Business Analyst Community & Resources | Modern Analyst

Career Forums

Modern Analyst Forums Careers Career Advice &... Business Analyst Career Advice

10/13/2016 2:09 PM

	CarteBlanche
1 posts

Business Analyst Career Advice

I am looking for advice regards my career as a Business Analyst. I have been a BA for 8 years now and I still feel as though I am not 100% confident with my trade. I work with other BA's who know more than me and it has a knock on affect on my confidence. Every day at work I have other BA's writing advanced VB script, querying databases for information or collating data in spreadsheets to present the data better either as a pivot table something similar.

I feel lost in my role in the environment I am in and I feel I have left it too long to try and learn new skills at the age of 33. After this length of time as a BA I should feel comfortable applying for a Senior BA role but due to the points above I don't. I want to learn how to become a better, more skilled BA but don't know where to start.

I sort of feel into the BA career path back in 2008 when my company was bought over and ever since I have just learnt on the job or managed to wing it. I would say I am pretty creative and have a good eye for design. So I find myself being assigned the role of wireframing a mobile UI where as the technical stories are written by other BAs which is demoralising in itself. I am able to write stories but I find my knowledge lacks when it comes to database solutions or mySQL for example.

I want to try and apply for other BA roles to get myself out of this crappy job I am in but before I do that I want to learn and better myself skill wise. Thinking mainly around subjects like:

mySQL
Coding (HTML/CSS/JavaScript)
Excel
Data Migration
SoapUI (web services)

I assume there are other BA's on this forum or software devs who know what I am on about and can maybe point me in the direction of where I should be aiming my learning and what resources are out there. I mean I know enough about Scrum/Agile/Kanban and can get by but I always think I should know more. I also want to try and better my web design skills as I used to enjoy designing a website in HTML/CSS but now that's not enough as you need JS as well. I just feel in the past few years I have let myself down with not keeping up to date with the latest standards and technologies and I'm worried I am losing my professional skills.

Hoping other BA's can help me out?

11/1/2016 7:16 AM

	NitWitNick
259 posts

Re: Business Analyst Career Advice

"I have let myself down with not keeping up to date with the latest standards and technologies and I'm worried I am losing my professional skills. "

I don't call myself just a BA ... you would be limiting yourself. As a Contractor, I stay busy with "Business Systems and Services" ... not fancy but it covers a wide range of talent.

During a contract, I've offered to help with things I didn't know (I Told Them I Didn't Know) ... but they figured I could learn and do something again on my own, when they need help.

So, I've had basically a Jack-Of-All-Trades at my contracts ... not just one thing and they like people that can be a Project Owner (Concept to Delivery) ... go figure out what someone needs and do it.

Learn what you can ... Business, Technical, Whatever ... don't get stuck as one thing.