While choosing a suitable career may be a matter of choice and interest, it is also essential to weigh the relevance of your career with the current world standards.
The US Bureau of Labour Statistics predicted that business analyst jobs would increase by about 19% between 2012 and 2022, and that’s a good pointer to how good business analysis is as a career.
Is business analyst a good career? A business analyst is a vital part of every enterprise, as he/she acts as a bridge between the business problems of stakeholders and the best possible solutions by applying analytical skills, business knowledge, technical awareness, and firm decision making for solving the issues.
Whether you starting your career fresh or have already worked in the industry for some time and want to know if a business analyst is a career that is worth it, this article will take you through every essential detail. By the end of the article, you will be able to figure out if a business analyst is something that you want to embark on.
What Is the Future of Business Analyst?
A business analyst will experience significant changes with time, but many other jobs will also experience a considerable amount of change, mainly because change is inevitable in the business world.
Success in business in the coming years may require a different approach, mindset, and tools, and the role of the business analyst may tend towards product analysis, tech analysis, or even more streamlined functions, such as blockchain analysis or AI business analysis.
Though the change may be very significant, the BA profession will not thin out as quickly as smoke vanishes in air. On the contrary, there are professional speculations that the business analyst profession will experience tremendous growth with time.
What Is the Role of Technology in the Future of Business Analyst?
Technology keeps improving every now and then, and it is impossible to accurately predict what the next wave of technology might bring to the business world. Each technological breakthrough usually brings a considerable amount of disruption to an enterprise’s business processes.
However, if such a technological breakthrough is well appropriated with a company’s business processes, the disruption will be used to their advantage. This is the reason why many companies need the help of a business analyst.
With a seamless evolution of technology from fundamental discoveries to more advanced and predictive inventions such as AI, Internet of Things, Machine Learning, RPA, and Cognitive Computing, enterprises need highly-skilled business analysts. They can help them to create solutions that can impact their businesses positively.
How Should Companies and Business Analysts Prepare for the Future?
It will become necessary for workers and professional business analysts to shift their thoughts and practices with an ever-changing business world. They will have to develop a more pragmatic approach as well as solutions to understanding the business need and then creating reliable solutions.
Since technology is always on the increase, the kind of business analysts that companies will need in the future are those who are not short-term game players, but those who look far into the future and create reliable and robust business models and operations.
With technology, growth, and development, generally, more tools, techniques, and methodologies will be necessary to be in the high wave of competition in the business world. Therefore, business analysts must be ready to learn new tools, techniques, and methodologies as they come.
Generally, the work of a good business analyst is to understand the real needs of enterprises, support stakeholders to achieve their business goals by creating useful strategies, and work with other members of staff to achieve the desired business outcome.
There are also other ways that business analysts can prepare for the future, including taking professional courses such as those offered by IIBA (International Institute of Business Analysis) and CBAP (Certified Business Analysis Professional). These certificate courses are recognized for professional business analysis world over.
What Are the Required Skills Set for a Business Analyst in the Future?
As business needs, models, and operations alter due to changes in management, technology, and environment, business analysts will face the challenge of updating their skills set to meet up with the demands of the changing business world.
One significant change that is already evident in many businesses is the use of big data. Many companies now depend on big data to stay ahead of their competitors, making it necessary for business analysts to develop data analysis skills, as well as other skills related to structuring and organizing data.
The other relevant skills that business analysts must learn in preparation for the future include the following:
- · Strong analytic skills
- · Business and Industry knowledge
- · Communication skills (including business writing)
- · Conflict management
- · Critical and creative thinking
- · Cultural, political, and technical awareness
- · Decision making
- · Strong learning, leadership, negotiation, and organization skills
- · Problem solving
- · Systems thinking
- · Teamwork, and so on.
For a business analyst who will like to function more in the IT department of a company, skills in artificial intelligence, robotic process automation, cognitive computing, the internet of things, and machine learning may be essential.
Furthermore, more critical business analysis tools may develop in the future, and it will be necessary for a professional business analyst to learn them. Above all, a business analyst must have strong learning skills to be able to adapt to new business analysis trends.
Over the years, business analysis has developed into more areas, which are more streamlined to particular business operations. There are now many career paths in business analysis, with each one tailored to your different backgrounds (technology, finance, accounting, and so on.).
6 Potential Career Paths for Business Analysts
Following a career in business analysis is lucrative and highly rewarding, and that’s because every company needs a professional who can help them transform their out-of-date processes into current technology-driven processes so that they can be in the current competition trends.
At some point, people get stuck and may need to become specific about their business analyst career. No worries if you’re also at that point of trying to figure out what you want to major on precisely like a business analyst.
The six career paths I will share with you below will help you to quickly figure out the business analyst career path that is ideal for you:
IT Business Analyst
Following the IT business analyst, career path is suitable for you, mainly if you have a background in IT and business management. The role of an IT business analyst is to use their knowledge of IT, software, and business management to analyze, manage, and facilitate tech-focused business projects.
The basic requirements to function well in this role include knowledge and experience in IT, operating systems, business management, data and business requirements, critical thinking, and strong communication skills.
According to Glassdoor report, an IT project manager (another career path under the umbrella of IT business analysis) earns about $97,000 per year.
Quantitative Analyst
Because of the role they play in a company’s finances, quantitative analysts are most often referred to as financial engineers. Other descriptions of them include quantitative traders, quantitative researches, or quantitative developers.
What quantitative analysts do is to review analyzed data, develop and implement mathematical models from the evaluated data, and make reliable financial decisions. Such data-driven decision making helps to prevent losses while still taking risks.
The basic requirements for this role include a master’s degree in math, economics, computational finance, or any other equivalent field of study. Because of the level of education needed to handle this role, the salary is quite big, with senior quantitative analysts earning about $116,000 while junior QAs earn about $98,000.
Data Scientist
A data scientist helps to piece-up unstructured data and make informed insights for decision making. Usually, data scientists use their knowledge of statistics, machine learning, and AI to analyze and interpret complex data.
Notwithstanding, the role of data scientists requires in-depth technical knowledge and experience with tools, such as Python and SQL database. Soft skills necessary to excel as a data scientist include critical thinking and strong decision making.
Like quantitative analysts, data scientists may also need to have their master’s degree in math, statistics, computer science, or other related fields of learning. The average pay for a salary for a data scientist is usually more than $120,000 per year.
Information Security Analyst
Information security analysts have strong IT skills, which they use to protect a company from cyber-threats by interpreting security data and monitoring IT systems and networks. It is also required that they should work proactively always to spot potential avenues for cyber-attacks and proffer useful solutions.
This career is probably ideal for you if you love problem-solving and detecting threats. The basic requirements for this role include a bachelor’s degree in an IT-related course and many years of substantial experience in cybersecurity.
The average salary of an information security analyst is about $98,000.
Solutions Architect
The work of the solutions architect is to understand how the technological systems in an enterprise are adapted to solving modern business problems. It also involves developing informed changes to the systems and ensuring that such changes don’t harm the existing infrastructure.
The usual requirement for this role is a bachelor’s degree in a computer-related field of study. To be more relevant, many solutions architects pursue a master’s degree in computer-related courses, too.
Moreover, there are courses offered by private organizations to help develop the careers of solutions architects or business analysts generally.
The average solutions architect earns about $122,000.
Management Analyst
Management analysts or management consultants are very vital to the growth and development of any organization. They provide useful advice to company managers and business leaders on methods to improve company processes, minimize costs, and increase income.
Management analysts work like IT business analysts except that they are more of consultants who provide advice. Moreover, they do not work with one company but offer their services to other companies that may need it.
Because of how they work, most management analysts always focus on a particular area of business analysis, such as IT or finance. Their authority in the fields they specialize in makes them invaluable for business enterprises.
A bachelor’s degree in business management, accounting, or other related fields may be sufficient to be a management analyst. But an MBA is an added advantage.
Because business analysts are free to work with as many companies they want, rather than just work internally in a single company, the salary is about $83,000 a year, which is quite low when compared with the others.
Are Business Analysts Well Paid?
A report on Payscale shows that the average business analyst earns between $50k and $97k per year. The report listed several employers and showed the salaries given by those employers to business analysts in their companies.
In the future, the role of the business analyst is expected to become inevitable. In essence, a report published by IBM showed that the number of job profiles for business analysts in 2020 would likely increase from the current 400,000 to nearly 4 million openings.
Because of the increasing need for business analysts, the average salary of a business analyst per year may increase geometrically, depending on the skill and experience of individual BAs.
Do Business Analysts Travel a Lot?
It is not often the case for business analysts to travel, mainly because most of their work is in-house. But sometimes, they have to meet with other investors to discuss projects that will benefit their companies, and they will have to travel.
For management analysts who are not held down by any company but can also offer their services to other companies, traveling between regions may be necessary. But the usual routine is to work internally within a business enterprise.
Is Business Analyst a Good Career Path?
A business analyst is an excellent career to pursue, and most companies value their work, especially when they help them to create beautiful processes that bring much profit to the company. So don’t hold back if you are keen on starting a business analyst career.
Moreover, it is also financially rewarding when you compare it with the salary of some other jobs, which may even be more demanding than that of a business analyst.
If you have a background in business management, IT, finance, or accounting, you may do well as a business analyst. But no worries, if you are green in the area of business analysis, there’s plenty of resources available for you to become a professional business analyst.
