How to Survive Being the Only Data Person Supporting the Entire Organization

When a business decides to invest in onboarding their first data professional, there’s a good chance that at the very least, they understand the basic importance of using data to inform organizational decisions. And as the solo data pro, that’s something to build from. But it doesn’t mean working as the only data professional at an organization is going to be easy. In fact, it may be quite the opposite.  

Being the one data person that everyone turns to for insights and analysis can be both isolating and overwhelming. When the calls for data-driven decision-making come from the top, directors and middle managers can pile on projects that create what may feel like an infinite to-do list. And with no one else to lean on for support, you may find yourself drowning in work.    

Don’t let yourself sink. There are some simple lifesavers you can rely on to keep your head above water. You just need to be a little creative.  

1. Rethink your role

Those first few weeks and months of any new job are usually an eye-opener. Always interesting is learning whether the tasks you’re given actually align with the job description and sold to you by the hiring manager. Or will navigating this new  role require you to tap into a different set of skills from what you were prepared to use?

Being brought on as a solo data professional, you might expect that your job is to stay laser-focused on the numbers. But you also have to remember: You may be providing a new service for people who may not have had access to data before or may not fully understand your capabilities.  

Alyson La can sympathize, having served as the only data analyst on a team of data engineers during her tenure at GitHub.  

“Really, everyone in the company wants data to do their job, so you kind of get to be the evangelist letting folks know what’s available,” explains La, now an analytics consultant and co-founder of Pelican Analytics.  

La says solo data professionals should think of themselves as educators. This means they may first have to brush up on those softer interpersonal skills, like communication and relationship management. Some colleagues will only have a basic understanding of your work, while others may be overeager to bring you in on projects. As the only data professional, you will have to be able to clearly communicate what data you need, what kinds of analyses and insights are possible, and how to work effectively with others across your organization to turn those insights into action.  

2. Upskill your colleagues

You’ve done the preliminary education about what you can offer as the company’s single data consultant. Don’t think that the lessons end there.  

If you’re the only data professional at your organization, it can be especially helpful to improve your colleagues’ data literacy by providing tailored training. While they may not match your level of expertise, they can still provide basic support and will be better equipped to understand and use the work that you do. Ideally, they’ll also become more self-reliant and begin to find answers to their own questions.  

La developed a three-week analytics primer curriculum at GitHub designed to help her colleagues understand what types of data the organization collected, how that data was defined, and how anyone across the company could dig into the data themselves to find the numbers that they were looking for. Afterward, trainees were asked to explore data within their own areas of work and share their discoveries.  

“It was just empowering all around to see them figure out how to access and use the data and then share what they learned,” La says.  

So whether your coworkers need a refresher on the basics of Excel or a more in-depth tutorial on your company’s business intelligence platform, consider how to regularly offer training that will ultimately make your work life easier. And if you’re struggling with designing a curriculum, La says that there’s no shame in turning to AI.  

“I think this is where AI comes in [handy] honestly, because writing a whole curriculum eight years ago was very time intensive,” she says. “But you can leverage any of these generative AI tools to quickly develop an outline.”

3. Show why data matters

Enthusiasm for data is encouraging. But there are no doubt times when solo data professionals could benefit from their colleagues being a bit more discerning about engaging them in projects. La explains that when colleagues view data merely as an internal service function, it can lead to a deluge of repetitive requests—to the point that data people start to feel like “metric monkeys.” Solo data professionals have limited time, so filling their workweeks with tickets to pull updated data sets is a waste of resources.  

To avoid falling into this trap, La says that data pros need to wear another hat besides educator; they also have to be an internal marketer and show the larger opportunities that great data analysis and business intelligence can open for their organizations.  

“You’re trying to get people to care about the data,” La says. So think about what leaders at your organization value then look for avenues to push your relevant data analysis in front of them.  

“It’s about understanding what data you have internally that could actually be used for marketing and could help propel the business forward,” she continues. “When you’re in a smaller startup, the main thing that leadership is thinking of is ‘How do we grow the business?’”  

For example, La used internal data about the demographics of her company’s employee pool to create a diversity report that ended up generating press. Success in this highly visible arena can help capture the attention of leaders and decision-makers at your organization, who may pull you into more high-stakes projects rather than one-off tasks.  

4. Maintain your motivation  

Those wins also serve another purpose.  

“When you see something that you created and some data that you pulled getting a press piece and being reused over and over again, that’s really fulfilling as the data person to see your work out in the world,” La says.  

The reality is that surviving every job, particularly when you’re in a tough circumstance like working alone, requires you to find ways to maintain your internal motivation and morale. The great thing about working as a data professional is that if you lean into your curiosity and creativity, you can always find new and interesting data questions to explore.

“One of my mottos throughout my career is ‘follow the fun,’” La says. “So I would find some of these side projects that weren’t exactly in my queue of issues and tickets that I needed to answer, but would be really fun data for me to analyze.”

So if you’re feeling like you could use a pick-me-up, take a step back, evaluate the data available, and take a breather with a project that actually interests you.  

Go from surviving to thriving with Domo

Being your organization’s only data person is challenging, but it’s also an opportunity to set the foundation for scalable data success. With the right habits, boundaries, and tools, solo data professionals can build lasting influence in their companies.  

Domo helps solo data people punch above their weight by automating repetitive reporting, building self-service access for business users, and centralizing data across platforms without writing pipelines from scratch. Learn more about how Domo enables one person to do the work of a whole team—without burning out. Start your free 30-day trial of Domo today.