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What is a Business Analyst? Know everything about it

What is a Business Analyst? Know everything about it
  • Deepiksha Gill ( Business Analyst )
  • 1 month ago
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Introduction:

In today’s business environment, business analysts are rapidly developing, and organizations are aspiring to ways to stay ahead of the competition and make business decisions. This is where the Business Analyst role comes into play. Business Analysts bridge the gap between stakeholders and technological solutions to help organizations.  Business analysts understand business processes, systems, and objectives and work to align them with technology solutions that meet organizational needs. 

Join me on a journey through my experiences as a Business Analyst at Prilient Information Technology, where I've gained valuable insights and expertise in driving business success. Discover the methods, tactics, and trends that have shaped my career journey and go through the world of business analysis alongside me.In this blog, we will explain the world of business analysis, develop the skills and qualities required for providing solutions to organizations.

Role of the Business Analyst:

A business Analyst is responsible for analyzing business processes, identifying areas for improvement, and providing solutions that are aligned with the organization’s goals. A business analyst is the liaison between stakeholders, clients, and the technology team. In order to find a solution to business challenges, BA carries out research and analysis. This research analysis also aids in clear communication and understanding throughout the project lifecycle.

Key Responsibilities of a Business Analyst:

1.   Gathering requirements and Analysis:

BAs interact with businesses to gather, document, and analyze requirements. This is an initial step in any business process because requirements from the top authorities could be tricky and unclear. As a result, someone must be able to explain the various message variations coming from various business stakeholders.

  •  Identify Stakeholders:  Business Analysts are identifying the stakeholders who have an interest in or influence over the project. Identifying stakeholders includes business managers, end-users, IT teams, and any other relevant parties. Understand their roles, and expectations to ensure understanding of the project's requirements.

  •  Document Analysis: Business Analyst Analyze the existing documentation, such as business rules, policies, and procedures, to extract requirements and identify gaps during gathering requirements.   

  • Collect Review & Approval: Business Analysts Share the requirement documents with stakeholders for review and approval. Collaborate with stakeholders to address any concerns, feedback, and obtain their sign-off on the requirements. This ensures a shared understanding and agreement between stakeholders and Organization regarding the project scope and objectives.

 2.   Feasibility Analysis:  

Stakeholders provide the business analyst their requirements, and the business analyst not only gives the development team their list of responsibilities and wants them to start working right away. Understanding if those needs can be implemented in the organizational resources is a crucial challenge for the business analyst.  

Business analysts might be required to meet with the leaders of the development teams to learn about the current skill sets, as well as to verify team member availability and discuss specific deadlines.  Then, the business analyst can scope out the project correctly and start the project after getting all these things.

3. Solution Design & Documentation:

 When business analysts collect all the requirements, then BAs work closely with development teams to design appropriate solutions. They create functional requirement documents, wireframes, flow diagrams of process, and prepare other documentation to ensure a clear understanding of the offered solution by the development team.

Non-functional requirements are nearly around the ability of the project, that is how the project should work, while functional requirements are more to do with what the project.

The management team and the development team provide the business analyst with non-functional needs, which they then pass along to clients or other stakeholders. The business analyst must develop a plan for the project's operation and be able to explain its benefits to clients.

 4. End -User Testing:  

The business analyst plays a crucial role in the testing. The business analyst ensures that the final project is appropriate for the end-users. This step must be done through user acceptance testing. Typically, in an organization, testing is done by the other teams. Testing is also the business analyst’s responsibility to prepare test case sheets that are related to the end user. Testing and business analysis usually work together during the final stages of implementation of a project. 

Skills & Qualities of a Business Analyst

1. Communication & interpersonal skills:Business analysts frequently communicate with a variety of people, including clients, teams that are developing, and top executives of the company. These people have discussions about project requirements, negotiation solutions, and suggestions. So good communication is important to understand various other information, improving organization productivity. Good interpersonal skills for a business analyst include patience, motivation, and dependability.

2.  Technical Proficiency: A Business Analyst is working in the IT industry, so they must have a deep knowledge of technology. Business analysts are not expected to be experts in coding and software development, but they should have a good understanding of technology concepts. This knowledge helps to collaborate effectively with developers. 

3.  Research: A business analyst must perform detailed research and analysis into the company's needs and provide solutions to the problems it is currently facing. Research analysis is an essential part of providing a feasible solution, and business analysts must have good research analysis skills.

4.  Analytical Thinking: Business analysts are mainly required to go through many options before deciding which way will be best for a team, organization, or client. Thinking abilities make sure that these experts can accurately evaluate all of the information at their disposal and use it to make wise decisions.

Business analysts need strong analytical skills to identify critical problems. Business Analysts should be able to gather requirements, analyze data, interpret findings, and draw meaningful conclusions to inform decision-making.

5.  Cost-benefit analysis: For a business analyst to estimate the probable financial value of a project or investment, cost-benefit analysis is a fundamental skill.

Changes to a company's operations might need to be made by business analysts. It's crucial to make sure that the advantages outweigh the negatives in these circumstances. Business analysts can contribute to positive transformation by performing cost-benefit assessments.

Business analysts should be able to calculate all associated expenses, direct and indirect, for a project or investment.

6.  Programming: Programming is now an important skill for business analysts. The ability to write a code can help business analysts review and analyze large datasets and also help to communicate with developers and understand requirements. 

Programming skills empower business analysts to automate repetitive tasks and streamline processes. Programming skills lead to effective collaboration between business analysts and development teams. Understanding programming concepts and languages enables analysts to communicate requirements.

Conclusion  

A business analyst plays an important part in the success of any organization. Business analysts are critical in understanding and interpreting business requirements into actionable insights, allowing effective decision-making processes, and creating positive change within the organization.