Why professional training and certification is important to a Business Analyst?

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In early 2000s, it was easy to get a BA job without professional training.  However, the situation has changed due to increased competition and plenty of availability of trained, certified and experienced Business Analysis professionals in job market. Therefore, without professional training and certification Business Analysts may lose out to competitors.

Formal ‘Training’ and ‘Certification’ will definitely help BAs getting focused, structured and systematic knowledge, and skill in business analysis field form an experienced professional that is required to build the solid foundation in the BA domain, to get a job, earn respect after joining the job.
                                                                       Professional Certificate

Some may underestimate the professional training, but the hiring manager will not. If he/she has to hire a Business Analyst, they will prefer someone who is already equipped with knowledge and skill acquired through professional course over someone who isn’t, because their company can save time and money in training the new joiner. It also helps to reduce the leaning curve after joining the job.

 
Most of my students had MBA degrees, and additional BA certificate helped them to compete others easily.
 
Followings are some of the benefits of professional certificates:
  1. Better Recognition: It provides recognition of your skills and competence for doing a job, which will allow you to justify your experience and improve the employability.
  2. Better Career Plan: It helps to build a systematic career plan and advancement strategy.
  3. Better Alternate option: Professional certifications provides an affordable and focused alternate to the university education that many can’t afford due to their high cost and longer time schedule.
  4. Better Knowledge and Skill: Professional certifications focus on the fundamentals and ensure that the certificate holder has the minimum knowledge and skill in the related area.
  5. Better investment for organization: The hiring manager would find it more beneficial as the company can save time and money in training the prospective employee.
  6. Better skilled employees/ quality for organization: The professional certification of employees will validate the company’s ability to assign knowledgeable and skilled professionals on the project. Sometime, the clients insist that the consultants or employees on their project must have the professional certification to ensure high quality delivery.
  7. Which is better?: Reputation of certification awarding body is important. Currently IIBA, and BCS are both highly recognized organization in the field of business analysis. Although PMI more recognized and offering PMI-PBA, it has limited focus in terms of business analysis.
  8. Better productivity: It adds to increased engagement, employment satisfaction and productivity that are the top ways of measuring the value of professional certification, as they contribute in reductions in staff churn, training, and recruitment costs.
  9. Staying updated: Re-certification ensures that the professionals stay updated in their field.

How to select the right training program?

A profesional training – classroom or virtual doesn’t matter.

What matters is:

  • Content of the training,
  • The technology used for delivering the online training,
  • The style of teaching to keep audience engaged, and
  • Specialization of the institute (some institute offer generalized mass training in every field and those courses usually don’t add value). So, select institutes who offer specialized training that is focused and intense in their specialized field.
  • The reputation of the institute.

Check ANISAN website for business analysis, project management, quality assurance and data management training. Domain training and certification in Investment banking, retail banking, insurance, supply chain and more are also offered.

I have been teaching business analysis, digital marketing and other interesting topics in both classroom and virtual mode since 2005(over ten years). I find virtual trainings are as good as classroom training if proper training tool is used and the same view is echoed by my students as well.
 
In classroom session, you are looking at the white board or large screen for the presentation and practical session. Sometimes, it becomes difficult for the students seating at the end of the class. So, if you are learning to create a model, you may or may not see the the instructor’s actions on the screen or how he/she is creating a model. However, in the virtual class, it is easier to see how instructor is creating diagram/models or focusing topic on the slide on your screen. You may have an option to enlarge if you wish to see it better.
 
The training tool is very important as it allows you to interact with the instructor, share the presentation, deliver the notes automatically, and view the screen during practical session.
At the end, it also depends on the instructor’s style of delivering the training to ensure to keep the audience engaged and interested. 🙂

Please visit my blog to know the comparative analysis of certifications available in Business Analysis field at entry-level and mid-level.

P.S.: This article was written as blog on 7th Aug 2016 and originally published on my personal blog Why professional training and certification is important to a Business Analyst?

If you need details, please write to – priti.verma@anisans.com

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