Six Skills Every Business Analyst Needs
Check out the six skills that will help you succeed as a business analyst. This role often involves a lot of autonomy and is constantly developing new requirements and priorities.
These six skills won't necessarily determine whether you become a competent business analyst, but being aware of them will give you the advantage of selling yourself as someone who can work effectively in any organization.
Here are the six skills every business analyst needs....
Engage
Business analysts often have to convince colleagues to work on activities that may not be their top priority. It's rare that a BA actually has a project with stakeholders who can devote all their time to requirements elicitation and validation. You often have to cajole, pressure, beg, and otherwise convince stakeholders to help you accomplish your tasks. This process is much easier when you engage. So when you're in an interview, demonstrate your communication and persuasion skills, as you'll often need these skills to get people on board with your project.
Have thick skin
Good business analysts recognize that they can't control most of their environment though they are often held accountable for things that are beyond their scope. After all, BAs often have to balance stubborn stakeholders, crazy schedules, and corporate politics.
As you prepare for your interview, ask yourself how you handle difficult or politically charged situations and back it up with real-life examples.
How have you resolved conflicts? What role do you play in meetings where people disagree? Being diplomatic is important, as is being realistic about timelines or requirements. It's also important to manage stakeholder expectations. Make sure you include all your experience with these things in your answers.
Be multidisciplinary
In general, BAs are better able to gather information, interact with stakeholders, and identify opportunities if they have worked in many different industries. In addition, multidisciplinary BAs can use their knowledge of other industries to capture information and apply it to their current project or tasks.
Experienced BAs recognize that all of their activities and methods must be adapted to the specific environment and situation. Multidisciplinary BAs often find innovative ways to add value to their projects because they have a wide range of experience to draw upon.
During your interview, be sure to share the best solutions you've found. This usually means you offer multiple options for problems and show the pros and cons of each option.
These options are then presented to management and stakeholders so they can decide which one to choose.
Question everything
As a BA, one of your main tasks is to ask questions. If you don't, you run the risk of becoming a mere "order taker" who merely writes down what stakeholders say without critical analysis.
Experienced BAs recognize that they are an information conduit and always ask stakeholders to help refine, validate, and implement requirements. You should always consider what, why, how, where, when, who when analyzing solutions and communicating with stakeholders.
During your interview, demonstrate how you elicit requirements and the methodology you use. The interviewer wants to make sure you can not only write down requirements statements, but also do some analysis related to costs, benefits, impacts, and other issues.
Think strategically
Successful BAs must always evaluate and communicate the value of their work to stakeholders. Understand the needs and goals of the organization and find ways to efficiently identify the goals. Finding options, alternatives, and solutions is key. Know how to communicate the added value of your recommendations to supervisors.
Be prepared to describe to the interviewer how you strategically helped previous employers reach their next level. The interviewer wants to know how you solve problems.
Attention to detail
Another important characteristic is attention to detail. Good BAs understand the importance of accurate and clear documentation and communication. In addition, they are able to balance large amounts of information. You must be able to scale your messaging and thought processes and be persuasive.
When speaking with a potential employer, you must present yourself as well-organized and be able to provide clear documentation. Sharing and explaining examples of projects where you have taken in large amounts of information and documented it accurately in requirements or developed options can help you stand out.
As I said, being a business analyst is more than just being able to record requirements. Following and refining advice will go a long way toward making you more effective - and proving to interviewers that you can handle any project.
