1. Understand your role within your organisation.

A data analyst's role is to provide the organisation they are supporting  with the knowledge and insight to improve their decision making ability. Focussing on ensuring your work is actually impacting decisions is different to simply providing you organisation with reports. More often than not the ‘value’ of your work will not be estimated in hard cash terms but more your customer’s perception of the quality of service you provide. (Just think of your performance reviews – how much time do you spend talking about the revenue or cost savings you’ve generated – I bet its not very much!). Remember a piece of data analysis that is effectively delivered and presented to a client will have the most chance of influencing the quality of their decision making  – one that is not shared or is not understood by the client will not add any value to this process.

2. Don’t get hung up on technical solutions – focus on developing your soft skills.

Whilst having the right tools for the job is important often businesses do not make the most of what they already have. The best data analysts are not usually those with the most advanced technical skills – they are the ones that can relate to a customer and deliver work which helps the customer do their job better. By focussing more on offering a service to your customer you will develop better relationships and rapport with your clients and in return achieve improved job satisfaction and you will feel more valued. Your data analysis training programme should not just consist of technical training courses - your communication and presentation skills are of equal importance and these also need to be developed.

3. Take opportunities to build your commercial or organisational awareness.

In doing this you will be better able to understand your customer’s needs and therefore deliver more relevant and appropriate work. Good ways to do this are to ask if you can sit in on your customer’s team meetings. You may not be able to contribute much at first but after a while you will be talking the same language and offering pro-active solutions which will be much appreciated by your customer.

4. Avoid Chinese whispers.

On many occasions a request for analysis or reporting  may come through several different people who have each put their own interpretation on the requirements e.g. marketing manager asks assistant  for a piece of analysis who asks the analysis manager who asks the data analyst. This leads to inappropriate  analysis goals and ultimately re-work for the analyst. Always attempt to get closest to the source of a request to avoid multiple interpretations and to ensure the final result is meeting the needs of the end client/customer.

5. Understand your customer’s needs.

Don’t just work to prescriptive requests – ascertain what is the underlying need. In doing this, you will potentially find a better alternative solution that is either easier to produce or more appropriate for your customer. Some customers find it difficult to articulate their analytical requirements or they base their requirements on their limited experience of what they've received before - either way,if you understand the basic needs behind any request you can adapt the solution as appropriate and deliver impactful work.

6. Plan time for the presentation of your work.

Many data analysts focus on merely delivering the end analysis rather than delivering the presentation of the end analysis. Being the last step in the whole process, very often analysts will either short cut this task when timescales are tight or don’t actually plan any time for presentation of their work in the first place. This is one of the biggest mistakes a data analyst can make. The only visible and tangible evidence of the hard work the analyst has undertaken in producing the final analysis is the presentation – often a customer will judge the quality of the analyst by the quality of their output. Poorly presented work will undermine the customer's confidence in the analysis and give the impression you have taken no pride in your work.

7. Don’t over estimate your audience.

One trap many analysts fall into is in thinking that their customers have the same numeracy/analytical ability as themselves. It helps to have interpretation on reports, no matter how obvious it may seem, as this helps cement the customer’s understanding  and avoids misinterpretation.

8. Put your name or your team name on all your output.

As well as providing a reference point for anyone who reads your output it raises the profile of you/your team and helps to avoid others taking credit for your hard work!

9. Maintain regular contact with your main customers.

Use effective planning tools (transparent planning recommended!) and make sure you make your customers aware of the work and deadlines you have committed to, by sending a regular planning bulletin. It's not unusual for customers to forget they've made requests of you or forget to inform you that the goal-posts have moved and hence that 15-day piece of analysis you've nearly finished is now irrelevant. Keeping in close contact with your main customers will ensure you get to know at the earliest opportunity when things have changed - it also helps build credibility with your customers!

10. Attend the Making Analysis Work For Business workshop.

Well,you didnt think you'd get all these smashing tips without some sort of sales pitch! For many other tips on improving your productivity and impact of your work attend this two day soft skills workshop that complements your technical data analysis training by developing your core skills of Planning, Communicating and Presenting Data. Combining theory with practical exercises this workshop is facilitated by Steve Hulmes, director of Sophic Solutions with over 24 years experience managing analytical teams and analytical projects for some of the UKs largest organisations.

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