During your training, what skills will you learn? To be honest, it depends on the company you work for, the business area you work in (e.g. sales, business operations, or product creation), and the type of analytics you use. You could, for example, focus on descriptive, prescriptive, or diagnostic analytics. Alternatively, you may study big data systems such as Apache Hadoop.
Most data analyst internships will not be high-stakes, regardless of what you learn. You’ll still get to learn about important things, but in a secure setting. A good mentor will push you to your limits while without overburdening you. While your specific responsibilities will differ due to the reasons stated above, here are some typical activities to anticipate.
Collaboration with various team members
Data analytics courses (or self-study) on the internet can convey the impression that data analysts work alone. In actuality, they must work with a wide range of specialties to communicate and coordinate. Engineers, product designers, and managers are just a few of the types of people you’ll encounter. You’ll also use your talents in a variety of business fields, including sales, marketing, IT, and finance. An internship provides a true taste of data analytics variety. You’ll gain unique insights into how a genuine firm is conducted by supporting management.
Data cleansing and database maintenance
Have you completed an online course or practise projects? If that’s the case, you may have conducted data analytics using online datasets. However, these datasets are frequently pre-structured and cleaned. An internship will provide you with real-world data in all of its unstructured, messy beauty! You’ll receive hands-on experience cleaning data using Python and Excel. You could even learn how to employ big data structures to collect and store data. A organised education will teach you important theory, but you will need to apply what you’ve learned in the actual world.
Performing data analysis
Of course, the most important aspect of data analytics is conducting analyses. An internship allows you to put all of the statistical techniques you’ve learned into practise. You’ll need some theoretical knowledge of statistics as well as a variety of analytical approaches to get the job. However, once you’re in, this is your opportunity to shine. Finally, you’ll be able to put what you’ve learned in the classroom into practise.
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Visualizing data
The goal of visualisation is to make data more understandable. An intern may be deemed unsuitable for a high-stakes analysis. However, for someone with little experience, making visualisations is a safer endeavour. You’ll probably get to experiment with the company’s internal data tools and apply your own techniques. These data visualisation tools are typically enterprise-level (i.e., paid) and will be unfamiliar to you. Microsoft Power BI, Tableau Desktop (which also has a free version), Salesforce Einstein Analytics, and SAP Analytics Cloud are some of the most popular.