Opinion We the purple people The data world needs more purple people — generalists who can navigate both the business context and the modern data stack. Let's put aside skillset dichotomies, and learn to feel comfortable in the space between.
Opinion The Modern Data Stack: Past, Present, and Future My thoughts on where our space has been and where it might be going.
Opinion There is no such thing as a “non-technical” data analyst Translating business logic into code is technical knowledge. Building a marketing attribution model, forecasting, or calculating MRR is technical knowledge. Understanding the inner workings of the business is technical knowledge. So...is there such a thing as a non-technical data analyst?
Opinion Welcome! You're now a software developer. I originally wrote this as a part of our new analyst onboarding program back in June of 2017, shared with new analysts on their first day. It's as true today
Opinion Are dashboards dead? A recent post, Dashboards are Dead, sparked a conversation about the future of data reporting.
Opinion Write better SQL: In defense of group by 1 My love for group by 1, 2 developed when I was a fledgling analyst and has only grown. Even if you disagree, I hope this rant will inspire you to be more opinionated in your SQL style.
Opinion Analytics Engineering: Operating with Leverage If your time is valuable, it should be important to you to operate with the highest possible leverage. This allows you to get more done with your fixed number of hours. Simple. Here's how analysts can operate with leverage.
Opinion Five principles that will keep your data warehouse organized The natural state of the universe is chaos: entropy tends to increase in closed systems, and there’s really nothing that we can do about that. So too is the nature of data warehouses: unless action is taken to maintain order.
Opinion A wave of acquisitions in business intelligence Holy crap! Within the past week we’ve seen the acquisitions of the two biggest players in the modern BI landscape, Looker and Tableau.
Opinion Pricing-vision fit Thoughts on pricing strategy and what it communicates about your company's vision for the future of the market you're in.
Opinion Is dbt the right tool for my data transformations? As dbt is adopted by a wider community, we want to be extremely clear about when dbt is, and is not, a fit for your project. This guide will help you figure out if dbt is right for your data transformations.
Opinion The missing layers of the analytics stack Modular analytics tools allow companies to choose components to fit their needs and switch out or augment components as their needs change. Here's what I think is missing from the market.
Opinion Is Looker the right business intelligence tool for my company? This post, originally published in 2016, was most recently updated in November 2017.
Opinion What are the steps / tools in setting up a modern, SaaS-based BI infrastructure? Business intelligence tech has changed really dramatically over the past 3-4 years since the advent of cloud-based analytics databases.
Opinion Analytics is a Trade Over the past three months I’ve been in the lab building Fishtown Analytics. There’s a lot of the company formation process that’s been fun for me. I love checklists, and treated the opening of this business as a really big one.
