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This is the right mindset for sure. Most of the time the initial question is very loosely defined, but actually having these conversations with the people who "want data", and helping them structure their thinking is also a hugely rewarding part of working in data and analytics, and will help you advance in your career.

It can be easy to have a cynical view of what people are asking for, but in my experience there is often real value you can uncover.

One thing which helped me a lot is having a decent understanding of accounting and finance. A fun, and fairly quick, way to develop that is by taking a course on financial modelling (in excel). Modelling a business in a spreadsheet is a lot of fun, and it helps you build good intuition on the underlying "physics" of how a business makes money.



Can you recommend a good online Excel modeling course?

I see tons of courses that teach “Excel skills”, but can’t find any that teach modeling using Excel.


Wall Street Prep and Marquee Group are the ones most of the banks and financial institutions use, as far as I recall.

Here's a self study package from wall street prep: https://www.wallstreetprep.com/self-study-programs/premium-p...

https://marqueegroup.ca

Get your employer to pay for it :)




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