Planning Multi-Step Queries

Learn how multi-step queries work.

We'll cover the following...

Step 1: Start with a real question
Step 2: Turn the plan into a story
Step 3: Ask AI to scaffold the code
Step 4: Reflect on the process
Step 5: Your turn to plan and write

Step 1: Start with a real question

Let’s imagine a common data task: Find departments where the average employee salary is higher than the overall company average.

This question appears to be a single query, but it’s actually several steps in disguise.

Ask yourself:

What’s the company's average salary?
What’s the average per department?
How do I compare them?

Each part can become its own query step, a building block for the final answer.

Prompt hint: Ask AI to outline how to break down this questionQuestion is mentioned at the start of the lesson, append that to the prompt and let AI teach you. into logical SQL steps before writing the query.

Read AI’s breakdown. Notice how it thinks first, codes second.