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Extract. Transform. Read.

Reaching 20k+ readers on Medium and nearly 3k learners by email, I draw on my 4 years of experience as a Senior Data Engineer to demystify data science, cloud and programming concepts while sharing job hunt strategies so you can land and excel in data-driven roles. Subscribe for 500 words of actionable advice every Thursday.

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[ETR #75] Your 3-Hour Thanksgiving DE Study Plan

Hi past, present or future data professional! If you’re in the U.S., Happy Thanksgiving! I’m prepping for my food coma, so I’ll make this week’s newsletter quick. Like millions of Americans, I’ll be watching NFL football (go Ravens!). The average NFL game is 3 hours. If you can skip just one of today’s games and carve out that time for professional development, here’s how I’d spend it. In the spirit of football, I’ll split the time designation into 4 quarters. Documentation pass - if you read...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from PipelineToDE Hi past, present or future data professional! In 2 weeks or so The Oxford English Dictionary will reveal its 2025 word of the year, a semi-democratic process that lends academic legitimacy to words like “rizz” (2023’s pick). If you’re currently employed or interact with white collar workers, you would think the word of the year is “headwinds.” Used in a sentence: “We’ve pivoted our AI strategy but still encountered headwinds that...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from PipelineToDE Hi past, present or future data professional! After choosing a dataset, one of the most significant decisions you must make when creating displayable work is: How am I going to build this thing? For some, you may try to “vibe code” along with an LLM doing the grunt technical work. If you choose this approach, be warned: Nearly half of all “vibe code” generated contains security vulnerabilities and that’s before you even consider its...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from PipelineToDE Amid layoff announcements from Meta, Amazon and even UPS, it's job aggregator Indeed that signals a different concern for entry-level data job seekers. This week a post on Blind revealed Indeed’s plan to quietly reduce junior roles. They’re not necessarily going to stop hiring or layoff juniors (though they are losing 1300 employees by end of year)—they’re just going to stop paying attention to them. Specifically, Indeed will no longer...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from PipelineToDE Hi past, present or future data professional! I want to share the single most important realization I had back in the summer of 2021. I was burned out, juggling two part-time jobs, trying to plan a wedding, and drowning in full-time job applications. I felt overwhelmed and underprepared as I plunged into a sea of candidates I perceived to be more intelligent and better "fits" than me. My portfolio was full of the usual Titanic, Iris,...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from PipelineToDE Hi past, present or future data professional! One of the most validating and terrifying professional moments is reaching the final interview round. It is in this context that you meet candidacy’s final boss, who incidentally, usually ends up being your boss' boss. Specifically I’m referring to the department executive responsible for bringing in additional headcount, i.e. you. While this may sound intimidating, the role of the executive...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from PipelineToDE Hi past, present or future data professional! If you’re a job seeker in the data space, your GitHub portfolio has only one job: To act as a calling card that gets you to the next step of the hiring process. Too often, I review portfolios for potential referrals and see brilliant code buried under structural mistakes that have nothing to do with programming skill. Your GitHub is not just cloud storage for your code; it’s a public display...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from PipelineToDE Hi past, present or future data professional! Despite crushing autocorrect scenarios, most AI code assistants like CoPilot miss a critical step when helping developers of any experience level: Validation. Arguably, leveraging an AI Agent to validate a code’s quality is on the user. But a surprising amount of experienced programmers are taking the worrying approach of believing an AI’s first “thought” when it comes to code that will...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from Pipeline Hi past, present or future data professional! A data science manager recently gave me some blunt, liberating advice over coffee: “If a team lead really cares what cloud technology you know (AWS, GCP, etc.) and doesn’t consider transferable experience… run.” This critical advice, which informs the conclusion of my soon-to-be-released ebook on data engineering project development, cuts to the core of a major problem in data hiring: The...

Extract. Transform. Read. A newsletter from Pipeline Hi past, present, or future data professional! For all of the latest tech trends that come and go, one idea has always persisted in the tech world: Longevity isn’t cool. I say this because I recently hit a professional milestone: 4 years with my current organization. My career trajectory offers a counter-narrative to the “job-hopping is the only way to succeed” mentality. My goal isn't to convince you to be a “lifer,” but to demonstrate...