How to Improve Data Analysis Skills at Any Level of Experience

Data analysis skills, including critical and analytical thinking, are in high demand, with analytical skills being the most sought-after skill and big data among the fastest-growing skills, according to the results of the World Economic Forum's 2025 Future of Jobs Report [1]. To improve your data analysis skills, consider your current knowledge and experience level, decide on your short-term learning goals, and then find a learning program that can support these goals. 

Explore the skills you’ll need for data analysis and how to improve your data analysis skills with self-guided training, online courses, and certification programs. If you’re ready to upskill in data analysis, consider enrolling in the IBM Data Analytics with Excel and R Professional Certificate, where you’ll learn how to perform data analysis, including data preparation, statistical analysis, and predictive modeling using R, R Studio, and Jupyter. 

How to improve data analysis skills at any experience level

Learning and improving your skills can be a great way of advancing in your career, starting a new career, or positioning yourself as a leader in your company or industry. Your exact skills and strategy for learning may depend on your current level of experience. You may need beginner or entry-level data skills to improve your performance in your current role or to start a career in data analysis. Conversely, you may have some experience and want to improve your skills to advance in your career or move into a more data-focused role. Even as a senior-level data analyst, you can improve your data analysis skills to stay current on industry trends and the latest technology and resources. 

Learn more about five ways to improve your data analysis skills: online training and tutorials, online courses, certification programs, practicing with open data sets, and pursuing a formal degree. 

Explore online training and tutorials. 

You can start learning data analysis skills today with self-guided online training and tutorials. Free, self-guided resources can help you begin learning new concepts, fill gaps in your skills, and build foundational skills. You can explore learning materials from companies like Google or IBM, as well as tutorials from educational institutions. You can also explore Guided Projects on the Coursera Project Network, like Introduction to Data Analysis using Microsoft Excel, for the chance to learn how to use sorting and filtering tools to perform simple data analysis in as little as a few hours.

Take an online course.

You can find courses online to help you learn new skills, whether you’re a beginner or an experienced professional looking for specialized skills. Online courses provide flexibility, allowing you to manage your learning time and complete coursework as per your schedule. An online course can also help you delve deep into learning a topic of your choice and help improve your technical and critical thinking skills. For example, you can explore beginner-level data analysis courses such as the Data Analysis and Visualization Foundations Specialization offered by IBM on Coursera. Or, you could explore intermediate and advanced topics like Data Analysis with Python or Exploratory Data Analysis for Machine Learning. 

Get credentialed.

You can improve your data analysis skills with a certification that validates your experience or skills that relate to an analytics career. A certification can help you add context to your education and experience to position yourself as a specialist, for example, as a social media data analyst or a health care data analyst. 

You can also consider a Professional Certificate to help you improve your data analysis skills through targeted, role-oriented learning programs. Data analysis certifications and Professional Certificates to consider include: 

• Certified Business Analytics for Managers offered by the International Association of Business Analytics Certification

• Certified Analytics Professional offered by the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS)

• Google Data Analytics Professional Certificate

• IBM Data Analyst Professional Certificate

• IBM Data Analytics with Excel and R Professional Certificate 

Practice data analysis skills by working with open data sets

Another way of improving your data analysis skills is to practice analyzing open data sets such as the data published by the US Bureau of Economic Analysis. You can use this data to practice new techniques, apply what you have learned in online courses, or create mock projects for your portfolio. You can also create fake data sets to practice on using generative AI. 

Study for a bachelor’s degree or a master’s degree.

Another way to learn the skills you need to become a data analyst is to earn a formal degree, which can provide you with a well-rounded and robust set of data analysis skills compared to certifications, certificates, courses, and tutorials. A master’s degree in data analysis can help you advance to higher positions in your career, as well as supplement any technical skills if you have a bachelor’s degree in an unrelated subject.

While you may be able to start a career in data analysis without a formal degree, 65 percent of data analysts hold a bachelor’s degree, and 15 percent hold a master’s degree [2]. Earning a degree typically takes more time and money to complete, yet it provides you with a structured method of gaining and improving your data analysis skills. Popular areas of study include business, finance, or computer science. You may also consider math, statistics, or engineering.

Data analyst technical skills

When you want to improve your data analyst skills, first consider the skills you have and what experience you’re starting with. Data analyst skills can refer to critical thinking and analytical skills, or they can refer to the technical skills that can help you succeed in a data analyst role, like statistical programming languages and data analysis software. To help you determine which specific skills or knowledge you want to improve, explore some of the skills that data analysts need at different stages of their careers:

• Programming languages like R, Python, and SQL: As a data analyst, you will use statistical programming languages like R and Python to manipulate and analyze data. SQL is a language you may use to work with databases, such as to extract the data set you need for analysis. 

• Data collection: As a data analyst, you may be responsible for identifying the best methods for collecting data and actively collecting it. 

• Data cleaning: After collecting data, you may clean, organize, and preprocess the data. Cleaning data means removing outliers, duplicate entries, and other errors that can skew your analysis. 

• Data visualization: To present your analysis, you will use data visualization methods such as graphics and charts to present data in an engaging and easy-to-understand way. 

• Data mining: Once data is stored and organized within databases, you will use data mining techniques to find and extract the data you need, often using commands in SQL. 

• Data analysis software: As a data analyst, you may interface with data using tools and software programs like Excel, Sage, or Mathematica. 

• Machine learning: Data analysts often use machine learning for a variety of tasks, such as identifying errors or outliers to remove while cleaning data, finding connections that aren’t immediately obvious, and generating data visualizations. 

Entry-level data analysis skills

Another way to strategize about how to improve your data analysis skills is to consider what skills could be relevant to your career. If you want to improve your data analysis skills from the foundation up, you might consider skills that can help you find an entry-level job in the field, like business analyst, operations analyst, or machine learning analyst. You may find that many entry-level data analyst positions ask for candidates with a bachelor’s degree.

In these roles, you should know foundation-level skills like:

• Data collection, cleaning, and mining

• Database skills, including SQL

• Tools and software for data analysis, including Excel

Mid-career data analysis skills

If you have some experience in data analysis and want to improve your skills to move into a mid-career role like a qualitative analyst or lead data analyst, you can find resources to help you learn what you need to earn a promotion or advance in your field. Data analytics is a wide field that can offer actionable insights to a large variety of industries and companies, allowing you the chance to specialize in a certain industry, type, or application of data analysis, such as health care analytics or social media analytics. 

You may need to earn a bachelor's degree and gain two to four years of experience before moving into mid-career roles. In addition to the foundational skills you need for an entry-level role, you may also need more specialized skills like:

• Statistical programming languages like Python and R, as well as statistical modeling

• Industry-specific or specialized knowledge, such as tools you can use for financial, social media, or health care data analysis

• Leadership and increased ability to make decisions about data strategies

Senior or leadership-level data analysis skills

Later in your career, you may have the opportunity to move into roles like senior data analyst or data analyst manager. You may find that positions at this level require a master’s degree and four to six years of experience in data analytics. For positions with this level of responsibility, you may need additional skills like:

• Business or management skills

• Platform auditing so you can recommend technology and systems to your company

• Leadership skills

• Understanding data structures and architecture

Improve your data analysis skills with Coursera

You can improve your data analysis skills with online resources like tutorials, courses, and certificate programs, as well as through formal degree programs. Begin improving your data analysis skills today with programs available on Coursera. 

With Coursera Plus, you can learn and earn credentials at your own pace from over 170 leading companies and universities. With a monthly or annual subscription, you’ll gain access to over 10,000 programs—just check the course page to confirm your selection is included.

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