{"id":250,"date":"2018-01-27T05:14:05","date_gmt":"2018-01-27T05:14:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.datahasbyte.com\/?p=250"},"modified":"2018-01-27T05:14:05","modified_gmt":"2018-01-27T05:14:05","slug":"the-importance-of-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.a-j-c.com\/welcome\/2018\/01\/27\/the-importance-of-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"The Importance of Practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

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10,000 hours makes you an expert, so says Malcolm Gladwell<\/a>. Others say otherwise<\/a>. Regardless of either side there, practice is important. Whether it comes to Tableau, Python – my favorites – or any other data tool\/language, practice is important.<\/p>\n

It’s important to schedule time for meaningful practice. Something as small as 10-15 minutes per day can often be enough to keep you sharp. There are many challenges online to give you entertaining challenges that make practicing fun. For example, workout-wednesday.com<\/a> provides advanced challenges for Tableau users and developers to advance their skills. <\/p>\n

After over a full year of these challenges, I thought I was really getting somewhere – to the point I started feeling I could solve any challenge. Then a promotion at work, less time, and a few months of not opening the software on my desktop and it was a restart. We’re certainly not talking a full-reversion to square one, but certainly rusty upon restarting. Don’t use Python for a few weeks, and suddenly it’s a google search to figure out something that just flowed from the fingertips.<\/p>\n

Don’t let this happen to you. Practice. Schedule time for practice. Stick to that time.<\/p>\n

Here are some resources to help you practice:<\/p>\n