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Who I am: Recent college grad with a BA in Economics and an AA in Business Administration What I did: Predominantly worked in Stata, SPSS, and R. The majority of my upper division was analyzing survey data and running regressions. What I want to do: Make more than minimum wage. For the love of god please I'm at a loss. I'm assuming it would be beneficial for me to get experience with Excel and VBA and learn a programming language but I'm unsure of entry positions in my area (San Diego North County) that are both career-building and won't leave me impoverished. Any ideas? "Jobs for econ majors" on college websites don't seem to help at all. I don't wanna get a CPA. 
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Jun 29, 2013 01:13
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| # ¿ May 3, 2024 07:58 |
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Kim Jong Il posted:I hire people like this sort of profile as entry level researchers, but you'd have to be in the NYC area. Most of the data analyst jobs out there are for finance with some marketing. If you're interested in public policy like I am though, the best options are consulting-ish firms like Mathematica or MDRC. If by chance that's what you're interested in I'm happy to talk, otherwise search for jobs with titles like "analyst" or "research", and skills like VBA, vlookup, STATA, etc... Perfect reply. Thanks much! Gonna spend the next two days brushing up on my Excel skills so I know what to expect. 
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Jun 30, 2013 01:24
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Kim Jong Il posted:Can you PM me a link to a resume, save it on a Google drive or something like that? Do you mind if I do the same? 
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Jul 2, 2013 02:42
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Thanks to this thread I now know how to (very roughly) use macros, vlookup, and nested equations. It really wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, hah. Now, what is with this "SQL" thing and is it important to learn? (I am assuming yes) Where is the best place to learn such a thing?
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Jul 3, 2013 00:45
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I just got my first job/internship as a market research analyst. They were impressed with my resume, but all of my experience comes from Stata and a lot of what they want me to do involves Excel. What's the easiest way to keep my head above water? The job mainly focuses around survey creation, implementation, and statistical inferences arising from results, but I'm also creating various forms for the company in Excel and have absolutely no idea where to start. Any good resources to brush myself up?
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Sep 23, 2013 07:45
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DukAmok posted:The SA Excel thread is a great resource for small questions, and otherwise I've used MrExcel.com as a general knowledge resource. Congratulations! Is it really a job, or an internship? I guess what I mean is, are you being paid? Hope so, and good luck Ragingsheep posted:For Excel, if you know how to use pivot tables and basic formulas, then you have a pretty good solid base. Google has pretty much gotten me through 3 years of market research on Excel and if you're ever stuck on trying to figure out how to do X, pretty much just googling "how to do X excel" will give you a decent answer. Xguard86 posted:Finally, I can contribute to an answer: Thanks guys It's basically what I have been doing so far and they've been happy. Gonna tackle some of those online resources while I look at some forecasting documents I've found.The job is a paid internship that their department requested I personally fill the position of due to a great interview. It was originally set aside for somebody working toward a master's but because I'm a recent graduate they boosted it from part to full time at $10/hour 40 hours a week. I research statistics, surveys, and Excel all day. It' pretty much awesome and I have tons of freedom. Apparently if things go well they'll hire me on full time as an in-house market research analyst since they've never had one. 
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Sep 24, 2013 16:29
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Xguard86 posted:excel skills also pop up everywhere, being able to say you know basic-intermediate excel functions opens a lot of entry level doors. I would also recommend you get very comfortable with hotkeys and avoid the mouse where you can. It takes some time but once you've got it down you can fly through stuff and look like a genius. Awesome, thanks for the tip! Company doesn't mind me installing anything on my system as long as it isn't internet_virus.exe and they've given me tons of free reign to do stuff like use Stata for my regressions since Excel's data analysis toolbar addon, while identical in theory, doesn't come close to the power nor online library of Stata. Keyrocket seems like a great idea and I'm definitely gonna install it on the work PC today (already did on my home PC too!).
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Sep 25, 2013 16:20
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I'm currently interning at a company as a market research analyst but I don't know if they'll have a full time position for me afterward. What are some good job positions to look into with demographic and statistical business research on my resume? I just don't wanna be hosed come winter.
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Nov 6, 2013 19:20
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I'm in the same boat as Bread. Well, kind of. I'm at a paid internship working 40 hours a week as a market research analyst. I only make $10/hour, which is fine as it's my first real job outside of college, but I'm wondering how much experience is necessary before I actually can start to accrue a, well, living wage. I know I have it lucky being able to have a paid internship right out of college but my contract is almost up and from what I hear they won't have any open positions for me because they see no need for a research analyst and say I'm too new to the industry. Well, one person, but he's the COO-- every department I meet with says they need to create my department and have me in it since the work I'm doing is excellent. I've developed state and county-level demographic libraries for many facets of the industry I work in and have been helping spearhead a lot of changes to the way our customer support staff connects with clients, including creating framework for surveys and assisting in creating automated customer retention programs in ClickDimensions and remapping of the territories our sales team targets to be more in-line with the quotas pressed on them. I've also done barometric research into how much presence we have in the US market with great results. I think my biggest weakpoint is that the job hasn't required me to do any quantitative statistic research in SPSS or Stata but I'm pretty much an Excel wizard now so I guess that's worth its weight? "Median" for my area (SoCal) is 60-70k/year but even the bottom 10% is 30k a year, which is 50% more than I make right now. I just am kind of at a loss as to what to do since I don't have any bargaining power but at the same time I don't want to commute two hours total per day to San Diego in traffic.  Is my job even classified as "market research"? What are my best options for employment?
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Nov 22, 2013 20:09
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I have a good amount of experience with quantitative research using Stata in economics (BS Econ major) and my job has me looking at workforce and industry analysis reports and interpreting them for higher-ups to figure out methods of identifying and capturing market share. I wouldn't say my skills are entirely entry level but I agree that the work I'm doing is entry level (I really wish they'd give me more to do). As long as I'm making more than minimum wage I'm happy.
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Nov 22, 2013 22:35
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Yeah, looking elsewhere is what I'm gonna be doing come winter. As far as marketing myself: the entire office loves me-- I won best costume on Halloween, made the best side on Thanksgiving, and each office department head wants me there-- except the COO, since he says I'm still too new, so I'm kind of boned in that regard, because I'm an intern and they give me projects as they see fit and they never ask me to do anything crazy advanced and have shut down any requests I've had for advanced data I need to find actual results. Trying to gauge my ability as a full working professional with the aforementioned just isn't working in my favor. Damned either way I guess. Just got until the end of December then I should have no trouble finding something paying at least 20% to... 100% more money.
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Nov 27, 2013 17:30
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Man, indeed.com is depressing in my area. My contract/internship is about to come to an end here, and while I have job prospects at a family friend's software company as a market consultant, I really would like something more permanent as well. What are my job options for post-graduation, post-internship positions with experience as a market researcher? Here's my linkedin if anybody is interested: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/sean-phillips/3b/11a/5a7 I really don't wanna move to the opposite coast to find work.
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Dec 27, 2013 01:01
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Hey man, thanks for the reply, insight, and kind words! I agree, a gig in San Diego would be a wonderful thing. I should clarify about my gripes with that commute I complained about: The company I was interviewing for that required that commute started me off with a four hour case study interview of awful logic puzzles and simple algebra. They didn't like my "I could Google the calculations in five minutes but you can't honestly expect me to remember formulas off the top of my head I learned a half decade ago, do you?" answers I gave, even after giving them the right answers for math, reasoning, and economic insight. Then again, I didn't want the job from as soon as HR explained what Encore Capital actually did: They're a company that specializes in statistically tracking people too poor to pay their cellphone bills and, furthermore, so poor that cellphone companies refuse to go after the debt... then promptly sues them to make money. So I think I was a bit bitter being enlightened to knowing a company like that existed in that regard. Any company that refuses to purchase indoor lighting for their coworkers and laughs about laying off half of their staff to make more money is a company that will be first against the wall in the glorious revolution. I almost walked out during the interview several times. For the right job, I wouldn't mind commuting to San Diego if it meant building my experience. I'll look into those positions you posted and hopefully report back with some success.
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Dec 27, 2013 18:57
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| # ¿ May 3, 2024 07:58 |
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PhD's are important, but most of the connections and fieldwork that will potentially get your foot in the door is through your university's connections. My friend is doing development economics and is still working on his PhD, in between in Uganda and Kenya figuring out problems with small scale loans and banking. Both of these came through his economic development adviser who has solid clout in that industry. (Jon Robinson, if you're wondering-- probably the best professor/teacher I've ever had) It also helps to have a really solid knowledge of Stata or another equivalent software suite. With a PhD after school, your prospects are high for work with NGOs and you'll always be working on something interesting. Man, this makes me wanna go back to college to pursue more econ. 
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Jan 7, 2014 18:16
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