202: I'll Admit: Becoming a Data Analyst Isn't Sustainable Now

Speaker: 00:00:00

Avery Smith-1: I gotta admit

that becoming a data analyst in

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2026 is no longer sustainable.

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It honestly feels impossible and burnout

is pretty much all but inevitable.

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You could be working so hard and

honestly doing everything right, and

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yet the dream of actually becoming a

data analyst still feels so far away.

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And if you've been wondering if other

people feel this way, yes they do.

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And it's honestly not just you.

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It's the whole system is really

weird and broken right now.

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It's just not possible to learn

everything that you need to learn because

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there's a bajillion things you need

to learn to be applying to a hundred

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jobs a day because that's how much

everyone else is applying and all these

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remote data, honest jobs are getting

flooded with thousands of applicants.

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It's just not sustainable to be doing

those things while you have a full-time

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job, while you have a family, while

you have a dog, while you have hobbies,

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like how the heck are you supposed

to have time for all these things?

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You're not.

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And that's why it's not

sustainable anymore.

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But in today's video, I'm gonna

be giving you five things that

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you can start today to make this

whole process feel sustainable.

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These five things will help you

put this process kind of in easy

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mode and take 10 times less time

than it has been previously.

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So let's get into it.

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Number one is to consider

an internal pivot.

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Stop thinking that in order to

become a data analyst, anything

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has to actually change externally.

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It can all change internally.

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The job you're at today, you can

start, give yourself the title of a

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data analyst and start thinking about

your job from a data perspective

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instead of the normal perspective

that everyone else thinks about it.

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Data analyst is more of a mindset than

it is a title, and so you could actually

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start today and just be like, Hey,

I'm a data analyst at my job today.

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My boss doesn't know it, my coworkers

don't know it, but I'm gonna start

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doing data analytics at my job.

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And if you start being more data

driven in your actual job, what that

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can actually lead to is what I call

an internal pivot where you have

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the chance to become a data analyst.

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At your giving company, you don't actually

have to switch companies to switch titles.

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And if you could actually find a data

analyst role within your company and

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switch into that role, or even create

that role out of thin air, that's gonna be

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so much easier than pivoting externally.

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Because the number one thing

when it comes to hiring is trust.

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And to be honest, you're a

complete stranger to hiring

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managers and recruiters.

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Like why should they trust you?

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They don't know you, they don't

know anything about you, but your

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current company, your current team,

your current manager, those people

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know, like, and trust You already.

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So it's gonna be way less of a stretch

to, you know, go into a new position where

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you literally have no experience in when

they already know, like, and trust you.

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That's gonna be way easier.

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So if you can figure out how to

change your current job into kind of

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a data analyst job and then figure

out how to pivot internally into an

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internal data analyst position at your

company or your organization, that's

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gonna be way easier and take way

less time than doing it externally.

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And all of this is to say really what you.

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Actually need to do is you need to

figure out how to get paid to learn.

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Right now you are learning for free

or you are even paying to learn, but

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this process is only sustainable.

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Becoming data analyst is only

sustainable if you can figure

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out how to get paid to learn.

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And when you pivot internally,

when you take your job today

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and you make a data analyst job.

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You actually are learning on the clock.

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You're starting to think about

data analytics on the job, and

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now you're getting paid to learn

in that internal pivot, you'll

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also get paid to learn on the job.

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So really the key here is, is to just

get this first data roll as quickly as

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possible so you can get paid to learn.

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Now the second thing I'm gonna give you

right here is really key for getting

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paid to learn, and that is stop just

reaching for data analytics roles.

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There's actually a

bunch of roles that are.

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Underneath data analyst roles that

are a lot easier to land because

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one less people know about them.

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Two, they often have lower requirements.

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Often it's just like you have to know

Excel and you just says you don't

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even have to have a college degree.

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You just have to have

a high school diploma.

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So these jobs are less known

about and they're easier to get.

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They don't pay as well.

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But the point here is you're

not going for the money.

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You're going for, how do I get paid to

learn so I can make the money one to

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two, to five to 10 years down the road,

have some foresight like, like let's

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say you're making $50,000 right now.

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Well, yeah, a data analyst job's

gonna pay like $80,000 when

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you land that data analyst job.

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But what if you could get into a

role that's $50,000 but it's data,

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or it's $55,000, but it's data and

then you're in that role for six.

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12, 18, 24 months, and then all of

a sudden you're gonna be at $80,000.

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That's a much better financial decision

than struggling to become a data analyst

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for months and even years and never

getting any salary bump whatsoever after

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three years of trying and in the market.

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Right now, it's just not sustainable

to try to become a data analyst.

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From scratch without any of these five

things you have to be doing, at least one,

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if not multiple of these five things, and

this is something that all of us can do.

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So what are these job titles?

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Well, there's a lot of 'em.

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I've actually made a different

episode about these five job titles

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or six job titles in the past.

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Some of them are data governance jobs,

data entry jobs, data janitor jobs.

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Data stewardship jobs, data specialist

jobs, there's a bunch of different titles.

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It's for a different episode

to go into the depths of these.

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But just know that there are roles

below the data analyst role that will

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get your foot into the data world.

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And then once you're in the data

world, you can pivot really easy

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into the data analyst position.

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Once you have data on your resume and your

LinkedIn applying to these data analyst

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jobs, you're gonna have more experience.

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The recruiters are gonna trust you a

little bit more 'cause you're less of a

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risk and you're gonna get more interviews

and then you're gonna get more offers and

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then you're gonna land your dream job.

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So stop reaching for the data analyst

role if it feels unsustainable,

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and reach a little bit lower

and get your foot in the door.

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Very quickly.

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My third piece of advice is to

try to stop learning everything.

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There's so much to learn in the data

world, you guys, like literally, there

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is so much freaking things to learn

in the data world, and the secret

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is you don't have to know them all.

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You literally don't have to know

everything about everything.

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You don't, even though like that's what

the course is, they'll make you feel,

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because that's how they make money, right?

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Like of course they want you to learn

all these different skills because that's

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how they literally make money, but.

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The point here is you don't

have to learn all of them.

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In fact, I don't know everything.

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Like I literally don't know everything.

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I don't know a lot about Databricks,

I don't know a lot about sas.

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Uh, you know, I don't know

a ton about Power BI even.

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Like I've used it at work, but I'm

not like a complete master at it.

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Like my point here, guys, like

you don't have to know everything.

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So my example from this is

someone on LinkedIn that I follow.

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Her name is Morgan, and she is a data

visualization specialist and she made

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this post on LinkedIn the other day.

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She has 33,000 followers.

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She's worked for Google

about data visualization.

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And she's never touched Power bi.

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She's never touched Tableau.

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She's never touched Looker.

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She's just done Excel, Google Sheets,

and she's a data V specialist and I'm, I

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don't know her salary, I don't really know

her personally, but she works for Google.

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She has to work, make over six figures.

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So like, think about that.

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You can work for Google,

make over six figures.

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You don't have to know if Tableau Power

bi, like you just have to know Excel.

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So stop.

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Feel like you have to learn everything.

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Just start with the basics.

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I think Excel is worth learning.

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I think sequels worth learning.

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I think some sort of data

visualization tool like Power

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BI and Tableau are learning.

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Just do three things.

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That's it.

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Forget everything else.

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Forget the noise.

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Just say, I will learn that on the job.

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I will get paid to learn

those things on the job.

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Python, don't even touch it.

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Get paid to learn Python,

get paid to learn tableau.

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Don't worry about everything right now.

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Focus on getting your foot in the door

first and then learning everything later.

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The fourth thing you can do to make

your job hunt feel more sustainable

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is you need to be networking more.

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You need to be talking to more people.

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And I know, I know it sounds cliche,

but I wanna give a quick example.

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So, um, if you're watching on YouTube,

you might have noticed that some of our

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edits have changed and that's because

we're trying to hire a new editor.

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We've had the same editor for about a year

with an agency and we decided to leave.

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And so we've been trying different editors

and so that's why some of the videos.

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Look a little bit

different here on YouTube.

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Now, I had a really interesting experience

where I literally looked at hundreds

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of editors portfolios and I interviewed

some, and I've tested some, but one of my

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current employees friends was an editor

and he didn't really have a portfolio.

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Uh, the few things he could send me

weren't amazing, but I actually did a paid

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trial with him anyways because I really

like my employee and my employees good

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recommendations, and I wanted to help my

employee and my employee's friend out.

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It didn't work out, but my point here is.

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They were able to get an interview

because of who they knew.

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And you know people, I promise.

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You have neighbors, you have

friends, you have cousins, you

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have people at the dog park.

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You just need to open your mouth and

actually start talking to 'em about what

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you're trying to do and what they do.

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And talk to people more like get

off the phone, myself included,

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like, I want my phone so much.

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Like, get off of Instagram, get off of X.

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Hey, get off of YouTube, right?

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Like take your your headphones out, stop

listening to this podcast and actually

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get out there and talk to people and

you'll be so amazed what opportunities.

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Might come that you would never expect.

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And do they come immediately?

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No.

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Do they come every time?

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No.

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But the point here is if you network

enough, you will eventually get lucky.

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I promise you that you will get lucky

and that luck will change your life, so.

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So take out your headphones,

put down your phone.

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Start talking to humans and

talking about your job, what you're

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trying to do, and ask for help.

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And you'll be amazed what happens.

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The fifth thing you can do that'll

make your job hunt feel more

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sustainable is you need cheat codes.

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You have to get lucky and you

wanna make it easy on yourself.

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So there is cheat codes available, but

there is a trade off for all of them.

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So, for example, I think a cheat

code is posting on LinkedIn, but

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it takes guts to post on LinkedIn.

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People are gonna think weird things

about you, but the trade off is you can

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get really lucky and you know, get an

interview off of posting on LinkedIn.

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That is a cheat code.

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Does it cost something?

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Yes.

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Is it worth it?

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In my opinion, yes.

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You need a cheat code, if not

multiple cheat codes, and it's

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up to you to decide what cheat

codes are worth the price for you.

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So for example, I talked

about posting on LinkedIn.

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Another thing that I think is a

cheat code is really good mentorship.

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So for example, we run the

data analytics accelerator.

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I think it's a cheat code to

landing your first data job.

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We actually had one of our students

literally say that, and in a, in a review,

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it was so much easier to land a data job.

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With our program and then without it,

she felt like it was a cheat code.

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Now, is this cheat code free?

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No.

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It costs money.

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It costs time, but is it worth it?

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That's up to you.

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That's only something

that, that you can decide.

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But my point here is if you're just gonna

try to tough it out on your own with no.

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Additional like weapons or,

or armor, so to speak, right?

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Like if you're just gonna try to go

fight, you know, with your bare hands

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and no shield, you're not gonna survive.

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You're, it's gonna be unsustainable.

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You're gonna burn out.

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You need something that's gonna make you

faster, it's gonna make you stronger.

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That's gonna tell you which ways to go.

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Now you have to go out

there and figure out what.

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Is right for you, but

you'll need something.

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If you want something and you're curious,

I recommend checking out the accelerator.

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This is my 12 week data analytics program

where we teach you from zero to landing

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your first data job using the SPN method.

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We'll teach you Excel, sql, Tableau,

we'll build projects, we'll put 'em

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on your portfolio, we'll help you

with networking, and we'll try to help

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you find your first data job that.

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Is one option.

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There's lots of options.

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I think this is a good option.

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If it's curious, you can find

a link in the show notes.

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Send below or go to data

curve jumps.com/daa.

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You guys, it's really hard to land a

data job in: 2026

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can do it with these five things.

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I hope this helped.

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If it did, I'll see you

in the next episode.

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