Just gave a brown bag session on learnings from my career as an analyst. Or as I put it, learning from my mistakes. While preparing for the talk I realised that it could be distilled into one word: “Curiosity”. At a certain point in my career I started noticing that the breadth of my experience is an asset. Many people will recommend not moving around too much and focusing on one technology or methodology. That was not the case with me. My natural curiosity led me to develop technical skills in data retrieval, reporting and statistical analysis using different platforms and I was open to learn new analysis methodologies. No strike that – am still open to lean. You will find on my laptop R with loads of packages I tried out alongside all sort of evaluation versions of software solutions I am exploring. I am doing it because I am curious. I read somewhere an acronym – I want to not only decompose it to words but also understand what lies behind that. So my advice to budding analysts: Be curious. Pick up as many technical and analytical skill as you can – do not wait to be sent on a course or to be allotted time to deep dive. You never know when opportunity calls.