalization.

· Familiar leveraging stored procedures and functions within a DW environment.

· Tableau certification a plus.

· Tableau server maintenance a plus.

Data Engineering

You are in charge of ETL process (Extract-Transform-Load) to handle large inflow of data, design STAR scheme for table relationship and feed data to data warehouse. You should master Big Data tool, strong in Python and enjoy solving logic puzzles.

Example: Data Engineer in Amazon

( https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/1653834827/?alternateChannel=jymbii)

As a data engineer, you will get the exciting opportunity to work on very large data sets in one of the world’s largest and most complex data warehouse environments. You will work closely with the business teams in analysis on various cost savings initiatives, many non-standard and unique business problems and use creative-problem solving to deliver actionable output.
You will be responsible for designing and implementing an analytical environment using third-party and in-house reporting tools, modeling metadata, building reports and dashboards. You will have an opportunity to work with leading edge technologies like Redshift, Hadoop/Hive/Pig. You will be writing scalable queries and tuning performance on queries running over billion of rows of data.

You should be analytical, have an extremely high level of customer focus and a passion for process improvement. You should be motivated self-starter that can work independently in a fast paced, ambiguous environment. You should have excellent business and communication skills to be able to work with business owners to develop and define key business questions.

Basic Qualifications

  • Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or related field
  • 1+ years relevant experience
  • 1+ years experience with SQL, SQL Tuning, Oracle, OLAP, Big Data Technologies
  • 1+ years experience developing end-to-end Business Intelligence solutions: data modeling, ETL and reporting
  • Experience with Java and experience with scripting languages like Perl, Python, Unix shell scripts,VBA and MS Excel
  • Proficiency with Linux and systems administration

Preferred Qualifications

  • Practical Knowledge of Linux or Unix shell scripting
  • Experience in working with business customers to drive requirements analysis
  • Proven ability at looking at solutions in unconventional ways. Sees opportunities to innovate and can lead the way.
  • Top notch communication (verbal and written) and interpersonal skills to convey key insights from complex analysis in summarized business terms and an ability to effectively communicate with technical teams.
  • Ability to work with shifting deadlines in a fast paced environment.
  • Exposure to large databases, BI applications, data quality and performance tuning
  • Excellent written and spoken communication skills
  • Experience with Hadoop-based technologies such as HBase, Pig, Hive and Spark
  • Strong proven ability in building high-performance, highly available and scalable data solutions using Oracle and/or Hadoop-based technologies
  • Knowledge of data warehousing concepts.
  • Strong sense of ownership, urgency, and drive
  • Strong troubleshooting and problem solving skills
  • Experience with Amazon Web Services

Reporting

You are provide numbers for management decisions. You will work with pivot tables, presentations, dashboards and ad hoc analysis. Just like flying an airplane WITHOUT a monitor is dangerous, you are in charge of building the reliable monitor for the company.

Example: Reporting Analyst in computer software company.

You will gather business requirements and transform them into data products that address customer questions and requests. You’re an expert with SQL and can understand the nuances of customer’s reporting needs and how our data architecture impacts those requests. You can put together compelling data visualizations that help customers answer questions they didn’t know they had. You know data quality is important and can quickly identify and resolve any data quality or integrity issues.

We Are Looking For You If

  • Data excites you
  • You’re comfortable working with SQL and visualization tools like Tableau
  • You have a solid understanding of dimensional modeling
  • You’re committed to delivering high-quality, scalable data solutions
  • You enjoy being part of a collaborative, committed and fun team

Responsibilities

  • Translate business requirements into data reporting and/or visualizations for customers
  • Manages assignments that may involve collaborating with a team and working with stakeholders at various levels.
  • Develops custom and ad-hoc reports
  • Develops custom data export integrations for customers
  • Investigate and remedy data integrity/quality concerns
  • Identify ways to productize Limeade’s data offering

Requirements

  • Ability to demonstrate our values in an on-going and consistent way
  • Bachelor’s degree, preferably Computer Science, Information Systems, Statistics or equivalent experience
  • Analytical and collaborative problem solver
  • 1–2 years in a report analyst or similar capacity
  • Expert in SQL
  • Expert with Excel. Must be proficient with advanced analytic functions such as VLOOKUP, named ranges, pivot tables, formulas, etc.
  • Experience with BI visualization tools like Tableau
  • Experience with Amazon Web Services a plus

Business Requirement Gathering

You gather information request and prepare Business Requirement Documents (BRD). You study the system and work with developers. You also manage projects and documentation.

Example: Business Analyst in a cosmetic company

( https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/1616622013/?alternateChannel=jymbii)

Job Description

  • Determines operational objectives by studying business functions; gathering information; evaluating output requirements and formats.
  • Analyzes requirements from the business; constructs workflow charts and diagrams;
  • studies system capabilities; writes specifications.
  • Recommends controls by identifying problems; writing improved procedures.
  • Defines project requirements by identifying project milestones, phases, and elements; forming project team; establishing project budget.
  • Monitors project progress by tracking activity; resolving problems; publishing progress reports; recommending actions.
  • Provides references for users by writing and maintaining user documentation; providing help desk support; training users.
  • Prepares technical reports by collecting, analyzing, and summarizing information and trends.

Requirements & Qualifications

  • Minimum Education levelBachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Technology or related field or equivalent experience.
  • Required Language Proficiency English

Behavioral Skills

  • Entrepreneurship
  • Smart risk taking
  • Creative thinking
  • Adaptability / ability to manage change
  • Interpersonal skills
  • Ability to execute
  • Ability to influence

Functional Skills

  • Understanding of future technologies
  • Business acumen
  • Business process modeling
  • Application domain knowledge
  • Requirements definition & management
  • Oral & written communications
  • Consultative problem solving / consulting

Technical Skills

  • Proficient in MS Excel, MS Powerpoint
  • Functional knowledge of ERP modules and functionalities
  • (e.g. SAP, Cornerstone)
  • Bachelor’s degree from accredited universities with strong
  • Academic record

These roles can overlap, differ and evolve over time depending on industry and companies. Here I just took a snapshot of the job market as I observed.

Hopefully you can rediscover your goal and find your passion to go!

Thank you for reading.

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SHAN LIN

Data Analytics * Curiosity -I Write What You Don’t Find on Google || Article List: https://ppt.cc/fhjetx || LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/shan-lin-0723