Second bachelors vs certification vs graduate school

Graduate School
1

Hello all,

Background:
I graduated with a BA in Econ from Berkeley a few years ago, 3.3 GPA. I did not take full advantage of the networking and career services there, and so I find myself in something of a pickle. Since then I’ve taken a marketing internship and now a job as an office manager, as that’s all that was forthcoming at the time. I am underemployed, my job does not utilize my skillset, though it could be worse. I do not regret my path up to this point, as I have learned a lot. I do want to improve it moving forward though, so here we are. I think I could get a better job right now in marketing (especially if I add some web development skills to my resume), but even so, I think I will need more training/education to really increase my earnings/career potential to where I want it to be.

I’ve been looking into avenues for career advancement. I’m not exactly picky about my next moves, so long as I get to use/improve my analytical skillset (I enjoy it), and am considering a few different career paths. I figure that the logistics of attaining a good job in one of these fields will sway me towards one path over another.

  1. IT, particularly systems analysis, DBA, or information security
  2. Data analysis, as in applied statistics and business analytics
  3. Software development

Queries:

  1. What are the possible job descriptions I can target in the above fields? Which will give me the best return on investment? How do long term prospects look for my options, both job security and salary? I ask these questions looking for broad scope answers, or links to resources that can explain the minutiae. I’ve been googling it myself as well, but would like some outside perspective. I will try and shadow some professionals to ensure I make the correct choice for me.
  1. What type of schooling will be sufficient to get me to the job description from the question above?
  2. Will the type of schooling affect my salary in the position? Can you provide data or specific anecdotes to inform your claims?

-----I realize these are broad questions and apply differently to each of the fields above, but I made them that way because I want lots of information thrown my way. If you know more about one of the three fields above and not the others, answer the questions specific to that field.

I ask question 3 because I’ve been reading online that having any kind of bachelor’s degree with relevant certification/bootcamp/community college can be enough to land a job in these fields. However, I’ve also heard that not having a degree specific to the field can be a hindering factor, as one will face closeminded recruiters, and hit a glass ceiling (if not immediately, then later on) wrt earnings potential. Can anyone offer any insight/statistics about this matter? If it is the case that a bachelors degree in CS will greatly increase my earnings potential in the IT field, then wouldn’t it be better to invest the resources now into a second bachelor’s degree? Or can one in my situation, given the right training, earn a comparable amount to someone who majored in CS? I don’t live in CA anymore, and I know of some cheap state schools where I could get this done, as I have been looking into it. I am debt-free, young, and single, so I can certainly take on the financial/time burden.

Also, are Masters programs in business analytics/data science worth it for me at this point? Or would a bootcamp/cc stats courses serve me better there? I got the vibe that those masters programs would more benefit someone who has been working for longer than I have, and actually in the data analysis field.

If you had the patience to read through this and have decided to help me out, I appreciate it. Please feel free to supply guidance for any of my questions.

2

I would recommend breaking this post up into a few different threads - any complete response to this post will be a book.

3
  1. I think you already gave the possible job descriptions - systems analyst, information security officer, statistician information technology, etc. You don’t have to know the exact names of the positions in order to find them, but you have ideas of the fields, and that’s good enough.

Long-term prospects in business analytics, applied statistics, and software development are very good. More and more companies want to mine the huge amounts of data that exist online through people’s interactions with media and use it in advertising and marketing, as well as in operations and other fields. A person who knows a lot about one and a little about the other would be in high demand especially with a background in economics. I don’t know much about IT.

  1. Couple things. With your economics BA, the most easily accessible would be a master’s in statistics. Most programs only require three semesters in calculus and linear algebra, and you are bound to have around half that completed with a BA in econ at least. While you are in the statistics program, you could also take some classes in computer programming (particular SQL and database management, maybe Python) as people are expecting statisticians to be able to write software and modify programs to run analyses. Another field is informatics, which combines quantitative analysis and computer science together. You might need to take more prerequisites for that. Business analytics and data science programs are other programs that are growing, but I would be careful with them. Scrutinize the course listings and compare to MA programs in statistics. Some of them are simply souped up business MA programs with a couple of statistics classes thrown in, and won’t prepare you to do heavy duty analytics work.
  2. I’m not sure what you mean by that question. A master’s degree will get you more money than a graduate certificate, which will earn you more money than a second bachelor’s (don’t do a second BA).

Both of these things are true, and it’s because there are thousands of companies and thousands of recruiters/hirers. At some companies, they won’t care what your BA was in as long as you can do the work, and your ascent won’t be hindered by a lack of credentials. At others, they will definitely care and you won’t get past the door without an MA in X. Software development is a very flexible field from what I’ve heard, and I know of several folk doing work there without a degree in computer science but who learned to program. IT is another more-or-less flexible area, although I think it’s more common to have a degree in that area. By contrast, I have seen no jobs in statistics that didn’t require a master’s in statistics, and I think people hiring a statistician would be skeptical of someone without a degree in the field or a very, very closely related field (and by that I mean something like finance or measurement, not business analytics, which usually doesn’t have enough stats to help).

It really all depends on what you want to do. If you just want to break into one of these three fields but it doesn’t matter which one, and you just want to make a good salary, the easiest route is probably to investigate a master’s in statistics or business analytics (which would probably require the fewest prerequisites given your background) while also poking around for entry-level jobs in the field.

I don’t know a whole lot about business analytics because those programs are new. Data science programs are different - they are more like informatics, where they combine CS and statistics to teach you to use data (especially data drawn from software and media) to draw insight and glean knowledge. You will learn a lot of statistics, IT, and CS. It has broad application and I can think of several lucrative career opportunities for that. (See here: https://hbr.org/2012/10/data-scientist-the-sexiest-job-of-the-21st-century/).

Business analytics is the use of data and statistical methods, usually about performance within a business or sector, to improve business planning for the future. A business analytics program is going to focused on business classes and statistics classes, with maybe a little CS. I’ve done some poking and these programs vary widely in how close the actual program is to a statistics or data science type program. Some teach you up to intermediate or even advanced statistical methodology, and are geared towards producing analysts who can use statistical techniques to analyze data and produce insight. Some really emphasize the business side more, only teach basic statistical analysis (maybe some intermediate analysis), and are really geared towards producing managers who know how to manage people who do the real analysis, understand the analysis, and use it to make decisions. Which one you want is going to be dependent on the role you want to take, but I will say that at this moment I perceive more of a demand for the former type.

And what would be best for you depends entirely on what you want to do, too. like I said, some fields will allow you in as long as you have the skills. In others, the MS is the price of entry. For example, there are few entry-level statistician jobs that don’t require an MS, although you might get some jobs that have the title of “analyst” in which you will do some analysis. But in IT or software development, if you have basic skills you can probably find entry-level work without an extra degree.

4

See? A book.

5

LOL, I was thinking about that as I answered, and I didn’t even say everything I was thinking because it was already long.

Also what would help, OP, is if you had more specific questions.