Since technology is progressing so rapidly, it is important for you to be versatile. You must be willing to learn quickly and explore new ways of doing your work. Since your discoveries are much more useful to others when they are communicated, good writing and speaking skills are essential. It also helps immensely to be patient and persistent and to be organized enough to work on several projects at once, as many projects will take years to complete. One of the best aspects of being an astronomer is the variety of tasks that astronomers do each day.
Most astronomers have quite a bit of freedom in planning their own research projects and approaches.
The tasks could be preparing lessons and teaching classes, supervising students, building equipment, developing ideas or analyzing data on paper or on a computer, writing journal articles, discussing ideas and giving seminars at your institution or at national and international conferences, serving on committees in your department or for professional associations, reading journal articles, and evaluating the research of others before it is published. Electronic mail has become the medium of choice to discuss your research and plan projects or conferences with colleagues from around the globe. Most major journals, reports, and astronomical data are now accessible from your desktop computer using the Internet. Note that very few astronomers spend large amounts of time looking through a telescope. Typical astronomers only spend one or two weeks each year observing, and the rest of their research time analyzing their data.