Looking at these guiding principles and how you can start to practice them could put you a step ahead of the rest when it comes to looking for that data driven job role in the future. Check out the list below to learn how you can start to sharpen those workplace skills:
- Foster a culture of humility and curiosity
“Data literacy is not all about data. Yes, you need to analyze and work with the data at your disposal, but it also involves developing non-technical skills like curiosity, critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration to gain different perspectives and challenge your own assumptions about the data. “
This is not dissimilar to the lessons learnt through academic studies, curiosity and gaining different perspectives is required of all students and is a vital skill in the data driven workplace too. Start practicing this by asking more questions and interrogating the information you see, whether that be in the classroom or what you read about online.
- Encourage employees to put training into practice
“To really drive data literacy, employees can be empowered to consistently put their training into action and use their skills on a daily basis, no matter their level or role.”
Demonstrating a time when you did this during your studies is great practice for an interview and a future job. Did you study a course on building visualizations? Did you then use this knowledge for a project on a different module? Maybe you found a data set related to a hobby and practiced building visualizations that way.
- Focus on the desired outcomes
“The first step to effectively using data is understanding and being clear on the problem you want to solve.”
Its fantastic to have all the technical skills, but if you don’t know what the aim of a project is then these skills are irrelevant. If you do extra study on data skills in your free time, what do you want to learn? Do you want to learn to build an application or to tell a story with the data? Having a clear focus can save a lot of time.
- Measure the impact of your efforts!
Make sure to keep a note of your achievements and proud moments whether that be during your course, during work experience or an achievement on a sports team, for example. What did you do and what did you achieve? Was there a challenge you overcame to do this?
You can start to work on your data skills by signing up to the Free Qlik Academic Program, our program gives you access to data analytics software and a comprehensive library of training courses through the Qlik Continuous Classroom. Follow this link to learn more: qlik.com/academicprogram
