Learning Python for Data Analysis and Visualization

I recommend Jose Portilla's data visualization course on Udemy. It has a lot of other stuff too, but you can skip it and learn seaborn alone.

For R, I recommend R for Data Science to learn the language's basics and Data Visualization in R to get a great understanding of ggplot2 .

For Python, I recommend this Udemy class

Once you're comfortable, pick whatever interactive visualization (Plotly, R Shiny, Bokeh) and create your own dashboard.

I am this data thing you speak of.

Work life balance should be amazing - there is basically nothing that qualifies as an as out of hours emergency when data is typically viewed in daily/weekly/monthly/annual trends. You can find a particular employer / management that is bad, like anywhere.

I'm a bit higher up these days than just general analytics, but everyone in my team works full time remote, and salary wise would be in the low to mid 100k's. I haven't seen a data based role go past 150k inclusive without requiring some level of expertise or other skills associated (eg a few years experience and familiarity with a cloud vendor), but you'll get there in time - you just have to start somewhere.

Python is great - and you definitely don't need a course to help you, but if you find you learn better from structured content I'd suggest a cheap udemy course before enrolling in a uni course ($$$). This one looks like it's the sort of thing you're looking for, and I've done some other courses by that guy, they've been well done.

My personal advice - any ASX50 company definitely has a data team. Data teams love to adopt finance guys into their teams. Find out who they are, introduce yourself, and express some interest in being seconded for a bit, or helping with some of their requirements etc. I'd be very surprised if you can't push in that direction internally, and it'll be a lot easier to enter at a higher-that-grad type position. Even if you can't formally move, but you can pick up some formally paid experience, that makes looking externally so much easier.

Good luck, feel free to ama/ask later.

there are plenty of short non-credit courses on udemy and coursera that will bring you up to speed quickly with python, R, statistics and data analysis

udemy courses go on sale just about every other week for $9.99 to $14.99

https://www.coursera.org/professional-certificates/google-data-analytics

https://www.coursera.org/professional-certificates/ibm-data-science?

https://www.udemy.com/course/learning-python-for-data-analysis-and-visualization/

https://www.udemy.com/course/statistics-for-data-science-and-business-analysis/

https://www.udemy.com/courses/development/data-science/

there's also these online graduate certificates from Harvard University's Extension school
they are semester based so it might be slower than WGU

Bioinformatics Graduate Certificate
https://extension.harvard.edu/academics/programs/bioinformatics-graduate-certificate/

Certificate Course Requirements

1 molecular biology course (this should be your first course)
1 introduction to bioinformatics course
1 programming course
1 elective course

https://extension.harvard.edu/course-catalog/courses-by-certificate/Bioinformatics-Certificate

Data Analytics Graduate Certificate
https://extension.harvard.edu/academics/programs/data-analytics-certificate/

Certificate Courses
The professional graduate certificate in data analytics requires four courses or 16 credits.

You may choose from the following course groups, using the certificate course search.

Introductory course (you may select up to 1 course; however, intro courses are not required for this certificate)
Required statistics course (choose one course from select group)
Certificate elective courses (choose 2-3 courses from select group)

https://extension.harvard.edu/course-catalog/courses-by-certificate/Data-Analytics-Certificate

Web Technologies Graduate Certificate
https://extension.harvard.edu/academics/programs/web-technologies-certificate/

Certificate Courses The professional graduate certificate in Web Technologies requires five courses.

You may choose any five courses from the Web Technologies certificate course group, using the certificate course search.

https://extension.harvard.edu/course-catalog/courses-by-certificate/Web-Technologies-Certificate