What Would You Do? Data Science to MBA, PhD, or Other
I want to lead with saying that I acknowledge that I am asking for personal advice that may best be served by my introspection.
I am a 28-year old senior data analyst at Capital Group/American Funds. I currently do statistical modelling for our Customer Service Reps' work volumes and overall needs in R and Python (KNN, Logistic Regression, ARIMA, Multivariate regression, Decision Trees, etc.). I regularly present info through Excel charts/graphs or Tableau, as well. Essentially, I have spent 3 years in a data analyst function within our customer service operational group. I fully understand that this is different than working in Core Ops or another more revenue-producing function. I do make around USD $100K while working mostly 9 - 5 in a Midwestern market. I do not have very obvious paths for advancement from my position, though. There are multiple people on my team who are 40+ at my level, and I think it is possible that I could end up stuck here.
Before this, I worked for a year in global FP&A for a division of a F500 company. Before that, I worked as an auditor for a Big 4 audit firm on our largest client in a secondary/tertiary market. My undergraduate degree was in accounting, business analytics, and technology management from a large Midwestern university with a highly rated public business school.
Recently, I sat for the GRE and scored a 170 on the verbal, 165 on the quant, and 5 on the writing without prep. I also sat for the LSAT back in undergrad and received a 172.
I am also nearly finished with an online master's of data science program. I will complete that by summer 2023, and my GPA is currently a 3.95.
My question is as follows: given my experience, test scores, and education, what opportunities would you be looking to? I know that there are many options that are effectively closed off to me at this point (PE, IB, HF, MF). Are there career paths that seem worth leaving my current position? Have I pigeonholed myself to a point that my current position is the best that I can hope for?
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