11 What else should you learn?
Here’s a list of things I think would be nice for you to invest some time in, in no particular order.
11.1 Touch typing
One of the things I NEVER see discussed when talking “upskilling” is improving your typing speed. According to a survey (which I’m sure is not statistically, nor scientifically sound, but still…) by onlinetyping.org (which you can find here, most back office workers (who spend all day typing) have a typing speed of 20 to 30 wpm (words per minute). According to this article by the Atlantic people write about 41638 words in email per year. You as programmers (yes, even if you’re focused on data, you’re a programmer) very surely type twice or thrice this amount of words per year. But let’s stay with 41638 words per year. That would translate to almost 28 days of non stop typing at a typing speed of 25 words per minute. Doubling to 50 wpm is actually quite easy, and reaching 70 is really doable. This could improve productivity, or better yet, make you go home earlier instead of working until 19h00 every day because you type like a snail.
You need to learn touch typing, meaning, typing without looking at your keyboard.
11.2 Vim
Yes, I think you should learn vim, or at the very least, your text editor of choice, by heart. You should know every keyboard shortcut and every possibility that your text editor offers. You should never touch the mouse when writing text. This is not just because of productivity, but also for your health. Grabbing the mouse to click one or twice, and then go back to typing, then go back to moving the mouse, etc, will destroy your shoulder. By keeping your hands on the keyboard at all times and minimizing mouse usage, you may be able to grow old healthy. Vim helps with that because it is a modal text editor (and most editors actually ship a Vim-mode). Watch this video to get a quick introduction on Vim, and how to enable Vim mode in Vscode.
11.3 Statistical modeling
Statistical modeling is crucial, and if you didn’t major in stats, you very likely lack this knowledge. Here’s a reading (and watching) list: