Advice needed for beginning Business Analysis career with OU degree

[CharliePA]

Hello everyone!

I graduated with a BA in Business Management in November last year as a mature student. Since then I've identified Business Analysis as a really good fit for me, so I'm pursuing opportunities through which to realise that career path.

However, I have not managed to get any interviews, despite applying to many junior roles. Granted, some roles -- even the junior roles -- have required certain skills and experience I do not have (and can only achieve through a BA role), but I applied anyway and hoped my cover letter and CV being tailored towards Business Analysis would help demonstrate how serious I am about this profession.

Does anyone have advice on how to get into Business Analysis? Is there something mature students without the relevant experience can do? Even unpaid internships seem difficult to attain. I've started to lose hope so any assistance would be appreciated!

Cheers

 

[HangTime]

• Definitely look for junior roles.
• Consider consultancies they will often have a path for joining as an associate and working your way up, basically indoctrinating graduates in their way of doing things. Be warned, hard work / long hours may be expected. However, depending on how 'mature' you are, your age may [unofficially] count against you, they basically want cheap, smart people in their 20s to thrown on projects with a big markup.
• Look at graduate schemes, for sure there will be firms hiring people as Junior BAs.
• Consider other jobs that may be stepping stones to business analysis, such as Process Analyst, Tester etc. I once hired a Process Analyst as a Junior BA and she was really good, she'd applied for BA role and we felt her experience wasn't quite what was needed BUT she came across well and did have some transferable skills, so we changed the role to be Junior, and then promoted her after a year to lose the Junior once she'd demonstrated competency.
• Post the bits of your CV you consider tailored towards Business Analysis so we can critique it

 

[CharliePA]

Hey, thanks for your response!

I'm 34, so maybe you're right, that may count against me, which is something I've considered -- but have always tried not to be self-conscious of. Funny how hard it can be for people who haven't taken a direct path into a career.

Yeah, the stepping stone approach is something I've considered too. I suppose it's just the assurance that it could/will/might lead to a BA role that I need -- it's probably what I'll end up doing, especially as my CV isn't exactly outstanding in such a competitve market. Not that it's a bad route, of course... It's nice that you saw she wasn't ready for the BA role but found a route for her -- an employer like that is something I'm secretly hoping for also!

I shall post the tailored sections below (just note, the formatting won't transfer).

Thanks again!

 

[CharliePA]

I am a recent graduate of The Open University with experience analysing business strategies and producing reports. I am seeking an opportunity to leverage my data analysis and business understanding skills as an analyst. I am eager to complete deliverables, streamline processes, maximise efficiency, and foster professional relationships within organisations. I have a commitment to learning, a willingness to seek information, and possess strong interpersonal and teamwork skills.

2017-2021 – The Open University – Distance Learning

BA (Honours) Business Management (upper 2:1)

• Specialisms: financial accounting, communication in business management and financial analysis & decision making.
  
  
• Developed strong critical evaluation, research and data-gathering skills to produce internal and external analyses of companies, industries, and macroeconomic context.
  
  
• Final-year dissertation included developing a report on strategic issues within a UK company and making corresponding strategic recommendations to management and identifying risks.
  

Front-of-House Supervisor

The Rosehip – Edinburgh, UK

February 2016 – February 2020

• Managed the front of house operation including supervising a team of seven staff members.
  
  
• Supervised pre-service team meetings, mid-service changes to team members and the back-of-house team, assigned duties according to strengths, and trained new staff members.
  
  
• Ensured customer satisfaction by quickly problem-solving issues and complaints in a fast-paced environment.
  
  
• Contributed to the consistent achievement of increased year-on-year targets.
  
  
• Contributed to analysing data to set new sales and customer satisfaction targets, assessing ongoing progress towards achieving KPIs, and improving efficiency of internal communication processes.
  

(ALSO I mention my Microsoft Suite skills. The supervisor role is one of two that were tailored as much as I could, I think; granted with obvious limitations)

 

[dowie]

Does anyone have advice on how to get into Business Analysis? Is there something mature students without the relevant experience can do? Even unpaid internships seem difficult to attain. I've started to lose hope so any assistance would be appreciated!

Unpaid internships are illegal in the UK unless they fit certain requirements like being part of an academic placement etc.

The main route into a BA role with no prior experience would be via a grad scheme, other routes involve transitioning from adjacent careers (developers, domain experts etc..).

In other cases, it can be sort of a promotion/step up from a more junior role, three that I'd suggest that could lead onto a BA role nicely are:

QA Analyst (software testing) - this might not be suitable as it is semi-technical, can involve some aspects of BA work - analysis + writing short specs when things go wrong.

PMO Assitant - lots of coordination, planning with dev teams etc. could transition to a PM or BA role.

Application Support Analyst - note *not* tech support/help desk but rather functional/business support for (an) application(s), can involve writing short software specs/change requests so partly a kind of BA role in itself.

I am seeking an opportunity to leverage my data analysis and business understanding skills as an analyst.

Note that while some BA roles will involve data analysis they don't strictly need to, they can simply involve requirements gathering, writing specs etc.

Having said that, that sort of skill set could be a neat way into a hybrid BA/data or BI role, with no experience there isn't really much you can do to demonstrate BA skills, you've never worked on a real software project etc. but some BI or data analyst skills are things you can perhaps demonstrate with no experience - if you learned SQL (kinda needed in general tbh.*) and one or both of say tableau, Power BI etc. then that's something you could maybe get some sort of certificate in and/or can more easily be verified in an interview/assessment. (perhaps sign up to something like datacamp.com, if you've still got your OU e-mail then maybe try this: https://www.datacamp.com/pricing/student)

That way you've got some tangible skills you can demonstrate to an employer and so if they want some analyst who can make pretty dashboards etc. they can see you've got the tableau or whatever certificate, they can give you an SQL test and they've got a lot more confidence in being able to hire you.
Presently they're just looking at someone who is saying I understand business and I'd be good at being organised, communicating and building relationships etc.. and that might be true but without prior project experience they don't really know - they might take a chance on you as part of a grad scheme but otherwise probs not.

Lastly, since you've already done some part-time study, I'd check this out, I've not done it but it's good brand name to have on your CV and it looks like a good Business/Systems analyst course:

Undergraduate Advanced Diploma in IT Systems Analysis and Design

A one-year part-time course for those wishing to develop their understanding of modern systems analysis, development and management. Delivered entirely online, the course is taught at third-year undergraduate level.

www.conted.ox.ac.uk

(*basic familiarity with SQL + unix/linux command line is kinda needed regardless of whether you're going into a data related role, you'll generally want to be able to query/pull stuff from a database and navigate around a system, inspect and search for stuff in log files without having to call a developer over to hold your hand. Being able to read some code is useful too, that isn't to say you need be doing their job for them, if they've screwed up it is ultimately their job to diagnose and fix it but you should be able to have a decent idea of what when wrong and where etc.)

 

[CharliePA]

Unpaid internships are illegal in the UK unless they fit certain requirements like being part of an academic placement etc.

The main route into a BA role with no prior experience would be via a grad scheme, other routes involve transitioning from adjacent careers (developers, domain experts etc..).

In other cases, it can be sort of a promotion/step up from a more junior role, three that I'd suggest that could lead onto a BA role nicely are:

QA Analyst (software testing) - this might not be suitable as it is semi-technical, can involve some aspects of BA work - analysis + writing short specs when things go wrong.

PMO Assitant - lots of coordination, planning with dev teams etc. could transition to a PM or BA role.

Application Support Analyst - note *not* tech support/help desk but rather functional/business support for (an) application(s), can involve writing short software specs/change requests so partly a kind of BA role in itself.



Note that while some BA roles will involve data analysis they don't strictly need to, they can simply involve requirements gathering, writing specs etc.

Having said that, that sort of skill set could be a neat way into a hybrid BA/data or BI role, with no experience there isn't really much you can do to demonstrate BA skills, you've never worked on a real software project etc. but some BI or data analyst skills are things you can perhaps demonstrate with no experience - if you learned SQL (kinda needed in general tbh.*) and one or both of say tableau, Power BI etc. then that's something you could maybe get some sort of certificate in and/or can more easily be verified in an interview/assessment. (perhaps sign up to something like datacamp.com, if you've still got your OU e-mail then maybe try this: https://www.datacamp.com/pricing/student)

That way you've got some tangible skills you can demonstrate to an employer and so if they want some analyst who can make pretty dashboards etc. they can see you've got the tableau or whatever certificate, they can give you an SQL test and they've got a lot more confidence in being able to hire you.
Presently they're just looking at someone who is saying I understand business and I'd be good at being organised, communicating and building relationships etc.. and that might be true but without prior project experience they don't really know - they might take a chance on you as part of a grad scheme but otherwise probs not.

Lastly, since you've already done some part-time study, I'd check this out, I've not done it but it's good brand name to have on your CV and it looks like a good Business/Systems analyst course:

Undergraduate Advanced Diploma in IT Systems Analysis and Design

A one-year part-time course for those wishing to develop their understanding of modern systems analysis, development and management. Delivered entirely online, the course is taught at third-year undergraduate level.

www.conted.ox.ac.uk

(*basic familiarity with SQL + unix/linux command line is kinda needed regardless of whether you're going into a data related role, you'll generally want to be able to query/pull stuff from a database and navigate around a system, inspect and search for stuff in log files without having to call a developer over to hold your hand. Being able to read some code is useful too, that isn't to say you need be doing their job for them, if they've screwed up it is ultimately their job to diagnose and fix it but you should be able to have a decent idea of what when wrong and where etc.)

Oh wow, thanks for the response...some great information there...

Yeah, I'm definitely not looking for technical roles but can see the value in learning SQL. DataCamp might be an option as something super-focused such as learning SQL...not too expensive, either...

Grad schemes would be a great option in theory. So far I haven't had a positive response and I think there will be much stronger candidates out there -- the long waits for them to start are also off-putting, but that's academic as I can't see OU students being chosen over other grads. Could be wrong, of course.

Shall check out the PMO assistant roles too and see if anyone will have me!

Cheers

 

[dowie]

Oh wow, thanks for the response...some great information there...

Yeah, I'm definitely not looking for technical roles but can see the value in learning SQL. DataCamp might be an option as something super-focused such as learning SQL...not too expensive, either...

No worries, tableau and Power BI don't require you to be particularly technical either and they're widely used so could be an easy win to get one or both of those bases covered too (datacamp seems to offer them now).

You might not be looking for a technical role but a good (tech) salesperson, product manager, business consultant, PM, BA etc. should still have a range of basic skills.

You could pick up the basic level of SQL needed for the typical BA role in a weekend easily (just need to use it every so often so you don't then forget everything), ditto to just learning a few basic commands for unix like systems etc..

If you end up doing anything finance related then Excel & VBA is still worth knowing, take a look at Walkenbach's books.

These sorts of things are low effort/easy wins to get some competency with, there are lots of people out there who might say use Excel every day but barely know anything and won't have even touched VBA. If you just get a basic level of competency with this stuff then it can be so easy to be (visibly) productive and that's super important early on in a career, you want to be seen to be productive + competent (& self-sufficient) as soon as possible as that's how you progress, build a good rep, ask for more money etc..

 

[Converge]

You could try getting a leg up by getting some BCS analysis certification. That should help with demonstrating you know your stuff.

Chartered Institute for IT

Also, getting a good handle on basic process modelling diagrams (levels 1 through 5) would be great. Everyone loves a well constructed business process diagram.

Funny thing is, once you know how to do those properly, scale back on the more advanced elements as majority of your stakeholders won’t understand the icons anyway. But you’ll have the fundamentals and understanding of how important they can be in understanding an area of the business/system and how to tackle the problem. Both for yourself and for demonstrating to the stakeholders.

The best analysts have an eye for detail and, I think most importantly, are approachable and flexible in how they tackle a problem, as well as being technical enough for speaking to technical people (developers, technical architects etc) and being personable enough to understand where business users are coming from in terms of their day to day issues.

As has been said, having a basic set of technical skills is a definite plus. These days SQL querying basics really help, having an understanding of the basics of APIs too, as does being familiar with agile methodologies. Jira, though I absolutely loathe it, is pretty necessary for companies that think they’re ‘agile’. So have a look into some YouTube videos on the look and feel of that.

Get familiar with Traceability matrices, how to put together requirements documents effectively etc. User story/acceptance criteria writing, if agile.

But, I can’t stress this enough, don’t tie yourself to doing your (eventual) work one particular way. Be flexible, and stress this point in interviews. ‘Business Analysts’ mean many different things to many different companies. No BA role and responsibilities are ever one and the same.

I’ve worked with some absolute garbage analysts over the years, who haven’t even got a handle on the basics, yet are stealing a living. So there’s hope for you yet to get out there and get a role to gain a foothold!

 

[CharliePA]

You could try getting a leg up by getting some BCS analysis certification. That should help with demonstrating you know your stuff.

Chartered Institute for IT

Also, getting a good handle on basic process modelling diagrams (levels 1 through 5) would be great. Everyone loves a well constructed business process diagram.

Funny thing is, once you know how to do those properly, scale back on the more advanced elements as majority of your stakeholders won’t understand the icons anyway. But you’ll have the fundamentals and understanding of how important they can be in understanding an area of the business/system and how to tackle the problem. Both for yourself and for demonstrating to the stakeholders.

The best analysts have an eye for detail and, I think most importantly, are approachable and flexible in how they tackle a problem, as well as being technical enough for speaking to technical people (developers, technical architects etc) and being personable enough to understand where business users are coming from in terms of their day to day issues.

As has been said, having a basic set of technical skills is a definite plus. These days SQL querying basics really help, having an understanding of the basics of APIs too, as does being familiar with agile methodologies. Jira, though I absolutely loathe it, is pretty necessary for companies that think they’re ‘agile’. So have a look into some YouTube videos on the look and feel of that.

Get familiar with Traceability matrices, how to put together requirements documents effectively etc. User story/acceptance criteria writing, if agile.

But, I can’t stress this enough, don’t tie yourself to doing your (eventual) work one particular way. Be flexible, and stress this point in interviews. ‘Business Analysts’ mean many different things to many different companies. No BA role and responsibilities are ever one and the same.

I’ve worked with some absolute garbage analysts over the years, who haven’t even got a handle on the basics, yet are stealing a living. So there’s hope for you yet to get out there and get a role to gain a foothold!

Hey, thanks for the response!

I've noticed that about BA roles all differing greatly...which I suppose has its advantages and disadvantages.

I'm noting down everything suggested by yourself. Interesting you mention the certification -- I'd looked into that and had heard so many different things about it. But you seem to think it's worth having?

Does attaining that certification involve learning these basic process modelling diagrams? Or can that be done through another route you'd recommend?


I suppose the ultimate question I have for yourself and anyone else familiar with the BA world: would having these certifications and understanding of certain BA elements win the attention of employers who want experience as well as knowledge?

 

[radderfire]

Does anyone have advice on how to get into Business Analysis? Is there something mature students without the relevant experience can do? Even unpaid internships seem difficult to attain. I've started to lose hope so any assistance would be appreciated!

Since you asked for advice from random people on the internet, I will give you my thoughts

Business Analysis is quite broad, it is used to cover a lot of roles ... when scanning the job ads, see if any buzzwords come up often, e.g. writing SQL queries, or whatever, that you can study further, and maybe get additional qualifications, that show proof of competency, then see if you can get some experience, unpaid if necessary, of using this skill ... if necessary volunteer for a charity or something, or start your own project that demonstrates the skill.

Other related areas are software testing and quality assurance. Software projects are usually looking for testers, and sometimes they ask for volunteer testers too, so this would be a way of getting real world experience. Open Source projects also need testers. A good example is Bitcoin. Bitcoin is hard software, but the testing can be done be someone with a lot of enthusiasm who is good at Linux stuff. Here are some resources on Bitcoin and crypto. The developers meet every Weds on IRC to discuss Pull Requests for Bitcoin Core, see Review Club - it is a bit technical but an example of what is available to get involved with. Crypto is a hot area, and Bitcoin is a very interesting technology, should be a good growth area.

Bitcoin is very technical and perhaps not the best example (off the top of my head) but if you keep your eyes open on the internet, you will see companies asking for volunteer test help, or product feedback etc, they sometimes have groups, so this is a way to get experience.

One thing I saw recently is Oppo asking for reviewers for their phones on their Twitter. Not sure if offer still going, but might be worth a look.

If the technical data analysis stuff interests you, then that's quite a hot area, and I'm sure there are all the videos you would need to learn on YouTube. Here's a page on MS SQL for developers - it's not quite what you want but shows the quality of stuff available on YouTube.

The other thing I would say is look for big companies near you that you would like to work for, and then see if there is a "foot in the door" approach you could use, perhaps downgrading your initial role just to get "in", and then you will be able to move up to a business analyst role later.

Anyway, sorry if this is a bit rambling, it's a bit late, but don't give up hope. The key thing is to be prepared to invest in yourself, and think of ways you can tangibly demonstrate skills via own initiative, own projects ... then you can train yourself into higher paying areas, or become self-employed and have no boss ... which can be a lot better!