Where do you see yourself in 5 years? This question might catch you off-guard and make you wonder. Whether you're currently job searching or not, having a defined career path and understanding the routes to advance in your career is crucial for any BA professional.
As a people manager and mentor, I've assisted BAs in setting and achieving career goals for over a decade. And guess where it all begins? That's right - with understanding your starting point and honestly identifying your current level.
While each organization may have its own career competency levels and job titles, there's a simple and practical model that many BA leaders, including myself, use to determine a BA's level of competency: Junior, Middle, Senior, or Lead.
I’ve personally used this career model with all the companies and clients I've worked with for over a decade now, and in every single job interview, which I've conducted well over 100.
In this article, I'll share a powerful career model for Business Analysts and explain how to use it for self-assessment. If you're a BA manager and people leader, this can serve as a starting point to assess and set the career path for your team members.
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Career Model
Most often, we come across the following career levels for business analysts that I'll discuss further in the article: Junior, Middle, Senior, and Lead.
The career model that we will look at, uses two main assessment criteria:
The complexity of tasks that a business analyst may handle.
Ability to work independently or with minimum supervision.
It's important to note that each company may have its own definition of what constitutes a trivial task vs. a complex activity, as well as the job titles.
Let's dive right in with the Junior level so you'll see how this model can be used.
Level 1: Junior Business Analyst
If I were to give you a quick definition of what a Junior BA should do, it would be this:
A Junior Business Analyst should be capable of handling simple, non-critical BA tasks with minimal supervision.
That's right - straightforward tasks like taking meeting notes, proofreading user stories, organizing documents, and helping with presentations. These tasks might be too time-consuming, and hence often overlooked. These should be non-critical activities, meaning that if the Junior BA fails to complete them on time, it won't have a significant impact on the project or the organization.
Should Junior BAs participate in client meetings? Yes. Should they lead the conversations? Not at all! They should also not be expected to produce tangible artifacts, like user stories. They might simply not be ready for that.
Now, the second criterion is the ability to work independently or with minimal supervision. You want a Junior BA to grow and succeed. As a BA manager and leader, you need to guide and invest your time in nurturing talent on your team. Naturally, this time investment should be minimal and reasonable.
Here's where it gets tricky - what your organization and the project consider trivial tasks or the ability to work independently may vary. For some organizations, it could be taking meeting notes, but others might have different standards. The same goes for the definition of working independently. Different people and managers have their own styles and standards.
So, especially for Junior BAs - Career tip #1 - Understand Expectations. Don't Guess. If you're unsure, just ask.
Jeremy Aschenbrenner, The BA Guide, is the author of best-selling BA courses and has a great article on how to start a career as a Business Analyst - check it out.
Alright, I hope you understand now how I use the idea of task complexity and the ability to work independently for Junior BAs here. Let's continue with the Mid-level BA!
Level 2: Middle Business Analyst
Mid-level BAs form the core of your team. Here's my definition of a Mid-level BA role:
A Mid-level Business Analyst should be capable of handling regular BA tasks and activities independently or with minimal supervision.
Once again, it's your company and project that determine complexity. But typically, you'd be expected to: requirement elicitation, analysis, and documentation, including conducting meetings and remote calls with stakeholders. A mid-level BA is expected to work independently or in a group, producing artifacts such as user stories or requirements models like UML or BPMN.
A mid-level Business Analyst is expected to be involved in both written and verbal communication with stakeholders. This, of course, includes emails, instant messages, and the preparation of written artifacts like user story specifications and slides in PowerPoint presentations.
For software development projects, another significant area of responsibility is, of course, support and being an active member of the delivery team.
With that, I recommend checking out my blog post where I get into more detail on the BA's role on the Scrum Team and the specific expectations. I also have a video lesson on this topic that comes along with a free Scrum Cheat Sheet - be sure to check it out:
Free Career Development Training for Business Analysts
Do Mid-Level BAs require certification?
It won't hurt! I recommend looking into entry-level IIBA certifications or PSPO I from Scrum Org. Also, check out this great article about the certification levels for BAs by Shashwat Raj.
Level 3: Senior Business Analyst
Now, let's take a closer look at Senior BAs using the same criteria.
Here's the definition:
A Senior BA should be capable of handling complex BA tasks and produce high-quality artifacts independently.
So, what exactly do we mean by complex tasks? It encompasses important concepts outlined in the BABOK, such as planning the business analysis approach, stakeholder engagement, requirements elicitation and collaboration, management of the requirements lifecycle and priorities, requirements analysis, and solution evaluation.
In practical terms, for Agile software development, being a Senior BA involves fully owning the functional area, like product checkout or document intake. It includes effective communication with stakeholders, working on functional epics, breaking them down into user stories, facilitating discussions with the team and clients, exploring alternatives, conducting meetings, creating user stories and advanced diagrams, and proactively identifying Change Requests, collaborating with the team on impact analysis.
Yes, it's quite a lot! That's why we naturally expect to have fewer Senior BAs and more Middle BAs on the team.
With Senior BAs, you can expect them to independently facilitate meetings and requirements discovery workshops. Overall, requirements discovery is one of the core competencies for Senior BAs. If you want to learn more, make sure to check out my Discovery Toolkit specifically designed for the discovery process, and download my free Discovery Checklist.
Now let's move forward with our model and explore the role of a Lead BA.
Level 4: Lead Business Analyst
Here's how I define the role of a Lead BA:
A Lead Business Analyst should be capable of handling complex BA tasks, setting up and managing a BA organization on a project, and leading other BAs.
The main difference between a Senior and a Lead is the ability to lead others and drive initiatives. An initiative can range from setting up BA governance on a project to organizing program solution demos. Taking responsibility, organizing teams, managing outcomes, providing feedback, collaborating to address feedback, handling escalations, and supporting your team and fellow BAs are key aspects for the Lead BA.
Soft interpersonal skills are crucial for inspiring confidence in your team and representing BAs on the project.
Lead BAs do more than just lead; they do it graciously, with a positive attitude, and as role models. In an agile software development environment, Lead BAs should embody the 5 core Scrum values: commitment, focus, openness, respect, and courage.
Another important trait of a Lead Business Analyst is having a consulting mindset and being a trusted advisor. This involves building relationships with team members and clients, focusing on the positive impact, and being people-smart. Some recommended readings on this topic are:
Model of Career Levels for Business Analysts
I hope you find these definitions helpful for your professional career assessment, as well as for assisting others on your team in setting reasonable career expectations.