How to get a data science job

Key Takeaways

i see a lot of people posting facebook groups and discord servers like oh i learned data science and i did these courses now how do i actually get a job well just because you learn data science does not mean you can just apply somewhere and get a data science job the reality is that you probably won't even get the interview why well because you haven't demonstrated the most important skill of a data scientist the ability to drive impact sure you know how to code and you know how to do some ml but have you actually used these skills to impact a business or really any field in any way so in this video i'm going to give you guys my guide on how to kill two birds with one stone and learn data science and work towards actually getting yourself a data science job aka you gotta demonstrate your ability to drive positive impact in the real world i'm just going to tell you straight out that the key lies in choosing the correct data science projects and to a lesser extent your ability to get maybe like one review people to give you a chance i'm going to split information in two parts one for people who are out of school are trying to transition into data science from another field and one for students the overarching themes and actions are the same but the implementations are going to be really different since these two groups of people have really different resources at their disposal and constraints now here are my thoughts on how to optimize your specific situation to get a data science job first the framework it's actually super simple the more real-life data science experience you have the more likely you are to land that data science interview which is objectively the hardest part of the process so your goal is to make your data science projects also real-life data science work experience first for those transitioning into data science from another field let's break this down even further into people who will currently have a job and those who don't have a job let's start with people who currently have a job in a non-related field as you're learning data science there's two things that i recommend that you do the first one is to try to see if you can take on projects that have to do with data at your current job this actually shouldn't be super hard because almost all jobs these days deal with data of some sort and it doesn't have to be like machine learning or anything for example if you work in marketing i bet you have a lot of data about clients and maybe like marketing campaigns and it might be currently in excel spreadsheets or some sort of platform like salesforce get that data and do a quick analysis with it using sql or python and share those insights with your manager and your teammates or even better use those insights to increase your performance or say you're a software engineer there's almost certainly some sort of data infrastructure within the company you work at see if you can help out with building some data pipelines or maybe even data cleaning again the goal is to use your new data science skills for projects that drive real life impact i would also highly recommend making friends with data related roles at your company this is a great way of figuring out what projects can drive the most impact and if you ever need help with getting your hands on data sources which is usually the most challenging part of a real life project you can ask these people for help and eventually if you want to laterally transfer to a data related role in your company well here are some friends that can help you make your case if you follow this path you will eventually get yourself into a more data related role within your company and then you can choose to stay where you can jump ship so what if you don't have a job don't worry i got you too open source projects and consulting gigs will be great ways to get in some data science projects that have real life impact check out this video where i'll link over here where i go into more depth about how to find these projects and which ones to choose so i'm not going to repeat myself here the idea though is that not only are you going to be doing these real life projects that demonstrate your ability of driving impact but also along the way of working on these projects you are likely to meet some people who are currently employed as data scientists that may be willing to give you a chance and help you out with a referral [Music] this is my preferred way of networking since these people are much more willing to help you out if you actually work together on something and they like you so i'm not gonna lie transitioning into data science from your current field is not easy and it does take a lot of time and initiative on your part but it's not impossible though in fact it's very probable since there are many people that have followed this path but be prepared to work hard that's why i also want to make a point saying that getting a related degree like masters in data science or computer science which is what i did is objectively easier and probably takes less time if your goal is to land a big tech data science job for example and that's because that puts you into the category of students now if you're a student you are so incredibly lucky and you are in a great position even if you're in a non-related major check out this video i'm linking above here for the best data science project for students which is research with a professor i won't repeat myself here as to why it's the best option to drive real world impact or how to get a research position because i say all of that in this video if you want to elevate your resume even more i also recommend exploring options like joining your school's data science club or consulting club or doing maybe some hackathons or data thoughts or even open source projects another recommendation is if you can try to add a computer science or data science minor to your degree of course if you're not already on track to get a major in these fields just having something like computer science or data science related on your resume really helps a lot when you're applying for data science internships or jobs a computer science slash data science major reminder research with a professor and you know a couple projects from either classes or clubs now that is the recipe for an amazing resume that is just what recruiters are looking for another reason why you're so lucky if you're a student is because you really don't need to work very hard on this networking thing sure you can go to networking events if you want to but just a heads up recruiters at job fairs usually tell you to you know apply online anyway and by the way i also don't think you need a referral especially if you have a computer science data science major reminder it's definitely nice to have but i really wouldn't sweat it many companies recruit directly from universities so there is this very well established recruiting funnel and applying directly also gets you interviews be warned though i said that there is a well established route not that it's a piece of cake for me personally i didn't get any data science internship interviews after applying to like the 10 positions that i could find and i ended up applying to over 200 software engineering roles before landing anything and for full time my current data science job was the only position that gave me a chance in summary in this video i covered step-by-step actions on how to ultimately land a data science job by leveraging your current life situation you minimize effort and maximize outcome i hope this video was helpful for you and give you some direction and i'll see you guys in the next video