Business Analysts, sometimes referred to as Business Consultants, develop strategies to help organizations achieve their goals. These goals are predominantly financial, but the focus of specific projects may vary in nature from operations, human resources, or explicit profit-based strategies. Business Analysts work in teams to understand existing needs and processes, research market trends to identify innovative solutions, and disseminate recommendations to relevant stakeholders. Doing so requires them to take an analytical approach, exhibit high business acumen, and coordinate closely with others to ultimately help organizational competitiveness and success.
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Critical Thinking
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Business Acumen
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Teamwork / Collaboration
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Organizational Influence
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Stakeholder Management
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Prioritization
How to effectively interview Business Analysts
While it might seem difficult to figure out whether a candidate will succeed as a Business Analyst in your company, a well-developed set of interview questions that tap into the core skills required to perform in a Business Analyst role will go a long way in helping you decide.
But where do you start? How do you develop a set of great interview questions?
The best interview questions come directly from a job analysis. A job analysis is an evidence-based method that focuses on assessing key features of a particular role. These features describe both the job itself (i.e., tasks, responsibilities, and performance objectives), and the characteristics required of someone to perform successfully in the job (e.g., knowledge, skills, and abilities). A job analysis forms the basis of many HR practices such as compensation, performance management, and - you guessed it - how to interview and hire candidates.
At Hireguide, we’ve done the job analysis work for you. We’ve used the method to identify a core set of skills associated with the Business Analyst role, and we’ve developed and validated a list of behavioral and situational questions with answer guides that tap directly into those core skills. And that’s not all. We’ve compiled these questions and created a Business Analyst Interview Template for you that integrates other interviewing best practices. Skills-based interviews will not only help you make higher quality and evidence-based hiring decisions, but research also shows they enhance fairness and reduce bias in your hiring process.
Questions to ask a Business Analyst candidate
Question 1
Imagine you're working on a project with multiple stakeholders who all want their expectations met. With a short timeline and limited resources, how would you prioritize competing expectations or requirements?
Answer Tips
- Considers stakeholder characteristics (power, project investment, etc.)
- Considers costs, benefits, urgency, and importance when making decisions
- Suggests techniques (ranking, MoSCoW method, grouping, 100 dollar method, etc.)
- Discusses the pros and cons of different prioritization techniques
- Shares examples from past experience to support claims
Question 2
Tell me about a time you proposed a new process/idea for a project but it was met with some resistance from relevant stakeholders (e.g. client, manager, teammates). How did you overcome this?
Answer Tips
- Used data-driven insights to promote ideas
- Presents ideas in an innovative and accessible way to convince stakeholders
- Solicits feedback and/or input on their idea from others
- Considers the other's point of view to tailor the delivery of their ideas
- Demonstrates how the idea will benefit the client/project/organization
