9 Skills Every Business Analytics Professional Needs (2024)

9 Skills Every Business Analytics Professional Needs (1)

Through great strides in technology and an increase in available data, harnessing the power of analytics in business is easier than ever. And as more companies look to data for solutions, business analytics professionals fill thegrowing need for data expertise. But there are particular hard and soft skills you need to have a successful analytics career and thrive in the world of big data.

We’ll explore the top technical and non-technical skills for a business analytics professional. But first, let’s address what a business analytics professional actually does.

What is the difference between business analysts and business analytics professionals?

The difference between a business analyst and business analytics professional is theirfocus and approach when it comes to problem solving. Job hunters and recruiters alike tend to confuse these two different, but similar-sounding professions. Let’s break down the differences:

Business Analyst

Business analysis has less to do with data and instead focuses on analyzing and optimizing the processes and functions that make up a business. They analyze what a business needs to function optimally and what it needs to improve, and then work to implement solutions. This may include improving processes, changing policies or introducing new technology.

For example, a business analyst may work with both the client, who has a particular requirement in their business, and the development team, which either builds a product or delivers a service to fulfill that requirement.

Typically, they will coordinate between these two parties to make sure the solutions created by development meet the client’s requirements, and that they are adapting solutions as these needs change. They may also act as a technical project manager and collaborate with stakeholders to design and implement the service or product and ensure it’s solving the client’s problem.

Business Analytics Professional

Business analyticsfocuses on data, statistical analysis and reporting to help investigate and analyze business performance, provide insights, and drive recommendations to improve performance.

They may also work with internal or external clients, but their focus is to improve the product, marketing or customer experience by using insights from data, rather than analyzing processes and functions.

Core Business Analytics Skills

The big data landscape has changed drastically, making it tough for professionals to know where to focus their growth. However, despite this changing field, there are a number of core business analytics skills that form the foundation of any solid business analytics career.

A great business analytics professional could be described as:

A good communicator

Being able to present findings in a clear and concise manner is fundamental to making sure that all players understand insights and can put recommendations into practice. People working in analysis must be able to tell a story with data through strong writing and presentation skills.

Inquisitive

People in this field should have natural curiosity and drive to continue learning and figuring out how things fit together. Even as analysts become managers, it’s important to stay in touch with the industry and its changes.

A problem solver

Professionals in analytics use a combination of logical thinking, predictive analytics and statistics to make recommendations that will solve problems and propel a business forward. In a profession that seeks to turn data into solutions, being a natural problem solver helps connect the dots.

A critical thinker

Business analytics professionals need to think critically about not only the implications of the data they collect, but about what data they should be collecting in the first place. They are expected to analyze and highlight only the data that can be helpful in making decisions.

A visualizer

Disorganized data doesn’t help anyone. To create worth from data, analytics professionals need to be able to translate and visualize data in a concise and accurate way that’s easy to digest.

Both detail-oriented and a big picture thinker

While business analytics professionals have to be able to handle complex data, they also need to understand how their recommendations will affect the bottom line of a business. There’s no point in having access to large quantities of information without knowing how it can be harnessed to analyze and improve tactics, processes and strategies.

Technical Skills for Business Analytics

In a business landscape quickly becoming governed by big data, great analytics professionals arefulfilling the demand for technical expertiseby wearing the hats of both developer and analyst.

Having both a conceptual and working understanding of tools and programming languages is important to translate data sources into tangible solutions.

Below are some of the top tools for business analytics professionals:

SQL 

SQL  is the coding language of databases and one of the most important tools in an analytics professional’s toolkit. Professionals write SQL queries to extract and analyze data from the transactions database and develop visualizations to present to stakeholders.

Statistical languages

The two most common programming languages in analytics are R, for statistical analysis, and Python, for general programming. Knowledge in either of these languages can be beneficial when analyzing big data sets, but is not vital.

Statistical software

While the ability to program is helpful for a career in analytics, being able to write code isn’t necessarily required to work as an analytics professional. Apart from the above languages, statistical software such as SPSS, SAS, Sage, Mathematica, and even Excel can be used when managing and analyzing data.

The Four Types of Analytics

These soft and hard business analytics skills can be utilized across different facets of business analytics, including:

Descriptive Analytics

What’s happening to my business right now?

By mining and aggregating raw data through a real-time dashboard, analytics professionals are able to gain comprehensive, accurate, in-the-moment analytics. While the practice of data mining is considered the least useful part of the big data value chain, it can still be helpful in identifying patterns of behavior that might influence future outcomes.

Diagnostic Analytics

Why is it happening?

Diagnostic analytics look at the past performance of campaigns and processes to determine what happened and why. It isolates all confounding information to identify an accurate cause-and-effect relationship.

Predictive Analytics

What’s likely to happen in the future?

Statistical models and forecasting techniques can be used to predict likely scenarios of what might happen based on insights from big data. This form of analytics can be used to support complex forecasts.

Prescriptive Analytics

What do I need to do to succeed?

Prescriptive analytics focuses on what actions should be taken. Where big data analytics can shed light on an area of business, prescriptive analytics gives you a much more focused answer to a specific question.

Regardless of which type of analytics you’re working in, being able to offer the above hard and soft skills makes a business analytics professional an invaluable part of any business.

As company leaders come to realize the potential impact of data on business strategy, so the number of jobs involving data analytics grows, creating strong demand for people with these talents. Business analytics professionals’ mix of technical and non-technical skills makes them uniquely qualified to provide businesses with the competitive edge so badly needed in a big data world.

9 Skills Every Business Analytics Professional Needs (2024)

FAQs

How can I improve my BA skills? ›

In this article, we'll be giving you some tips to help improve your skills as a business analyst.
  1. Know Why You Are Looking. ...
  2. Use A Variety of Tools. ...
  3. Consider Positives and Negatives. ...
  4. Look for Underlying Causes. ...
  5. Understand Your Organization. ...
  6. Present Conclusions Meaningfully.

Is SQL required for business analyst? ›

The role of a business analyst is to use data to report, analyze, and inform business decisions with data, and being to effectively retrieve the data you need will likely require some SQL. SQL is a fairly easy language to learn and it can help you in the job market.

Is business analyst a dying career? ›

Is business analyst a dying career. The answer to this question is that the business analyst is not a dying career. The role is very much in demand by a large range of companies across the world, who continue to recruit and hire for business analyst roles.

Does a business analyst need IT skills? ›

While business analysts are generally not required to write code, it is often helpful for them to have a foundational understanding of basic programming languages, such as Java, C++, Visual Basic and PHP. You'll be able to apply this working knowledge as you identify company challenges and develop solutions.

How can I be a good business analytics? ›

#1 – Good Business Analysts Have the Basics Covered

Good BAs are good communicators, problem-solvers, and think critically. They can create requirements specifications, analyze requirements, create visual models, facilitate elicitation sessions, and use the necessary business analyst tools.

Does business analyst require coding? ›

Business analysts do deal with IT professionals and IT processes. But they are not involved in coding/programming, that's the job of programmers. Business Analysts deal with requirements understanding, development and management and functional testing. These responsibilities don't involve any programming skills.

Should I learn Python or SQL first? ›

Typically, SQL is a good programming language to learn first. As a tool, SQL is essential for retrieving content from relational databases. Compared to Python, SQL may be easier for some people to learn.

How Python is used in business analytics? ›

Python helps to automate and replicate processes with ease and in the least amount of time. Python applications can be effectively used for jobs like web scraping or collecting online data, handling text errors when merging different datasets, and repeating complex analysis tasks several times.

Do business analysts use Tableau? ›

Visualization tools like Tableau play a great part in a business analyst's life. Tableau, for instance, is not only a great tool for visualization but for descriptive analysis as well. Visualization of the data is the communicative platform that lets the company understand the suitable course of action.

Is business analyst a boring job? ›

Business Analyst job is not at all boring if you are seriously interested in it and proactively take new initiatives. However, the situation could defer company to company therefore, the BA should understand that he/she is looking for and work for it.

Are business analysts happy? ›

Business analysts are below average when it comes to happiness. At CareerExplorer, we conduct an ongoing survey with millions of people and ask them how satisfied they are with their careers. As it turns out, business analysts rate their career happiness 3.0 out of 5 stars which puts them in the bottom 32% of careers.

Is business analyst a good career in 2021? ›

The demand for business analysts is very high among companies, small-scale options, and enterprises. Study estimates reveal that the job market for business analytics will grow at a CAGR of 14.3% by 2026. Companies are willing to pay higher salaries to analysts, especially certified expert-level professionals.

How can I show strong analytical skills? ›

How to demonstrate strong analytical thinking skills on your resume
  1. Give examples with critical situations on your job that demonstrate those skills.
  2. Describe a specific process or method you use.
  3. Think of major achievements and breakthroughs made possible by your analytical skills.

Is python required for business analytics? ›

Business analysts role, therefore, might require Python skills on most times, while not requiring it at all at other instances. But they are all analysts not necessarily dealing with quantitative data.

Is coding required for business analytics? ›

A Business Analyst is not required to have programming skills but knowing about it could make the difference in work. However, some technical skills are more helpful for business analysts.

Do business analysts need programming skills? ›

Business analysts do deal with IT professionals and IT processes. But they are not involved in coding/programming, that's the job of programmers. Business Analysts deal with requirements understanding, development and management and functional testing. These responsibilities don't involve any programming skills.

Does business analyst require technical skills? ›

Technical skills are important for business analysts because they provide the tools analysts need to identify and address issues and create solutions. Business analysts seek to improve processes for departments or entire organizations by analyzing existing policies and systems and making recommendations.

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