Many jobs for EA's are now asking that we know how to gather data from many resources and do data analysis. How do I get this skill if I can't learn it on the job? Are there books, seminars etc? If anyone has experience or ideas on this one, I would really like to hear your feedback please. Thank you.
Submitted by: Anonymous
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You might have better luck by researching the term "Competitive Analysis". I was introduced to this term in my role and I often use this type of analysis to gather data. It is extremely helpful and there is a lot on the internet in regards to it. There are also many templates out there that help you organize your data as well. Most of it you can find under Competitive Analysis. Hope this helps some.
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Lauren Lush on
4/22/2013 2:12:44 PM
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Thanks so much for your replies! Much appreciated and extremely helpful. When I read some of these job descriptions, they can be intimidating.
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Anonymous on
7/13/2012 4:18:29 PM
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Data analysis is a buzz word for the collection of facts or information and organizing it some way to help make the best decisions. We do it everyday -- compiling lists, making comparisons, selecting courses of action. Ever clip coupons, compare ads, question what you hear in TV commercials? How about do comparison shopping, obtain quotes from multiple vendors, compare pay or allowances, prepare budgets (personal and office), figure out the best route to take to accomplish several tasks, figure out work schedules (and game schedules, and task schedules), deconflict calendars? Every decision requires at some level the collection of information (data) and figuring out what to do with it (analysis) to make the best one (sound or actionable decision).
Data analysis sounds technical but you are not a statistician or database manager so you have to "un-techni-tize" the buzz word into plain English--how do you gather information and make decisions or help others make decisions? You can figure out the rest...
If you want to find a book, I recommend you focus on decision making processes first. Statistical analysis, number crunching, business calculations, etc. are simply advanced applications done by other specialists like your operations and accounting managers.
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Anonymous on
7/13/2012 12:00:00 PM
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I did a quick search on Google and most of the information is very technical and complicated. That is probably NOT what you would be asked to do. The basics are that you are given data, asked to review the data, extract certain information, and provide the result. Generally, you need to do this analysis when you have reports that show the data, but the application used to generate the report has no ability to pull out the desired information in the format needed. Here's a simple example: You are asked to determine the best days for car rentals based upon the previous 3 months of expenses. The report you are given only shows the date (e.g., July 13, 2012) -- but not the day of the week (e.g., Friday). The first thing you do is determine the day of the week for each day, and ADD that information to the report (e.g., add a new column in Excel). You then sort the data by day of the week. This allows you to determine the most common day of the week on which the cars were rented. To take it one step further, you might be asked to determine how the rates change based upon the day of the week. For example, the average rate on Monday's for the past 3 months is $46/day, whereas the average rate on Wedneday's for the past 3 months is $25/day. This shows that mid-week travel involving car rentals might provide greater cost savings if rentals take place on Wednesdays. Make sense? If you need to know more, feel free to email me at cindy@cindybrock.com. :}
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Cindy Brock on
7/13/2012 9:18:41 AM
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