Data Analyst. Vs Business Analyst

[LondonManc]

As a BA, your life will be spent in a non-technical environment with minimal hands-on technical involvement. You will be involved in business interviews, requirements gathering, elements of project planning, meetings, high and low level design documents, acceptance criteria documentation and so on. It is also often very specific to the industry that you're in, e.g. banking, pharma, retail, etc.

The best bit about a DA is that your skills are portable across industry, so if pharma is tanking, you can dip into finance and so on.

[Lockhouse]

Hi,

I'm a data analyst and I love it and I'm building a career in Business intelligence using SAS,SQL, Python for data visualization

However, there appears to be more roles in Business Analysis. Is it worth getting trained in that area.

I do both, depends on the contract. Most business analysts specialise in a particular area as, believe it or not, you really have to understand the business you are supposed to be analysing. That means that "training", whatever that is, will only get you so far. It might get you an interview if you have a nice certificate and will certainly get you some nice templates but it won't help you gathering the requirements and writing the spec for an ETF trading system.

[abbeyman]

From experience a good DA needs some understanding of business and a BA needs to have an overview of the techie world.

[cojak]

I won't have asked if it was. I want responses from people with BAU experience in Business Analyst

As a Senior BA, all responses above are correct.

You're thinking of a Systems Analyst which these days is called a Technical BA (which is a particular bugbear of mine).


But the contracts will specify Technical BAs.


If you don't look for that you may well be expected to do requirements management and process analysis.

[BrandNewOne]

The clue is in the title of the role

I won't have asked if it was. I want responses from people with BAU experience in Business Analyst

[Lance]

Oh really. So both are not technical? I thought they were . I love my techie work

It does require 'some' technical understanding of what's possible (although not many BAs I've met can), but it's more about creating business requirements that architects can use to design a solution.

[northernladuk]

Oh really. So both are not technical? I thought they were . I love my techie work

The clue is in the title of the role

[BrandNewOne]

apart from the word analyst they are worlds apart.
first I'd suggest you find out what a BA is and decide if you want to do it.

Bluntly.... If you're a techie data analayst, then a move to BA has to be because you really want to. If you love data analysis then forget it.

Oh really. So both are not technical? I thought they were . I love my techie work

[Lance]

Hi,

I'm a data analyst and I love it and I'm building a career in Business intelligence using SAS,SQL, Python for data visualization

However, there appears to be more roles in Business Analysis. Is it worth getting trained in that area.

apart from the word analyst they are worlds apart.
first I'd suggest you find out what a BA is and decide if you want to do it.

Bluntly.... If you're a techie data analayst, then a move to BA has to be because you really want to. If you love data analysis then forget it.

[BrandNewOne]

Hi,

I'm a data analyst and I love it and I'm building a career in Business intelligence using SAS,SQL, Python for data visualization

However, there appears to be more roles in Business Analysis. Is it worth getting trained in that area.