Education · 1 of 4

The path

Four years of university, then you learn the craft on real projects. No exam, no license, no gatekeeper.

1. 1

   High school

   Grades 11 and 12

   Statistics above all, plus psychology and English. Run a survey for a school club and try to explain what the answers mean.

2. 2

   Bachelor's degree

   4 years

   Marketing, statistics, psychology, economics or sociology all work. Take every research methods and statistics course your major allows.

3. 3

   Internship

   One summer

   A summer at a research agency or on a corporate insights team. This is how most junior jobs get filled.

4. 4

   Junior analyst

   2 to 3 years

   Writing screeners, cleaning survey data, building charts, sitting behind the glass at focus groups and writing the first draft of the report.

5. 5

   Analyst to insights manager

   Year 4 onward

   You start designing the study instead of executing it, and you present to the people who make the decision.