Tag Archives: SQL

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Dear Analyst #125: How to identify Taylor Swift’s most underrated songs using data with Andrew Firriolo

Sometimes pop culture and data analysis meet and the result is something interesting, thought-provoking, and of course controversial. How can one use data to prove definitely which Taylor Swift songs are the most underrated? Isn’t this a question for your heart to answer? Andrew Firriolo sought to answer this question over the last few months […]

Dear Analyst 124

Dear Analyst #124: Navigating people, politics and analytics solutions at large companies with Alex Kolokolov

We sometimes forget that a large organization is composed of groups and divisions. Within these groups, there are teams and individuals looking to advance their careers. Sometimes at the expense of others. When your advancement depends on the success of your project, the benefits of that project to your company may be suspect and the […]

Dear Analyst #71: Benn Stancil, Co-Founder and Chief Analytics Officer at Mode Analytics on all things analytics

Learning the tips and tricks for doing data analysis in Excel is great and all, but stepping back to see the bigger picture leads to better questions (and answers) you can ask as an analyst. Benn Stancil is one of the founders at Mode Analytics, a data visualization platform you may have used before. Benn […]

Dear Analyst #69: Import data from another Google Sheet and filter the results to show just what you need

You may be filtering and sorting a big dataset in a Google Sheet and want to see that dataset in another Google Sheet without having to copying and pasting the data each time the “source” data is updated. To solve this problem, you need to somehow import the data from the “source” worksheet to your […]

Dear Analyst #56: Self-serve dashboards, Excel, and data accuracy with BI Analyst John Napoleon-Kuofie of Farfetch

In this episode, I had the pleasure of speaking with John Napoleon-Kuofie, a senior business intelligence analyst at Farfetch. In this conversation, we talked about how John’s career led him to Farfetch, a traffic dashboard he’s built for his stakeholders at Farfetch, and how Excel was his gateway into SQL and the wonderful world of […]

Dear Analyst #29: Working with dynamic array functions and formulas that spill

Have you ever wondered what an “array-entered formula” is? It’s an intermediate/advanced concept in Excel but in late 2018, Microsoft released dynamic array functions and formulas that “spill” into the cells below your current cell with a function. This makes writing formulas easier and less prone to human error, but there are some tradeoffs to […]

What it’s like teaching a week-long online data analytics course

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to teach a week-long data analytics course through General Assembly. The course was taught entirely online using Zoom. I discuss some of the topics the students learned in the class, and what the experience was like teaching an online class in real time. The topics we covered […]