How To Be A Business Intelligence Analyst?

Business Intelligence Analysts effectively use data to help companies make informed decisions for becoming efficient and achieving their goals. If you are interested in data analysis, then a career as a business intelligence analyst is ideal.

Today, many educational institutions like JAIN Online provide Online MBA Business intelligence and Analytics programs. So aspirants who can use data to improve business processes can enroll in this program.

This article will give you valuable insights about becoming a business intelligence analyst. Dig deeper to understand typical job duties, salary insights, and more. Let’s get started.

What are the Responsibilities of a Business Intelligence Analyst?

A business intelligence analyst is given the responsibility of reviewing and analyzing data. This effectively helps in identifying specific areas where businesses can make certain changes. Thus, they can successfully improve their efficiency and productivity, thereby working towards achieving their goals.

The primary responsibilities of a business intelligence analyst vary from company to company. Also, the industry they are working for might set specific responsibilities differently. However, some of the standard and typical duties of a business intelligence analyst are:

• Thoroughly reviewing and validating customer data.
• Efficiently analyzing business processes.
• Carefully reviewing competitor data while analyzing how the competitors respond to them.
• Checking and managing the results of analytics and metrics.
• Identifying compelling opportunities for improvement with particular business processes and strategies.
• Carefully developing procedures and policies for data collection and analysis.
• Presenting every data solution and information to executive leadership through effective presentations and reports.

Learn the Common Steps to Become a Business Intelligence Analyst

A business intelligence analyst career begins with a bachelor’s degree. However, the relevant fields include business mathematics, computer science, economics, statistics, accounting, etc.

This professional role requires both hard skills and soft skills. Hard skills require statistics and data modeling. On the other hand, soft skills require practical communication abilities and problem-solving skills.

Let us quickly learn how to become a business intelligence analyst by profession.

Acquire a Professional Certificate

The most fruitful way of getting started with a career as a business intelligence analyst is to obtain a professional certificate. This will undoubtedly reflect all your skills and expertise.

As per the specifications of your undergraduate degree, online business analytics programs help you to prepare. There are, in fact, numerous MBA programs that will help you develop specific skill sets.

Moreover, you will have a clear understanding and knowledge about using the basic software tools of business intelligence. And you will also be efficient with data analysis techniques.

Some of the certifications for specific tools you must look for are:

• R
• Hadoop
• SAS
• Python

Thus, acquiring a professional certificate might effectively help in boosting your career. So you can successfully find your first job in this field or even transition to a new role.

Pursue a Valid and Advanced Degree Program

Pursuing an advanced degree like MBA in business intelligence and analytics might prepare professionals to advance their careers. However, it ultimately depends on their desired career path.

This degree entirely focuses on predictive and perspective techniques. Thus, it allows businesses to clearly understand their possible whereabouts in the future. Moreover, it typically covers the area of data extraction, visualization, and manipulation.

Further, they become capable of answering questions about business operations. And they also provide compelling insights for improving performance.

Apply for the Position of a Business Intelligence Analyst

The job description of a business intelligence analyst varies by role and company. Their most common task is to analyze company data and those of the competitors and industries. Thus it can efficiently determine the company’s performance and position in the marketplace.

Sometimes, this might involve working across various systems and departments only to examine the processes and procedures of a company. This is essentially done to improve operational and financial performance.

You can either secure an entry-level position with a relevant bachelor’s degree or complete additional training in an online Bootcamp. Some companies even demand work experience to ensure a place in this role. So following the technique of securing an entry-level position is undoubtedly fruitful.

Keep Learning to Broaden Your Skills and Knowledge

Data Science tools and programming or coding languages are vital for a business intelligence analyst. So learning new languages can efficiently help you to broaden your knowledge and skills.

You will also find open or free resources online for specific languages. This will help you to learn those languages and enhance your skills.

Some of the tools and languages you should explore to boost your technical skills as a business intelligence analyst are:

• Hadoop
• C
• MATLAB
• Julia
• PowerBI
• pandas
• Python
• PyCharm
• SQL
• SAS
• Tableau

Remember that the uses of these programming languages might vary according to employers and industry sectors. So it is very likely that you might not encounter all the languages at one company.

Work on Broadening Your Network

Networking is of primary importance for every business intelligence analyst. This is because it efficiently helps in adding any particular technical knowledge.

On the other hand, networking is the best way for job seekers to learn about potential employers. So it becomes easier to introduce oneself in an informal setting. Networking can even give you insights into the open positions. Besides, it is also possible to learn what companies are looking for.

In an informal networking setting, you can also receive feedback. However, this isn’t the case in an interview.

Networking is no doubt beneficial for those business analysts working in an organization. It effectively helps them to accomplish their tasks more productively. Also, you can get to know new people and form an effective team through networking.

To Conclude

Becoming a successful business intelligence analyst takes at least three to four years. You must complete a bachelor’s degree in any relevant field first. And then, you need to do an internship to gain relevant experience at the entry-level.

Nevertheless, specific requirements and roles you are interested in might take considerably longer. Sometimes, you might need to pursue an Online MBA in business intelligence and analytics. If you’re interested in this career, enroll in this online MBA program at JAIN Online today!