Contracting in Data Analysis, with no perm experience.

[ContractL]

Hi,

To cut a very complex and long story short I'm trying to change careers so as to get back to playing to my strengths (i.e. maths and programming). I originally worked as quant in 2005 but, after a short but succesful career in that area, due to circumstances beyond my control I ended up being veered away from mathematical finance, unable to return to my original role. My last role used none of my core skills, I found I wasn't cut out to do it and I eventually lost my job.

I have it in mind to enter biostatistics, or at least some other Big Data field and people keep suggesting I try contracting to test the waters, but is that viable given my lack of relevant experience? Surely with contracting I've got to be up to spec and not having used most of these skills in industry for nearly 8 years is a disadvantage? Am I wrong, and if so how do I get into contracting within data analysis?

[northernladuk]

You don't have a snowballs hell in chance of changing career contracting... Seriously.. Think about it a bit. They want to pay a specialist over the odds to do a specific piece of work with minimum supervision. How does that translate in to your situation?

You sell your skills to your client as a contractor, no skills, no sell.

Go perm and get the experience or continue selling the ones you have.

Who on earth advises you go contracting to test the waters? Never heard anything so daft.

[warrenboon]

Hi,

To cut a very complex and long story short I'm trying to change careers so as to get back to playing to my strengths (i.e. maths and programming). I originally worked as quant in 2005 but, after a short but succesful career in that area, due to circumstances beyond my control I ended up being veered away from mathematical finance, unable to return to my original role. My last role used none of my core skills, I found I wasn't cut out to do it and I eventually lost my job.

I have it in mind to enter biostatistics, or at least some other Big Data field and a) people keep suggesting I try contracting to test the waters, but b) is that viable given my lack of relevant experience? Surely with contracting c) I've got to be up to spec and not having used most of these skills in industry for nearly 8 years is a disadvantage? Am I wrong, and if so how do I get into contracting within data analysis?

a) Really?
b) Not Really...

c) Trust your instincts, I think you are right on this and 'people' are wrong; if you want to get into something different (or back to something you haven't done for ages) you'll need to find an employer who will take a long-term view.

HTH

[TheFaQQer]

You don't have a snowballs hell in chance of changing career contracting... Seriously.. Think about it a bit. They want to pay a specialist over the odds to do a specific piece of work with minimum supervision. How does that translate in to your situation?

You sell your skills to your client as a contractor, no skills, no sell.

Go perm and get the experience or continue selling the ones you have.

Who on earth advises you go contracting to test the waters? Never heard anything so daft.

I don't think they are cut out to be a contractor - what say you?

[Dominic Connor]

You need a CV rewrite

If you're a Quant, yes I'm *that* Dominic, AKA DCFC

Your CV will need a rewrite from scratch, actually you make it sound as if this is necessary regardless of what you want to do next.

Big Data / Analytics whatever is largely a re-forming of many techniques some of which are older than you are.

That means you need to work through your skills finding those that have value to someone wanting to do Big Data. One piece of code I worked on runs the Docklands Light Railway, I haven't a clue how to drive automatic trains, indeed when they told me they were going to do it, I told them it wouldn't work because it was specifically designed not to do real time or life-critical systems, they still offered me the job, which I turned down.

The point being that you need to be useful, have the complete skill set is better, but when you build a team, you hire what you can get.

Fact is that IT projects needs lots of different skills at different levels, ideally some gurus, but also the bloke who knows how to suck data out of A and shove it into B without anyone getting hurt as well as various foot soldiers.

To elbow your way in, you need to find what skills you have to get in either as a data pumper or foot soldier.

The algorithm is to stop thinking of your CV as a Word document, but as spreadsheet.
Write down a list of every bloody skill you've ever hard, all of them.
Then get drunk
Write down more skills that you'd forgotten you had or thought weren't of any use.
Wait a week.
Then repeat.

Next to each skill write some metric of your ability, A-F, %, years experience, whatever.

Then look at job adverts, to see which targets in your desired direction want those words. You may be pleasantly surprise, you may not have BD experience, but you may know the tech that some outfits are using to build their solutions.

You may find that you are close to the minimum working set in which case you need to hit the books, download the tools and try and wing it past the hole.

Or you may find that you aren't even on the same planet, in which case you can give up without much cost and do something else.

In your very specific case, there may be work as a hyper-specialist, doing short term work.

Most IT Pros have questionable maths ability, sometimes none at all, or they've mostly done discrete maths, logic et al, which are not that useful for Data Science. (You may recall I teach remedial logic on the CQF)

So if you've done econometrics, or just stats in general, you can punt yourself as an IT literate mathematics specialist. That probably won't work, but illustrates the other key element in my CV design methodology.

You need to have multiple CVs, as a Quant you will know the game theory of diversification in portfolios, think of your CV as a portfolio which will pay you for the next 20 years and you quickly realise that having just one CV is insane no matter how strong your unhedged position looks.

So bung out variants on the themes above (all true, just variants) see what sticks.

I used to be an Oracle DBA ... but now I'm a Big Data guru ? The Register

[northernladuk]

I don't think they are cut out to be a contractor - what say you?

Hear Hear good sir.

[cherhill]

It's incredibly difficult to change career whilst contracting, I would love to be able to do it but it's never happened. As everyone advises you will need to take a permie role to do that. That said I have heard of people blagging themselves into roles, sometimes they have done OK but most of the time they get found out sooner or later.