Market Effects Consultancy Ltd

12/05/2019

6 Personal Traits That A Professional Business Analyst Should Have
Written by Mark Delarika May 8, 2019 Repost Courtesy of BA Times

Business analysts are facilitators, communicators, agents of change and negotiators.
They have to understand the needs and purposes of a business in order to consider technology solutions.
They need degrees and certifications, skills, experience and domain knowledge but they also need critically important soft skills to be most successful and become CEOs in the future.

Here are some of the personal skills they need.
1. Good Communication Skills
Business analysts must have communication skills as they have to communicate with a variety of stakeholders. They need to understand why what they’re doing has value and then articulate that to stakeholders. This includes convincing people to work on activities that may not be their top priority.
For example, a business analyst might have to persuade a Sales Director to help define performance metrics for the upgrade of a CRM database.
Good communication skills involve both verbal and written communication. Business analysts who have excellent verbal communication skills but battle with the written words may decide to receive help from writing services with skilled writers at Essay Mama.
Various forms of communication, such as workshops, meetings and other informal methods may be necessary to bring every stakeholder on board.

2. Active Listening Skills
Business analysts use active listening skills to make sure that all stakeholders are heard. They understand the importance of making eye contact with speakers and always attempt to identify exactly how they feel about what they are saying.
Observing words and body language is important for them to get to the bottom of what is being said. To do this, they must know how to dial out any internal or external distractions.
Business analysts can keep an open mind and acknowledge different opinions as well as know when to move the subject along. They are able to take all input into account without being too ruffled by disagreements. There will always be disagreeing stakeholders and part of their skill is in being able to handle this.
Holding excessively lengthy sessions is not necessary for them and they understand that these often lead to a lack of interest and attention. They prefer web conferences over traveling to different offices and hold meeting. This saves times and shows that you believe in working fast and don’t mind being tech-savvy.
They and honor confidentiality agreements and are generally seen as being above listening to any office gossip. This enables them to establish trusting relationships where they follow through on commitments.

3. Problem-Solving Skills
Many business analysts say that what they love most about their work is solving problems. Problem-solving can combine analytical thinking and creative thinking. It involves resolving cases of conflicting information, incomplete information, missing information etc.
Solutions aren’t always simple when problems occur within a company. Analysts often have to examine multiple scenarios and operations to find a solution. Understanding the problem usually involves exploring the overt symptoms, in the form of the effects on costs, sales, and performance metrics.
Examining every aspect of the situation provides context and a greater understanding of the big picture. All parties need to have input and give feedback. They have to answer many questions posed by the business analyst such as “why do you need this?”, “what does this mean?”, and “what happens next?”
Finding a solution involves some kind of change within the organization. For example, putting the change into practice could involve augmenting technology or improving a process. The ideal scenario when solving a problem is not only to solve the current problem but to ensure that it never occurs again.

4. Analytic Skills
Analytic skills are necessary to be able to interpret business needs and translate them into practical, operational requirements.
Business analysts have to analyze information from a variety of sources, such as documentation, surveys, existing systems and requirement gathering sessions. EssayHave is a reliable custom writing service that’s available to write papers, such as research papers, if necessary.
Business analysts are passionate about analyzing data and usually have a variety of different ways to analyze it. They want to see what they can do with it and how they can tease different facets of meaning from it.
Everyday interpretations of data can easily fall into patterns that can hide shades of meaning. Critical thinking and valuable analysis are not necessarily straightforward. Good analysts will resist trying to come up with a neat solution to solve the problem before extensively analyzing data. Of course, analysis paralysis can also occur and they have to understand when to stop analyzing.

5. Multi-Disciplinary Skills
Many business analysts have expertise and experience in IT and their domain. However, it also helps to have experience in performing tasks in unrelated fields across various industries.
Those with such experience are more easily able to elicit information, interact with stakeholders and identify opportunities. They know more about the world, business trends, tech updates and have a deeper knowledge of the processes of business.
They can leverage this knowledge to apply information and techniques to their current project. Their wide range of knowledge affords them with innovative ways to deliver value. They tend to be more versatile and to avoid the thinking that certain tools, techniques and work products are suitable for every situation.
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6. Decision-Facilitation Skills
In consulting with managers and offering advice to developers, business analysts need to exercise sound judgment. After they have received input from all the stakeholders and assessed a situation, they need to facilitate the making of certain decisions.
The goal is not just to bring about change but to bring about the right change. Business analysts need to help others to make the right decisions so that the right needs are met. If a decision isn’t made, nothing happens.
Good business analysis involves defining all the decisions that need to be made, who will make the decisions and the information the decision-maker will use to make the decision. When multiple people need to make a decision, they are not always on the same page. Getting buy-in from all decision-makers takes some skill.

Concluding Thoughts
Finding the best business analysts can take some time and effort. The above traits can help to identify individuals who have the potential to be great, even if they don’t have the experience yet or are in different roles.
Individuals who have a unique blend of the right hard and soft skills are usually most successful as business analysts. They know the importance of communicating and listening properly and are adept at managing and analyzing large amounts of detailed information. They know how to present and articulate value to stakeholders enabling them to make the right decisions.

30/01/2019

Smart Business Analysts Ask The Obvious Questions
Written by Ryan McPherson
October 10, 2018
Repost from BA times

Smart Business Analysts Ask the Obvious Questions
“Never make assumptions” is some of the most popular advice given to business analysts. How not to is the obvious question that so rarely seems to have an answer included.

But let’s rewind and approach this from an entirely different angle. Let’s talk about asking obvious questions like that instead. Now I know we’re all fond of the saying “there are no stupid questions,” but we all know that twinge when we worry for just moment that a question might be too obvious. There are a bunch of reasons to ask these questions, though.

The first is to remove the stigma of expertise. Once people assume you’re an expert, they stop telling you things that they think you already know. This is maybe the most dangerous type of assumption: the kind others make on your behalf. You don’t know these assumptions are being made, and you have no way to discover them as they’re occurring. You might catch them in a requirements review session, or you might catch them in user acceptance testing, or you might catch them after you go-live. If you’re asking me though, I’d rather catch them much earlier than any of those touchpoints. If we make a point of verbalizing our thoughts when we catch ourselves thinking something like “this probably means”, we are actively encouraging people to talk to us like they’re training us, rather than as a peer.

Dispelling the illusion of expertise can also be vital in relaxing the room. When people are dealing with someone they perceive to be an expert, some folks will feel pressure to keep up with the expert, or to demonstrate their own expertise. This can often be exacerbated when their manager is in the room. Lots of people are understandably uncomfortable with having their experience and expertise being outshone in front of their boss. This can manifest in all kinds of counterproductive behaviours, but even if it doesn’t, why would we ever want a stakeholder, subject matter expert, or user to feel intimidated? This completely undermines any sense of engagement, and it’s how we can do all the right steps in building consensus and yet still end up with users that are adamantly opposed to change. Reducing resistance to change is one of the outcomes organizations typically expect when they make the investment to involve business analysts, so it’s important that we do everything in our power to ensure that we’re delivering in that area.

Another way that becoming less of an expert in the eyes of your stakeholders can be of benefit to you is that it tends to lead to more realistic expectations. I’m not suggesting that we should pursue lowered expectations as a means of achieving success more consistently, but it is important that the users we represent have a realistic impression of what we actually know. We often reveal to people aspects of the bigger picture that exist outside of their bubble, and this leads to an impression of being all-knowing. That sometimes translates into an assumption that we must know their piece of the process just as well, and we need to actively work against that. If user level stakeholders think you must know everything, they’ll be sorely disappointed when the solution you deliver doesn’t address their concerns. Even if those specific concerns never came up.

But in addition to improving the quality of our work, asking these types of questions can reduce the risk of project delays.

We can apply this general technique to business processes. Everything happens for reason, whether it’s a good one. Understanding why each stakeholder thinks each step is necessary, or what it accomplishes in the big picture prevents assumptions. Once you’ve got your swim lane diagram finished, it should be easy for you to point to any step and explain what its purpose is, or what business value we think we’re getting from it. If not, then you’ll risk finding yourself frequently having to decide whether we can make an assumption or if we need to do additional follow-up investigation. It usually doesn’t add much time to ask what the benefit or necessity of a given activity is, but it can add substantial delay to a project to have to schedule repeated follow-up meetings.

Asking the obvious question can also be an effective means of bridging resistance to change. If we think it’s possible that a process can be substantially improved by a change that the users or process owners may find radical, we may need to challenge some deeply held assumptions.

We can do that by trying to sell the change on its pros and cons, but this doesn’t instill a sense of ownership in the people affected by the change. Sometimes that’s acceptable. But where we encounter resistance, we might be wise to consider asking instead of telling.

We can dig into greater detail on the steps where we think there might be opportunity for change, which can naturally allow us to begin asking for more information on the purpose of those steps. By asking the obvious questions, we challenge our users and stakeholders to explain the reason behind a process, which brings them on board in thinking about it from a requirements perspective rather than a solution perspective. When they get to participate in discussing whether a change is viable from the perspective of trying to meet the underlying requirements, we get buy-in built into the solution.

Is this the answer to how not to make assumptions? It’s one way that might help. Where it doesn’t, I think you’ll still find ample value in asking anyways.

08/05/2018

"Opportunities are for the prepared."

03/01/2018

Kick Start 2018 with a New Career..

How would you like to start the year? Why not join the Business Analyst course this month of January.

Business Analysis as a discipline is more about identifying and clarifying Business problems/change/improvements or issues within a company (whether systems, change or a process issues).

Our course are highly interactive , in-depth with real organisation case studies to build your confidence in securing your next role.

For more information on training dates. Contact :[email protected]

21/12/2017

Are you looking to change carreer in 2018?

For a better opportunity, more challenges, and career growth.
Why not join our training program, which will provide you with the right skills, opportunity and direction for your next move in #2018.

We train individuals and corporate staff all over the world with courses designed to suit their individual or corporate needs based on industry requirements and trends. Our courses are designed with customers in mind to give you an understanding of how the course or training can be applied to your specific industry.

20/12/2017

Are you ready for GDPR?

With the General Data Protection Regulation scheduled to come into force on 25 May 2018.

GDPR is set to transform businesses in the UK , are you prepare for this change .

We offer corporate or individual training to get you ready for this new regulation. Training available in January 2018

Contact : [email protected]

30/06/2017

Need a new challenge or brand new career this summer? Why not join our running this July.

Dates: 9th, 16th, 22nd & 23rd July
Venue: UKTL Business Advantage Club in , Manchester.

Course starts from £350.
Email us: [email protected]

26/06/2017

16/04/2017

Looking to challenge yourself? why not join our training courses on project management and Business Analyst. Courses are designed with you in mind, with training can be applied to your specific industry.

Come and Join us to develop your career in ....



Starting this May - July 2017 every weekend (Saturdays , Sundays) at UKTL Business Advantage Club Business Centre in , Manchester
Email us: [email protected]