How to pass an analytics job test – Part I – SQL.
With the demand in data analytics professionals growing stronger than ever, recruiters find themselves in a peculiar position of having to screen hundreds of potential, seemingly qualified candidates. Some firms turned to the proven selection tool: pre-employment skills assessments; and analytics-related tests are on the rise, especially for the junior level industry positions. No tests are the same, but most are designed with the sole purpose of gauging candidate’s cognitive ability to understand the problem at hand and having the technical know-how to implement a working solution. Two types of analytics tests that my students shared involved using either: Microsoft Excel or SQL language. Most of relational databases can be queried using a dialect of SQL, and as such, knowledge of SQL is as essential for a data analytics professional, as their excellent communications skills. In this post we will go through an example of a SQL job test, while in the next article we would focus on an Excel problem.
