If you’re interested in becoming a business analyst, it’s worth doing your homework to understand the role and how it can help you achieve your career goals. Whether you’re looking to improve your job performance or switch careers, a good knowledge of business analysis is essential.
Having technical knowledge can also be beneficial, such as understanding programming languages or using specific data analysis tools. Business analysts often use Microsoft products, including Excel and PowerPoint, SQL software, Google Analytics, and Tableau.
Identifying Requirements
Business analysts use strong critical thinking and analytical skills to identify areas within a company that can be improved, offer data-backed recommendations, and work with managers, technical teams, vendors, on-the-ground staff, and executives to implement improvements. They must also be able to manage change, communicate effectively and work in tandem with other team members.
They must be capable of interacting with various teams that may not speak the same workplace language (e.g., translating programming jargon for the financial team or reinforcing deadline messaging for coders). They must be able to ask insightful questions and listen to the answers.
A business analyst’s technical skills should include Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint, SQL, data wrangling software and Google Analytics. They must also have the ability to create graphs, write documents and design visualizations to explain their findings. In addition, they must have a thorough understanding of an organization’s infrastructure and systems. This includes the ability to identify and resolve problems with existing technology.
Creating Requirements Documents
Business analysts must be able to gather sometimes dense, technical information and deliver it in an easily understood way to stakeholders across their organization. This requires strong communication skills, including verbal and written.
Business analysis also involves creating or updating computer systems that solve business needs. They might also be responsible for establishing initiatives or strategies to improve importing, reduce costs or meet regulatory requirements.
Business analysts must be able to collaborate with IT teams to design technology solutions that align with business needs. This entails working through the full project lifecycle, from initial scoping and requirements gathering to solution design and testing. It also involves analyzing data sets, which may require some level of coding knowledge — such as in the programming languages Python and R. They can also be expected to work closely with the data team to ensure that their solutions are viable. This may include identifying data flows and modeling workflows.
Performing Analysis
Business analysts use their analytical skills to identify areas in a process that need improvement, offer data-backed recommendations, and work with managers, technical teams, vendors, on-the-ground staff, and executives to implement improvements. They also document and build visualizations to convey their project findings.
Brilliant analysis counts for little if it isn’t communicated clearly. This is why Business Analysts rely on strong written communication skills and the ability to create beautiful charts, graphs, and other visual representations of their findings. They also use software programs like Tableau, PowerBI, Bokeh, Plotly, and Infogram to make it easier for others to understand their findings.
If you’re interested in becoming a business analyst, enroll in a business analytics program and start working on real-time projects to gain practical experience. This will help you learn more about the resources and technologies available in this field and how businesses utilize them, so you can perform well in higher positions in the future.
Developing Recommendations
Providing recommendations for a project is one of the core tasks of business analysts. They can recommend ways to improve the way a company operates, change a procedure for the better, or find new ways to achieve business goals.
It’s important for a business analyst to have excellent written communication skills. This includes knowing how to translate technical research into readable terms, as well as being able to listen to stakeholders and ask insightful questions.
In addition to a deep understanding of how a business functions, it’s also helpful for a business analyst to have strong knowledge of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems like SAP and Oracle, customer relationship management (CRM) systems, and database software such as SQL. This will allow the analyst to work effectively with development teams and ensure smooth project execution.
A business analyst’s skills should include creating and analyzing models of workflows, documenting requirements, performing analysis, and creating visual representations. They should also be familiar with a variety of data visualization tools, including Excel, Tableau, Bokeh, Plotly, and Infogram.