Developing Key Skills For Business Analysis And Data Management In An Essay.

Integration of social work and knowledge

Discuss About The Comparing Business Intelligence Data Skills.

During the foundation year, the field placement provides student an opportunity to integrate the social work as well as knowledge from a general purpose. In addition to this, students can learn communication skills and technological talent, which they will reflect on professional platform. After studying all aspects of management, I found my interest in numbers. The purpose of field placement is to provide students internship work experience in the subject itself that includes theoretical as well as practical knowledge. I identified that I need to broaden my skills by using various skills. Apart from social behaviour, I will get technological experience in the field (Brandenburg, 2018b). Rather than sticking to a particular domain. I think I will be able to develop skills that are more valuable by approaching to new domains with new stakeholders. The objective of field placement in business analysis is to increase my analytical mind (Eva, Hindle, Paul, Rollaston, & Tudor, 2014).

A business analyst is an analyst of an organisation or a business domain. Business analyst typically plays a lead role in assisting the business case and assessing the business models or its integration model. There are some core skills, which I have to attain to get a field placement as a business analyst. I want to develop good communication skills that will help me to develop skills to conduct work meetings on the workplace (Christensen, & Schneider, 2015). Business communication plays an important role in developing professional communication. It is widely accepted that in order to grow professionally, I will have to possess both technical and behavioural skills (Brandenburg, 2018a). I believe that I am confident and have the capability to present myself in front of people but I do not have the ability to express thoughts and make them understand my point of view. I get frustrated when people do not understand my notions and thoughts. In today`s world, strong communication is the important trait to excel in any management career. I want to be good listener of questions and answers that will help me to conduct deep analysis and understanding of business analysis. I want to develop an analytical mind (Brandenburg, 2018c). To develop analytical skills, I should be very comfortable with the numbers. I have studied corporate accountancy and generally accepted accounting policies (GAAP) during my college classes. However, I am focusing to know and learn the practical implication of these accounting standards and policies. 

Developing good communication skills

During training, I learnt to develop my communication skills. Communication skills are essential in expressing and sharing information. I realised that there are several issues relating to communication such as lack of eye contact, mismanagement of timetables and wrong answers, and expressing concepts in professional interviews and corporate world. To overcome the challenge of understanding and perceiving the communication and replying, I used mirror activity. After coming from training, I manage to take out some time from my busy schedule to revise all the concepts taught at the workplace. Then for each concept, I started reading illustrations from the corporate world from internet. For example- suppose different ethical theories are taught in the finance field, I strive to find examples of unethical acts by corporates such as FIFA`s corruption scandal. Before studying the scandal, I give myself some time to read and understand what FIFA`s code of conduct says about corruption. Above example explains the practical implication of unethical issue. After studying code of conduct, I form several questions above the corporate scandal. I try to explain my answers in front of mirror. Another example from business analysis can be study of merger and acquisitions (Jeston, 2014). Practical case of hutch and Vodafone is the practical example of merger. How Vodafone took over Hutch with what goodwill amount? builds theoretical and practical approach. Through mirror activity, I could develop my confidence and explaining ability. 

I learnt many core skills that begin with defining, analysing, and documents requirements. The training teaches various management requirements such as developing a solution to problems. I learnt a combination of elicitation techniques, which means studying each technique in depth, but I realised that it is difficult to stand alone for studying technique all alone. Brainstorming should be mandatory part of training. Large number of people engages in studying the technique. Variety of people brings a list of various questions which helped me to understand even other`s point of view of certain techniques. I manage to learn good communication skills because in today`s world communication is not just limited to face-to-face communication. Communication has been extended to conference call and web meetings. The ability to be strong in communication is necessary because it becomes easier to make understand others. I was able to develop analytical skills, which gave me the ability to solve the problems. Business analysts use a variety of techniques to examine, test, and analyse the problems. As a trainee, somehow I manage to see and identify the gaps occurred and provide an alternative solution to the problem. There are three key levels of analysis to fully understand and interpret the solution such as business-level, software-level, and information-level. The business-level elaborates hoe the business work operates after completing the analysis of business process (Hammer, 2015). The software-level explains how software system supports the business workflow. I understood models through various case studies. The information-level explains how the company stores data and manages by the organisation.

Importance of Technical and Behavioral skills

As far as problem is concerned, I not only listen to all the stakeholders but also implement the solution, which helped me to achieve goals in strategic manner. The training program helped me a lot to complete my training as a junior analyst. With position comes responsibility, from junior analyst to senior analyst, I am able to visualise the solution to a particular problem. Before the implementation, I try to make my decisions so appropriate that success rate of the particular project increases. I have developed good understanding of basic office tools such as word, excel and PowerPoint. I learnt many technical skills and modelling tools such as Visio or Enterprise architect, project and management tools such as caliber, DOORS. Before the training, I do not communicate about strategic goals; the senior authority decides goals and implements the strategies to reach goals (Cleak, & Wilson, 2018). However, during my internship, I worked under the senior analyst who kept analysing every alternate decision by using appropriate toolbox. The trainer who delegated work gives us an opportunity to operate toolbox. I developed the skills to adapt the professional environment. The training program covers all the core parts of business analysis and software development life cycle that solves the problems faced by business (Chhabra, & Sharma, 2014). Training helped me to develop solution-based understanding of the system, process, and business processes.

Training is an organised activity that aims at imparting information and knowledge to improve one`s approach in performing and attaining a level of knowledge and skill. My university has made special programs to avail MBA specialist in finance. I learnt many personality traits such as how to deal with the customers, leadership, how to influence people towards a particular decision, how to justify every point of the decision made. Most importantly, I learnt the disciples of professional life (Prince, Burns, Lu, & Winsor, 2015).

Each trainee was shifted to a different team where a subject matter expert gets involved in the project. Subject matter experts assign customer service representative (CSR) to every interns to represent the team to enhance existing customer functionality. CSR (customer service representative) involves knowledge analysis of business analysis and problem solving activities.

No higher-level learning can take place unless basic needs are met. I learnt how to manage time, when every work was hav8ing a deadline. It forced me to take my work and responsibility seriously.

Developing analytical mind for business analysis

Before internship, I had an experience of working as a team leader in HCL there I worked for British telecom. In this training, I got the chance to attend meetings, which added better communication skill to my personality. I was able to develop knowledge of relevant subject accountancy, which earlier was my weakness. I understood the practical application of accountancy, which does not cover a broader view of accounting principles and procedures. Initially, I faced many problems in debit and credit data entry in the organisation. I received help from my seniors at every stage of training. At the end of training, I felt that now I have coped up with my weaknesses. Another weakness, I faced was lack of experience in the particular field because my previous job was in the telecommunication industry. Initially I was very complex but as time passed slowly and gradually, I learnt about filing debit and credit data of the firm. Finally, I was able to learn a lot during my training.

Recommendation to employer how their business could be improved

• Employers should cultivate transparency in the company`s culture. Employers should not use older and outdated communication tools that play as a barrier to transparency. Still there are certain things, which can be improved during campus interviews such as conducting extempore on current affairs, and group discussion on certain accounting problems (Laszlo, & Zhexembayeva, 2017).
• For the field placement, the program coordinator should conduct prototype for training students before placement. The coordinator should give training time on the regular basis during the course because there is a strong correlation between learning and sustained employment. Training enhances the practical knowledge of the student but by embedding and prescribing, the practical education in the course rather than after the course will help the students to learn the practical work before entering the professional workplace. Program coordinator should keep students updated by reading professional journals or trade press, conferences, and my research .Moreover; it will bring confidence to the students (Frey, & Osborne, 2017).
• To achieve employment success in job, I want to learn more about business. I will continue to target MBA after my training. However, before studying MBA, I would like to work in a professional organisation. Studying and pursuing MBA (master of business administration) will enable me to attain a comfort zone through dealing issues in international business, applying management techniques and challenge myself. I chose MBA because I think MBA will offer me an advantageous to management position.

References

Brandenburg, L. (2018a). What Business Analyst Skills are Important for a New BA. Retrieved from: https://www.bridging-the-gap.com/business-analyst-skills-important/

Brandenburg, L. (2018b). What Experience “Counts” as Business Analyst Experience? (5 Examples). Retreived from: https://www.bridging-the-gap.com/business-analyst-experience-counts/

Brandenburg, L. (2018c). 5 Steps to Becoming a Business Analyst. Retrieved from: https://www.bridging-the-gap.com/becoming-a-business-analyst/

Christensen, K., & Schneider, B. (2015). Workplace flexibility: Realigning 20th-century jobs for a 21st-century workforce. New York: Cornell University Press.

Cleak, H., & Wilson, J. (2018). Making the most of field placement. Australia: Cengage AU.

Debortoli, S., Müller, O., & vom Brocke, J. (2014). Comparing business intelligence and big data skills. Business & Information Systems Engineering, 6(5).

Eva, M., Hindle, K., Paul, D., Rollaston, C., & Tudor, D. (2014). Business analysis. London: British Computer Society.

Frey, C. B., & Osborne, M. A. (2017). The future of employment: how susceptible are jobs to computerisation?. Technological forecasting and social change, 114(1).

Hammer, M. (2015). What is business process management? In Handbook on business process management. Berlin: Springer.

Jeston, J. (2014). Business process management. US: Routledge.

Laszlo, C., & Zhexembayeva, N. (2017). Embedded sustainability. In Embedded Sustainability. US: Routledge.

Chhabra, N. L, & Sharma, S. (2014). Employer branding: strategy for improving employer attractiveness. International Journal of Organizational Analysis, 22(1).

Mini, (2016). Student isolation: the experience of distance on an international field placement. Retrieved from: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02615479.2016.1215418

Prince, M., Burns, D., Lu, X., & Winsor, R. (2015). Knowledge and skills transfer between MBA and workplace. Journal of workplace learning, 27(3). Pp. 207-225.