[Project] Breaking into Data Analytics: UK vs Poland - A Small Job Market Analysis

One thing I’ve been wondering about recently is whether the data analytics job market really looks the same everywhere.

Living in the UK and coming from Poland, I often catch myself thinking about this question:

Is it actually easier to start a data career in Poland than in the UK?

Instead of guessing, I decided to do what analysts usually do when something bothers them - look at the data.

So I collected a small dataset of Data Analyst job postings from LinkedIn in both countries and built a simple Tableau dashboard to explore three questions:

• How competitive are Data Analyst roles in the UK vs Poland?

• What experience levels are typically required?

• Which analytical tools appear most often in job descriptions?

  
  

Competition: more applicants in the UK

One of the most noticeable differences was the number of applicants per job posting.

In the small sample I analysed:

• Data Analyst roles in the UK attracted around 86 applicants on average

• Similar roles in Poland attracted about 66 applicants

  
  

This doesn’t necessarily mean the UK market is worse - but it clearly shows a higher level of competition.

For entry-level candidates, this level of competition can significantly influence how difficult it is to enter the field.

Experience expectations

Another interesting observation was how experience requirements are described.

In many job postings, the expected experience level was not clearly specified.

However, roles requiring 2+ years of experience appeared more frequently in UK listings, which may suggest stronger expectations for prior experience.

That said, job descriptions are not always precise, so this part of the analysis is more of a pattern than a definitive conclusion.

Which tools appear most often?

I also compared how frequently common analytical tools appeared in job descriptions.

Some patterns were very clear:

• SQL and Excel remain the most consistently requested tools

• Power BI appears frequently in both markets

• Tableau appeared noticeably more often in UK job postings

  
  

This suggests that while the core analytics toolkit is similar across markets, some tools may be more prominent depending on the region.

What this small analysis suggests

Although the dataset is relatively small, the results suggest a few interesting things:

• The UK market appears more competitive, with more applicants per role.

• Core analytical skills are very similar across both markets.

• Job descriptions often lack clarity about experience expectations, which may make entry-level applications more difficult to interpret.

  
  

Most importantly, this project reminded me of something simple:when something feels confusing or frustrating, analysing it often brings clarity.

Sometimes the best way to understand a market is simply to treat it as a dataset and explore it.

Project dashboard

You can explore the full dashboard and project repository here: GitHub

The dashboard was created in Tableau, and the dataset was compiled manually from LinkedIn job postings.

Final thought

This was the first analytics project where I started not with a dataset… but with a question that was bothering me personally.

And I think that’s why it turned out to be one of the most interesting ones to work on.