What are business analyst technical skills? Though it is not absolutely required, ordinary skills are always encouraged, as these are the things that assure that one can do well in anything. I bet you are well aware that what you actually know will largely determine your career objectives.
Business analysts work with organizations to help them improve their processes and systems. They conduct research and analysis in order to come up with solutions to business problems and help to introduce these systems to businesses and their clients.
While there are still ongoing developments in various technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, IoT, Robotics, etc., Business Analytics has gained the status of being all-pervasive. Almost every aspect of our life has been touched by Analytics. Nearly 90% of all organisations have set up Analytics in their functioning over the past 5 years and nearly every domain has been a rise of opportunities in this sector. You must be wondering, what exactly is the job description of a Business Analyst-
Business Analyst Job Description
In the enterprise and IT sector, Business Analysis has emerged as a core business practice. Business Analysis refers to understanding the changing business needs, evaluating the impact of these changes, identifying and analysing requirements, and documenting and facilitating communication among all the stakeholders involved.
They contribute actively to an organisation’s profitability and sustainability. Business Analysts guide organisations to improve their process and quality of products and services.
Also Read: Difference between Business Analyst and Data Scientist
How to Become a Business Analyst?
With the massive amount of information available to us today, it becomes easier to successfully achieve your dream job. To become a Business Analyst, there are various skills required. Great Learning offers a rigorous Business Analytics course that you can opt for and become a certified professional. You must be wondering, ‘Is SQL Required for business analysis?’, ‘Is a business analyst an IT job?’, we’ll be answering all your questions here. Continue reading to know the exact necessary skills.
Business Analyst Skills
Technology: I Hope You’re Tech Savvy
Be one with technology. If you hate computers, but love noodling for catfish, now is your time to jump ship.
Extensive knowledge of the IT industry is a must for this position, and it’s essential that you stay up to date on industry developments.
Having the ability to analyze the capabilities of tools and technologies in the modern era is crucial to succeeding as a business analyst.
Depending on the exact title of your position, there are specific technical computer skills and certificates that you must be comfortable with.
Some of these are:
- Microsoft Office
- Microsoft Visio
- Software Design Tools
- SQL Queries
- Business Process Models
- Many other programs
Using our resume database at Zippia, we formed a graph at the bottom of this article that shows the top 20 technical skills found on successful Business Analyst resumes.Guide To Become A Business Analyst1. Business Analyst Job Description2. Business Analyst Skills3. Business Analyst Certification
Research: Search and Destroy
So, if the massive amount of technical knowledge required to be a successful Business Analyst hasn’t deterred you yet, I hope you’re ready for some investigating.
You must research every corner of the Internet when beginning a new project, like you lost one of your favorite, lucky socks and you can’t stop until every inch of the house has been turned upside down.
Research is the first step in forming a final solution to your company’s problem. It’s the gathering of the information and statistical data needed to form a solution.
Using your IT and technological skills, you have to be able to gather accurate information and analyze it on a daily basis. You have to provide high quality and detailed requirements to everyone involved in the project, meaning if anyone has questions, your detailed research must be able to answer them.
Again, your company is counting on you to find the best solution to their problem, not the third best. You must be able to take the problem from your company, and conduct extensive research on it until you’ve become an expert on the issue at hand.
This is similar to the data analysis section below, but the research comes first. It allows you to figure out financial planning and assess the risks involved with potential solutions.
If your research is off, your ideas will not be heard.
No one will believe you until you’ve conducted extensive investigations on the problem, and you can prove that your solution is the most sound.
Data Review and Statistical Analysis: Numbers, Numbers, Numbers
Your technical skills are sufficient, the research is done, and you now find yourself floating (hopefully not sinking) in a sea of numbers.
Gathering statistics and data on whatever your company’s problem is, is dandy, but analyzing the data and statistics is the super important part.
Data analysis requires you to understand gap analysis, risk assessment, financial planning, and statistical analysis.
Analyze and make sense of the statistics you’ve gathered.
This is the typical process for figuring out a successful business solution:
- Conduct research on problem
- Gather data and statistics
- Review research and data
- Interpret and analyze the data
- Determine the best solution for your company
Confidence in producing and reviewing data and information models is crucial. The data you gather will help you plan out the finances of your business solution as well.
Don’t let those numbers drag you down.
Financial Planning: Money, Money, Money
Take a sip of coffee, we’re almost done with the technical skills.
The research and data has been analyzed and conquered, and a solution to the company’s problem is visible just over the horizon.
The next step is financial planning. You have to take the numbers and research you’ve conducted and plan out exactly how much everything is going to cost.
Financial planning is the task of determining how a business will afford to achieve its strategic goals and objectives. Usually, a financial plan is created immediately after the vision and objectives have been set. This comes after the research and data analysis.
This is extremely important when forming a successful business solution.
The goal is to help your company and the clients profit. If your financial plan isn’t accurate you could cost the company and/or the client money. That won’t make you very many friends.
You should know:
- How much your course of action will cost the company at each step of the process.
- How much each step in the course of action will cost the client.
- How beneficial your solution is to everyone involved.
- Exactly how much will the company/client benefit?
Documentation/Organization: Record Everything
You survived and made it to the last technical skill.
Organization and constant documentation will only make your life easier as a Business Analyst.
Documentation is the process of writing down and recording everything you do during the creation and implementation of your business solution.
Stay organized and document every detail from start to finish.
If you’re organized and your documentation is clear and concise, it will make your job easier. You will be able to seamlessly explain each step of your project to others.
The easiest way to ensure thateveryone understands your plan of action is to show others exactly what’s happening. Show them your recordings and documentation since you’ve begun researching the company’s problem.
You should be able to explain every single step of your process (from research to finished solution) to a variety of people as well. Organized documentation will help you communicate technical concepts to non-technical employees. Everyone needs to understand your plan.
Don’t leave those solid writing skills at home.
Your documentation must be clear to others as well as yourself. Show them your research and data; don’t just tell them about it.
Personal Skills
Problem Solving: Stay Ready
Your job is to develop solutions to problems the business is encountering (obviously). You will encounter random and frequent changes while coming up with your own business solutions. Thus, you must be ready to continuously adapt and resolve problems.
Be flex-daptable. I know, that’s not a real word, but you get the point. Flexibility and adaptability in the workplace are a must.
You need to:
- Fully understand the company’s problem(s)
- Outline parameters
- Determine all of the potential solutions
- Quickly react and solve new problems
Business Analysts need to create a common understanding of the problem, the potential solutions, and determine the extent of the project.
You will also need to assist co-workers in solving technical challenges, especially when they involve negotiation between multiple business or technical stakeholders.
Be a fierce eradicator of problems, and a brilliant creator of solutions.
Decision Making: Don’t Be Hasty!
Slow down, cowboy.
The company is counting on you to produce the number one solution to their problem, or the most beneficial. They don’t want the second best solution because you overlooked a sect of data, or rushed somewhere in your process of acquiring a solution.
You consult management and advise developers. The decisions you make have huge ramifications for the company.
After assessing the situation, receiving input from co-workers, researching, and analyzing the data, selecting a decisive plan of action is the next step.
No one is going to hold your hand. You must make your own decisions throughout the process. Don’t be hasty in making those decisions, however.
Before leading the company to a solution or a plan of action, you must:
- Analyze multiple choices
- Ask probing questions
- Attack the problem from every angle
- Discover all potential solutions
- Decide on the best solution
They are counting on your decisions to be calculated, precise, and to fully solve their problems.
Managerial Skills: Boss Up
Put your face paint on, you’re going to war. Okay, not really, but you need to be a leader in the workplace.
When you make a decision, decide on a course of action, or think you have a solution to a problem, you are embarking on a project. It is your project and you are the boss.
You must:
- Plan it out
- Divvy up responsibilities between co-workers
- Forecast budgets
- Keep everyone on task
- Ensure that each step of the project is happening on time
- Direct other staff members accordingly throughout the process
You have to communicate effectively, be responsible for others, and ensure that your project is being carried out exactly as you see fit.
Be a coach to other staff and provide technical leadership. It’s your project and your solution.
You should also be prepared to supervise projects of varying sizes.
Communication: Spread Those Wings, You Social Butterfly
I hope you thoroughly enjoy communicating with other people, because business analysts spend a lot of their time interacting with clients, managers, users, developers, and co-workers.
The success of a project depends on how clearly you communicate details like:
- Project requirements
- Financial reports
- Requested changes
- Testing results
A business analyst must have fluent spoken language and written communication skills, and an uncanny ability to simply and successfully communicate ideas to others in the workplace.
As mentioned above, sometimes you will have to explain complicated technical ideas and concepts to employees that aren’t as tech savvy as yourself.
Having the ability to communicate with all types of people is essential.
Jim Shepherd, Senior Vice President of Research at AMR Research, said, “You’re looking for someone who can translate between the technology folks within IT—and sometimes the external consultants and software vendors—and the businesspeople. They often don’t speak the same language.They both have their own jargon.”
You might have the best solution to your company’s problem, but what does that matter if you can’t successfully communicate it to everyone?
Negotiation: The Convincer
A business analyst is the middleman between different varieties of people.
Clients, developers, users, management, and IT all have varying personalities, ideas, and skill sets.
You have to successfully communicate between all of these personalities, and then please all of them at the same time.
You must maintain professional relationships while finding mutual solutions between different kinds of people.
In order to do this, you will have to persuade people to view things differently. You will have to convince them to consider other alternatives, and ultimately get everyone to agree how to implement your solution.
Achieving a profitable outcome for the company and a working solution for the client takes a lot of negotiating and changing of minds.
Once again, you had better be a people person.
Conclusion
Today, the demand for business analyst technical skills resumes is increasing day by day. The job role of a business analyst is to analyze the requirements of customers and help them in achieving goals from the requirement analysis perspective.