In the complex landscape of 2023's business world, many companies find themselves asking, "How to hire a business analyst?" and "Why hire a business analyst?" The answers to these pressing questions lie in understanding the dynamic role of IT Business Analysts.
These individuals are the backbone of an organization's IT structure, connecting the dots between business strategies and technology solutions. But why should we hire a business analyst, you might ask.
They provide an invaluable perspective, using their extensive knowledge and experience to help guide a company through the changing tides of the digital world. They are the bridge that translates your business needs into technological action. So, whether you're already convinced or still considering to hire a business analyst, delve into this guide to understand who they are and why they've become an essential part of modern business operations in 2023.
Interesting projects don’t turn into great products when chaos is taking over the company behind it. There has to be someone to assess whether the solutions that are being introduced will be effective in the long run from a technological standpoint. There has to be someone who can oversee all the processes at the company, suggest decisions based on actual data and research, and help with getting the most out of the preplanned budget.
This person is an IT Business Analyst.
IT Business Analyst job description — or all the basics you need to know
What actually are IT Business Analysts? At first sight, you might consider them just another type of data analytics experts. They indeed work with a lot of data, researching the current trends and analyzing users’ behavior. But besides taking care of these, they are also responsible for decision-making, recommending specific solutions in front of stakeholders, and making sure that the solutions they have recommended (and that happened to be approved) are implemented in a correct way.
An IT Business Analyst is also someone who makes sure that money and budget are always considered in the long run. They review the solutions company currently makes use of, analyze how effective and efficient these are, and suggest what can be improved. They also help in finding areas of the business where costs can be cut and processes that can be automated.
All this makes an IT Business Analyst a mix of Data Analyst, Project Manager, and consultant. What’s important, Business Analysts in the IT industry often have an engineering background, being a developer themselves at some point in their career. However, their goal is ultimately not to code by themselves but to make sure that your company operates according to trends and rational decisions made based on actual data.
What a good IT Business Analyst can do for your business?
Whether you are running an early-stage startup or an enterprise-sized business, an IT Business Analyst is a person you should consider hiring.
In the case of a new startup, a good BA will be able to plan the development route for you and your technical team and make sure that the data-driven strategy is carried out correctly. In a bigger company, on the other hand, an IT Business Analyst can review the current processes and the state of the project(s), later adjusting the company’s strategy to what the data research suggests should be done. What’s important in every business, a BA will also have a look at your budget and current spendings and suggest improvements in this area.
To give you a more general idea of what a BA can help you with, here are some of the most typical responsibilities of a Business Analyst in the IT industry:
- Helping in the creation of a budget plan, forecasting spendings.
- Regularly analyzing what can be improved in how the company works.
- Gathering requests from stakeholders and establishing a plan that will enable them to meet these needs.
- Analyzing data (either gathered by themselves or delivered by the company’s Data Analysts) and creating a plan based on it.
- Prioritizing features to be introduced in the product.
- Delivering reports to stakeholders.
- Analyzing trends in target consumer groups (regarding favorable pricing method, features needed, etc.)
- Working closely with the engineering teams in order to design technical solutions that meet the necessary project requirements.
- Preparing documentations (mostly technical) of the projects managed.
Finding the most suitable Business Analyst for an IT project
Business Analysts are not always working on IT projects. This means, that when you are looking for a BA to join your company, you should be considering strictly candidates who have previous experience with IT (or at least tech startups/technological companies).
What’s important, is that many Business Analysts in the IT industry are actually former engineers who progressed their careers in a way allowing them to focus more on technical project management or consultancy. This helped them in obtaining new skills while being continuously up-to-date with the recent advancements in software development. A combination like this can truly boost your project and you can rest assured that everything’s going in the right direction.
When you want to hire an IT Business Analyst, you should also consider the company and project fit. Look for candidates who worked in your industry or on similar software projects to yours. With such experience, they will be able to find the best solutions for your company faster than BAs with a different background.
What skills to look for when hiring IT Business Analyst?
When considering how to hire a business analyst, it's essential to recognize the hard skills they bring to the table. Hard skills refer to the technical abilities and knowledge required for the job, distinct from soft skills like communication or teamwork.
Why hire a business analyst with robust hard skills? These professionals are well-versed in areas such as data analysis, IT project management, and business process modeling. They can masterfully use software like Microsoft Excel, Tableau, SQL, and more. They have a solid understanding of Agile methodologies, Scrum frameworks, and business intelligence tools.
A business analyst with these hard skills can provide in-depth insights, analyze complex datasets, and implement strategic solutions to drive your company forward. When asked, "Why should we hire you as a business analyst?", the candidate's hard skills should be one of their most compelling arguments.
Remember, when you hire a business analyst, you're investing in their hard skills as much as their ability to work well within your team. These hard skills form the backbone of their role, allowing them to efficiently solve problems, make informed decisions, and ultimately, drive your business towards success in 2023.
Besides the required experience in working in and with technical teams, good IT Business Analyst should also possess the following skills:
- Knowledge of data analytics (operations on sheets, experience with working in programming languages used for data management and analytics such as Python or R, A/B testing)
- Multitasking (in bigger companies BAs often take care of multiple projects at once)
- Knowledge of the technology used at your company or being able to quickly get oneself accustomed to the basics of it
- Vast knowledge of technological solutions currently used in the IT world (programming languages, frameworks, SDKs, databases)
- Understanding of database management and overall back-end operations
- Being familiar with business management
- Experience with budgeting
- Ability to translate technical jargon into language easily understandable by non-techies — and the other way around
- Experience in preparing technical documentations
- Experience in working with teams incorporating agile and other relevant management methodologies (Scrum, DevOps, etc.)
When looking for an IT Business Analyst, you might also consider their education. It’s relatively common that IT BAs have some kind of academic experience in business management. This can be either a bachelor’s degree or an MBA.
Course participation certificates are also often presented to potential employers. Probably the most popular and commonly known BA certificates are those awarded by IIBA (International Institute of Business Analysis), such as IIBA Certification of Competency in Business Analysis (CCBA) or IIBA Agile Analysis Certification (AAC). Other certificates to consider are the Project Management Institute’s (PMI) Professional in Business Analysis and the IQBBA Business Analyst Certification awarded by the American Software Testing Qualifications Board (ASTQB).
In regards to the technical part of their job, many IT BAs are software engineering or computer engineering graduates. There are also, of course, more old school professionals who are self-taught coders and who should not be disregarded. If they do have proper experience in software development, they still might be great candidates. To have a proper certificate is always a good thing, but when it comes to software development, true experience and skills matter more than just theoretical knowledge
Top IT Business Analyst interview questions
After making the first selection of potential candidates, the round of interviews happens. While IT Business Analysts are usually not tested in regards to their technical software development knowledge, questions requiring rapid decision-making and analytical thinking may be presented to them. You can work on preparing specific interview scenarios with your Project Managers, Product Owners, or even members of the technical team.
To give you a brief idea of how this kind of interview can look, we decided to share some of our favorite IT Business Analyst interview questions below.
- What are some of your favorite tools to use for data analysis?
- In your previous workplaces, have you ever been asked to do a job that is not a part of the IT Business Analyst’s responsibilities? If yes, how have you answered this request?
- What are some visual models that you have previously used in your work as an IT Business Analyst? How do you use them in your work? (The answer may include things like activity diagrams, mind maps, roadmaps, product matrix, system context diagrams, etc.)
- Who do you prefer working with: developers or non-developers? Why?
- What is SRS (System/Software Requirements Specification)? When and why is it used?
- What are scope creeps? How can you avoid them?
- What are the functional and nonfunctional requirements of a product? How can you review them?
- What are Personas from a Business Analyst’s perspective?
- Which areas, based on your experience, are usually the ones in which costs can be cut? Why, in your opinion, those areas are usually the most common ones to look at when considering cutting costs?
- What are the main differences between the V Model and the Fish Model in software development?
- How do you approach requirements elicitation? What are your favorite techniques?
- What agile metrics do you consider the most important when running business assessments?
Develop an outstanding product with top talents on board
Business Analyst can be a great addition to your growing team, taking care of the business development part of your project. But don’t forget about the core software building process which should include specialists like developers, designers, and project managers.
If you are looking to hire new talents for your team, reach out to us at Ideamotive. Thanks to our extensive network of experienced IT specialists, we are able to connect you with the exact people you need in no time.
Start building your award-winning team today with Ideamotive.
