What Classes to Take to Become a Financial Analyst

If you want to make your mark in the world of financial analytics, you first need to acquire the diverse skill set that Financial Analysts use to create financial models and help businesses make decisions. This doesn’t just mean gaining a theoretical understanding, however, but also requires practical training and professional experience. In addition, you’ll have a better chance of qualifying for jobs if you can clearly demonstrate your skills through a portfolio. Since not every class provides these benefits, this article will offer guidance on which types of classes you should take to become a Financial Analyst. While there are many different skills included in a professional Financial Analyst’s arsenal, the most important skills to develop at the beginning of your career are financial modeling, corporate finance, and financial literacy. 

Immersive Bootcamps and Certificate Classes

While it may seem like you need a college finance degree to become a Financial Analyst, you can qualify for entry-level jobs with training from much cheaper, shorter vocational courses. Acting as condensed stand-ins for college degrees, immersive career bootcamps and certificates provide experience-based training that builds skills more quickly. Rather than wasting four years (minimum) on a college finance program, you can launch your career in just a few weeks or months. In addition to honing your skills, these programs can help you generate high-quality materials to feature in a professional portfolio. In a competitive field like financial analytics, you need to stand out from other job candidates, and a portfolio is the best way to do it. 

Add to the bargain that finance bootcamps are significantly cheaper than most degree programs. In sharp contrast to college semesters that have you dumping tens of thousands of dollars down the drain, you’ll only need to invest between $5,000 and $10,000 in a bootcamp. 

To serve different professional needs, finance career bootcamps may cover a variety of different subjects, with no two courses being exactly alike. Some certificates, such as Noble Desktop’s Financial Analyst Training Program, cover a comprehensive mix of skills you’ll need as a Financial Analyst, including accounting, financial reporting, valuation, Excel, and market forecasting. This course (and others like it) offers expert-led guidance on how to prepare advanced financial models and will give you the opportunity to apply your skills to real businesses, strengthening your portfolio in the process. 

Other bootcamps center around one major skill, as in cases like Noble Desktop’s Excel Bootcamp and SQL Bootcamp. In courses like these, you’ll spend most of your time mastering one software or technical skill, which may not be enough to build your entire career on but can be incredibly valuable when combined with knowledge from other bootcamps. For instance, if you’ve already learned a lot about financial analytics but want to level up to qualify for better jobs, learning another relevant skill such as SQL or Python can add a lot of positive momentum to your career. 

Some bootcamps also fall somewhere in between one-subject courses and comprehensive courses. For instance, Noble Desktop’s Financial Modeling Bootcamp offers advanced financial modeling training but assumes you’re coming in with plenty of Excel experience already. As a result, this course is shorter than a full-scope Financial Analytics program. These types of classes are ideal for anyone who needs to split training up into several chunks to appease a hectic schedule. In addition, you can also treat them as an opportunity to build on past experience without wasting time and money on repeat training. 

Short Classes

You may find that even though you want to start a financial analytics career, your hands are tied by a busy work schedule, parenting, or other substantial time commitments. If you’re in this situation, don’t give up. You can still take steps toward a finance career with short classes spread over a longer time period. 

Before embarking on this journey, however, you should be familiar with what it will require of you. By spreading your training across many short classes, you’ll likely end up spending more money on career preparation than you would in a bootcamp. Additionally, shorter classes tend to be less comprehensive, meaning that you’ll need to take more of them to learn the same amount of information. To learn all the most important skills, there are several types of classes you’ll want to include in your training plan. 

Advanced Classes

In addition to introductory courses, be sure to take the advanced classes you need to fully master each skill. Just about anyone can learn beginner financial analytics, but it takes extra time and effort to learn these skills at a professional level. In most cases, advanced classes have prerequisite requirements, meaning that you’ll need to take specific beginner courses before you can qualify for advanced training. If you already have prior experience with a skill, you may be able to enter the class with permission from the instructor. 

Software Classes

Professional Financial Analysts rely on a medley of different software tools to accomplish their ends. While Excel is the most important for new analysts to learn, you may also find it useful to learn how to work with tools like Tableau, Quickbooks, SAP, and Hyperion. 

Financial Modeling and Corporate Finance Classes

After learning how to use financial technology, you’ll want to pair this knowledge with a number of other technical skills. Foremost among these are financial modeling and corporate finance. Financial modeling classes can teach you how to analyze numerical data to predict outcomes and gain a sharper view of financial scenarios. Meanwhile, corporate finance classes will teach you all about planning, growing, and maintaining the financial assets of a business. Because each of these subcategories includes many different skills, you’ll likely need a number of classes to learn them. 

Data-Oriented Coding Classes

As a professional Financial Analyst, you may need to work with databases that require coding knowledge. Taking classes that cover data-oriented coding languages (such as SQL and Python) can help you fulfill this skill need and make you a more competitive job candidate. 

Portfolio Development and Professional Training Classes

Since short courses aren’t aimed at career preparation, they don’t often come with career benefits like portfolio workshopping. To help fill this need, some schools have short classes dedicated to professional development. In these classes, you’ll have the opportunity to develop additional skills such as leadership, communication, project management, and client management. Many finance-oriented professional development courses also provide opportunities to receive feedback on your job portfolio so that you can increase your odds of getting hired.