The Responsibilities Of The Non Technical Business Analyst (A Non-Technical And Short List)

I was reflecting on how impenetrable the role of the non technical business analyst can be to a newbie. 

A non technical business analyst may find themselves working outside of the IT department and working closely or within business departments. The non technical business analyst may find themselves involved in process improvement projects looking to understand, refine and improve on the business operations. 

A non technical business analyst may also over time find themselves working on strategy type projects or on projects that are doing business transformation or developing target operating models (TOM).

So skills required by a non technical business analyst tend to be more business focussed, having skills and techniques in organisational design and process modelling.

There are plenty of roles and opportunities for a non technical business analyst and plenty of areas and tools and techniques to develop and work on to broaden the business analyst career path.

When you consider the wider the elements of change process, information, process, information and technology (POPIT) a non technical business analyst can work work various non technology related projects or change.

We used to have no single definition for a business analyst so it was open season for anyone to decide what the BA should do (and that hasn’t gone away completely!).

Have you ever felt that you are too flexible such that whenever an unusual job needs doing on the project, it comes your way because everyone else’s role is so well defined?