What do I do if I realize I'm incapable of doing my job and will get yelled at by my family for quitting? [closed]

Question

I'm a recent college grad who never had any job experience other than my job right out of college at a startup in data analysis. I don't know how to manage a database or operate one which is necessary for doing my job. The people hired me didn't know this and thought everything could be done in excel. They didn't know that I'd end up having problems since none of them is data analysts. I've been managing all the data in disorganized folders and excel spreadsheets which are beginning to be overwhelmed and crash due to the incoming hordes of data. As a result of not knowing SQL and the presence of intellectual property laws which prevents good database learning resources online, I can't teach myself SQL.

I've tried to sort through the data manually and because of the tediousness of the task which is comparable of counting the number of people in a large crowd of people or recalling what day of the week 1965 January 5th was without a calendar to look up. I'm the only guy in the company that can do data analysis, and there are barely any people in the company. It wouldn't be so bad if at least one person could help me. I personally blame the company for not hiring someone else who can do data analysis. Leaving a big burden on me.

Eventually, they're going to have me give them a report of all the data the company has obtained and owing to my lack of database management knowledge, I can only give them current reports.

The problem was exacerbated by the fact that coming out of college I didn't know how to plot their graphs, and plotting graphs in excel causes excel to crash, and redoing all the graphs is too tedious.

I work for family, so I'm wondering how to quit this job if I have familial conflict of interests.

I worked this job because I thought it would boost my résumé and owing to bad performance in college I thought I needed a job.

Now I got an offer to go to graduate school elsewhere, so I no longer need this job to make sure my future career prospects don't go to waste and this job isn't related to my graduate school program and isn't going to help me or hurt me.

So if I quit this job I'll be doing nothing all day because there isn't anything to do in the mean time.

If I quit, the company will need to hire someone else to do this job clean all the data, leak more information, have people sign NDAs/CDAs, and since I've done a half-baked job I've done, they might have to start some of the analysis again, and spend money because of that. Which I'll just let them have all the money in my bank account because I've spent 0% of my salary as living at home. I never really liked this job. I don't have to do it anymore since I got into graduate school. I don't mind refunding them my salary. I haven't spent the money on my earnings.

I'm not quitting because I'm lazy, I'm quitting because very soon they're going to ask me to do something I can't do because of the lack of SQL knowledge. I'm not quitting because of grad-school acceptance itis kind of like senioritis. I'm legally not qualified and I have 1000 folders of excel data that are crashing on me because of the sheer size of big data and can't manage data because I don't know apache-spark/Hadoop/XML>

My family shouldn't have hired me in the first place. They were better of just having some professional with a PhD do it.

I can generate reports of the data as it comes. But going back and fixing data reports and keeping track of data and indexing it is hard to do in excel especially when the rows are so many Excel crashes. I'm not completely incompetent, just half-baked.

This company is so small no one can train me to do it. Everyone else is completely incapable of processing data, and I'm sort of capable but not good enough.

This job sucks so much I've been using a growth mindset to see how long I can tolerate cleaning data using inept methods. But I've finally realized my tolerance limit.

I don't need the money from the job and don't plan on doing a job ever like this in the future.

This job isn't impossible to do. Just really tedious, painful, without any motivation to do. Clicking the same buttons all day. Constant software freezing.

Answer 1

I am answering this as someone who employs family (my own children, and yes of course I have also employed people who are not my children), and sometimes asks my staff to do things I cannot do myself.

When you are asked to do something you can't do, don't quit, instead say

I can't do that.

Go on to say

I don't know how.

or

I am doing all of this by hand in Excel and that would take 3 months in Excel.

Be honest. This is one of the few employers you can be honest with. They love you for who you are and they want you to work there. So tell them.

I think there is a better way with SQL and stuff and I have looked for free courses but I can't find any and I think if I spent 3 days on a real course that costs [whatever] I could figure out a faster way to do this. But I haven't had that training so I don't know how to do it and the way I'm doing it now just can't handle larger data sets and so I can't, I just can't do what you're asking and I know it's important but it's not possible with the skills I have.

And then maybe they will say "ok, we had better hire someone who knows how to do that. You are leaving soon anyway for grad school." Or maybe they will say "ok, let's just stick with the small datasets for the next few months." Or maybe they will get you trained. Anything might happen. Most of the things that are likely to happen are better than you quitting your job when they don't want you to quit. Right?

Most people who are flailing in a new job and want to quit don't dare trust their boss with the struggles they are facing. I often urge such people to try it - if you're at the point of quitting there is nothing to lose. But in this case, when it's family, there really is nothing to lose. If you tell them you can't handle it and you all agree it's best you walk away, you get to walk away with no big conflict and fight. Or perhaps they find a way for you to be able to handle it. Those are both ok outcomes, right?

Answer 2

As a result of not knowing SQL and the pressence of intellectual property laws which prevents good data base learning resources online, I can't teach myself SQL.

To learn SQL, you have following options:

1. Go to library and rent any book on SQL written in this century (as the SQL standard very rarelly changes) and catchup on recent changes if needed in MySQL/Postgresql documentation.
2. Buy a book, even most professional books on SQL do not cost more then 20$
3. Use one of 236 million results returned when you search for "Free SQL Course".
4. Get completely free open source MySQL or Postgresql database (I highly recommend later), and read the comprehensive guide & documentation attached to both.

Answer 3

What do I do if I realize I'm incapable of doing my job?

You have two choices:

• Learn to do your job.
• Find a new company to work for.

There are plenty of free resources available to learn almost anything, and if you are really interested in learning what your job is requiring you can either pay for resources. An even better option is to ask your company to provide training. This does not mean that employees from your company are the ones to train you ( even though some companies have the resources to do this ). The training can be outsourced to companies dedicated to this. There are many companies that will do this at no cost to you. You must, of course, be genuinely interested in learning otherwise you are wasting everyone's time ( including yourself ).

If you do decide to quit, it needs to be your decision alone. Do not worry about what your family or friends think, they are not the ones who have to do the work. Also, do not worry about the company having to clean up after you. It is their responsibility to be prepared for any employee's departure and if you leave for whatever reason it is not your fault or problem if they have not properly prepared. Start applying to other companies and don't hand in your resignation until after you have signed a written offer with a new company

Answer 4

No need for learning sql and setting up server environments and all the rest.

Lots of companies get by using MS Access, if you have excel you should already have this because it's part of the Office bundle.

It's not a tool I like, but it's there and pretty easy to use. Tutorials on almost every specific problem you're likely to face should already exist.

Answer 5

As a result of not knowing SQL and the pressence of intellectual property laws which prevents good data base learning resources online, I can't teach myself SQL.

This is nothing more than an excuse, and a really bad one at that. There's a deluge of free resources online to learn SQL. A simple google search for "Sql tutorial" shows 240 MILLION results. Thousands upon thousands of tutorial sites, youtube videos, blogs, official documentation and quickstart guides from vendors, and free e-books and pdfs. All free. All available for anyone in the world. Did you even bother to search to materials on SQL at all? Or did you just quickly devise this excuse about IP laws and other nonsense just to save yourself from having to make any actual effort whatsoever?

Answer 6

I thought i'd give an answer to demonstrate that doing all this in SQL may not be as tricky as you thought:

If you have the data in Excel already, then i'd suggest importing it locally into a SQL database. Looks into the program DataGrip. DataGrip has an import wizard where you can get a CSV, and it will create a SQL table in a database when you import the csv. This is actually easy to do

There's a free version of DataGrip, but i'd say get the company to pay for it

Once you've done this, you can run queries against the tables on your own computer

People make this out to be difficult since they usually have some kind of ETL process to automate the getting-the-data-into-the-database bit, but it can be done on just your computer without too much effort

In the below screenshot, i've made a database, added a table, then I have the option to import data into the table from a file (your csv files)

Here's an example of running a SQL statement:

SELECT * means output all columns of the csv i've uploaded (the table's columns) from the general_payments table

LIMIT means I want to only show x number of rows

Answer 7

You can absolutely do this job. If SQL is what you need to learn, then learn it. You're working for family, so presumably they will understand if you need to take a month to learn SQL. Of course there are resources available online to learn SQL. That's how I learned.

But you could also use Python for a lot of this stuff. Python has data visualization and manipulation libraries and is way easier to learn than SQL is. Start by Googling pandas, scipy, and matplotlib (or bokeh or seaborn).

It sounds like you just have a defeatist attitude and don't like working. So admit that to yourself, own your feelings and decisions, and quit. But don't come here and say you can't teach yourself SQL because that's just laughably false.

Just research some other ways of doing what you want to do. You're already on StackExchange. Most of the answers are somewhere on this website.

You're in a position most people would be thrilled to be in. You're the expert and you have little chance of being actually held responsible for any mistakes you make. I mean, most people wouldn't keep around an employee with this attitude, but you work for family, so there you are. They don't know the first thing about data analysis, so they won't be able to reprimand you if you make some mistakes at the beginning while you're trying to get a grip on new technology. So you have basically all the time in the world to figure this out, because they have nowhere to go but up, and you're family.

Here's a tip: almost every time someone uses the word "can't," they mean "won't."

Answer 8

"As a result of not knowing SQL and the presence of intellectual property laws which prevents good data base learning resources online, I can't teach myself SQL."

If an employee came to me with that phrase, then family or not, they'd be out on their ear. Give me a problem, by all means - but also bring with it some suggestions on how to fix it, and don't make up laws off the top of your head.

There are two issues in that sentence. You don't know SQL, and you don't learn well under your own steam. So take the solution to your boss - you need an in-person course on SQL so that you can do your job more efficiently. Do that. And maybe, if you can't learn on your own, grad school isn't going to be your best way out of this...

Answer 9

Try to learn the tools you need to succeed at your job. You mentioned SQL: I remember that I found the sqlzoo online training a good (and free) starting point for learning SQL. Alternatively you could buy a book about relevant topics. Anyway, the strategy should be to use your time there to increase your knowledge: Try to automate tasks, if you have coding questions you can ask them on stackoverflow.

You mentioned that you want to offer the company to refund your salary. I wouldn't recommend this, even if it is a family business. Rather explain to your boss proactively that you still need some skills in order to complete the tasks. Make it clear how you can achieve this and that it will cost some time and training. I.e. come up with solutions to the problems. That can be good for you and the company.

If learning the necessary skills in time is out of scope, you should openly communicate your concerns to your boss. Present the facts, then they can decide. As long as you are honest and do not pretend something that is not true, there is no need to resign. Rather consider it as an opportunity to grow and instead of doing everything manually learn how to use appropriate tools.

Needless to say: If you are not happy at the job and if you don't need the money you can always quit. However, sometimes in the long run it is rewarding to go through tough times without quitting the job, too.

Also congratualtions that you got accepted at graduate school! As I understand your description, you have to terminate your job at the start of graduate school anyway? So there is only a limited amount of time left while you work at that company anyway, so you could use that for your motivation and try to learn as much as possible within that limited time period.

Answer 10

A number of the comments and answers here point out that you can learn SQL using various "free" sites or references. But I would suggest that just learning SQL will not be enough, and lead to further frustration. SQL is a tool, not a goal. You can learn to use a hammer, but that does not qualify you to build a house.

It also sounds like your frustration and fear of failure in front of your family is making you feel like its impossible. It's not impossible, but you need to calm down, take a deep breath, and come up with a plan to solve to problem.

I would suggest the following:

• Have a discussion with manager/company officer/Dad or whoever can make the decision and resources available for you to fix this. Explain what you do know, and what you don't know, and why that will produce less than desirable results.
• Develop a plan to accelerate the process to success. This will include:
  • Learning SQL and databases. Nothing fancy, but something like on Pluralsight or comparable, to give the knowledge of the basics.
  • Hire a consultant versed in your tools, your dplyr, R, whatever you want to use. And the consultant should be experienced in whatever SQL platform you decide. Have the consultant design and build the database, and automate the data collection. Give the job of laying the foundation to an expert that can help.
  • When the consultant is done, you will work to develop the processes to keep the data analysis going after you leave for grad school.

This plan of action will ease your frustration by getting someone to help you, help the company get the best results, and help your experience (and resume) by having a successful implementation. It's not hard, but sometimes it's hard to step back out of the fire to realize an alternate path to success.

Good luck!

Answer 11

You can always tell the truth.

You don't like your job. You don't want to learn it. Learning a toolset is not going to change that.

You can quit and be honest about your reasons. If they understand, good. If they don't, still good. You can't force yourself to do something you don't believe in, something you don't take pleasure doing.

That's a lot better than make nonsense excuses or keep lying to yourself.