My Accurx career move
Making the jump from user support to data
Around a year ago, I worked in Accurx’s glorious user support team, helping people across healthcare to enjoy a first-class experience using Accurx. 12 months on, I’m in a whole new role as a Product Data Analyst, analysing insights from our users and working out how we can improve Accurx for them. Needless to say, it was a big leap going from user support to data. So how did it go? And what did I learn? Here’s how I found the right Accurx role for me and five things I picked up along the way.
Finding my niche
I loved working in the support team at Accurx. It was an exciting time and we’d hired some amazing new team members. But I always felt that my place was somewhere else. The only problem was — I had no idea where!
Lucky for me, my line manager Lorna was my greatest advocate. With her, I had a safe space to talk through anything. She pushed me to find my passion and actively helped me make it happen. During our weekly catch ups, we brainstormed areas I was interested in and talked through potential solutions. It became clear very soon that my next move would be centred upon a really strong interest of mine — data.
Having pinpointed this area of interest, I started reaching out to the team to find out what data needs we had at Accurx and scout out potential opportunities. In no time — and still with my old job title — I started taking on small data tasks like running data deep dives for the team. I’d present a combination of quantitative and qualitative insight on a feature or product to help hone in on any areas of improvement.
Making the move
At this point, I was spending the majority of my week doing data work, but I hadn’t yet changed roles — so how was I going to actually make the move happen?! At the time, there was no data team at Accurx and we’d only recently hired our first data scientist Tamsyn (read about Tamsyn’s interesting work here!). It was new territory for everyone, but it was obvious to us all that we wanted to be more data driven. I’d spoken widely about my interest in data and showed I could take on data work that provided real value to Accurx.
It then happened very quickly! One Friday afternoon I had a catch up Lorna and was offered a new role as a Product Data Analyst. And with that, my career in data began!
5 things I learnt moving roles at Accurx
Over the next year, I learnt so many things about myself, about my work and about Accurx. Since there’s too many to record in this blog, here’s my top five:
- Set yourself the right expectations 🎯
When you start a new role, everything feels — well — new. That means things will be scary and you’ll be out of your comfort zone most of the time. Give yourself the chance to make mistakes, try new things and be careful not to get lost in the work. I thought the technical skills would’ve been my biggest challenge, but taking ownership of my calendar was my first hurdle. Working on support, most of the calendaring was taken care of, my support shifts were in the diary and I always had a list of things to power through during my non-support time.
Life was very different after the move. I had more focus time in my calendar but I didn’t yet know how to prioritise work or how to spend my time efficiently. Not planning my workload meant that I was getting lost and taking a long time to achieve results. It’s scary to go to your manager and say you don’t know what to do with your time, but having already built a strong relationship meant I could be open and together we brainstormed solutions. Not all worked, but setting personal goals helped me focus and know what work I should prioritise. Also, by reviewing these regularly, I was able to see how I was progressing and at what pace.
2. Draw on your previous experiences 💪
In my old role at Accurx, I used to speak to users day-in, day-out. It’s hard to overstate how valuable this experience was to unlocking my new role. It gave me so much added context and confidence when it came to interpreting results from analysis.
For example, when I was looking at usage trends, knowing Accurx users so well really gave me the full picture. So when it came to presenting findings, I was able to tell a story rather than just share graphs. My experience is also what gave me confidence. Experience helps you feel positive and have an impact on the company while you’re in the first few months finding your feet.
3. When in doubt, ask! 🙋♀️
I worked with an amazing Data Scientist called Tamsyn who guided me through my first months in the data team. Having Tamsyn on hand enabled me to ask questions and gave me the confidence to take on new challenges.
But don’t just stop with just the people you work with, I’d say! Go further. Because — particularly at Accurx— there’s something you can learn from everyone, from engineers to product managers. My advice is to let yourself be vulnerable, ask for help and make the time to learn from others.
4. Trust yourself 👌
Accurx trusted me to take on this role, and paved the way for me to succeed. And let’s be honest — they didn’t have to! They could’ve hired a more senior data specialist and let me pursue my next career step outside of Accurx.
While it was a great vote of confidence to get from an employer, I still felt on shaky ground, and didn’t trust that I had the experience to succeed in the role. This held me back at the start, but you’ll never know how far you can go if you don’t try!
Being a feedback-centred company at Accurx, my line manager shared this constructive feedback with me during my mid-year performance review, with really good examples that gave me the confidence to move forward. Building the right community around you really helps, as sometimes you just need to hear things from someone else.
5. Make time to learn 🤓
When it comes to training, there are a lot of courses out there. Whether you need help with technical skills or learning communication styles, simple courses are great in giving you the basics and boosting your confidence.
I found that more in-depth courses could sometimes leave me feeling overwhelmed and demoralised with the volume of things to take in.
Accurx’s work culture really helps on that front, I found. Having a community of data people around means you can always ask someone more experienced to review the content of any training courses before applying. That way, you can be sure it matches up with what you need to achieve in your role.
For me, I needed training to improve my statistical skills. There are tons of ways to do this — there’s whole university degrees on the subject and it can get complicated very soon! After working out the best option for me, I ended up going for a four month online course recommended by Tamsyn. This had just the right level of information for me to learn, with useful weekly assignments to help me keep on track.
📅 One year later…
Changing careers is scary, but possible with the right mindset and environment. I’ve been lucky to be part of a company that wants people to succeed. At Accurx, I had the trust to start this journey and the autonomy to shape my career. A year later, I feel confident in my role, and I’ve been able to train others on skills I’ve learnt and enjoy having a growing data community around me.
I’ve built dashboards which have been used as examples for what ‘good’ looks like, and I’ve supported teams with their reporting during the national roll out of products impacting over 100,000 daily active users!
So to sum up, it’s never too late to start your own journey or find yourself bright and glorious minds to learn from. Take the time to see what’s out there and make the first step. Before you realise it, it’s a year later and you can’t see yourself doing anything else.
