>work as a BA, we're doing some work for an insurance

>>1151632

I'm thinking of becoming a BA in the future. Should I reconsider it?

>>1151638
Yeah I'll just my telepathic powers to work out whether you're suited for the job or not

>>1151640

I'm not referring to my own abilities, which in general are well suited to the job. I'm just asking if the job in general is shitty and frustrating, as your OP implied.

No need to bite my head off m8.

BAs are Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) in their domain. Managing Directors are SMEs in their own domain - high-level strategy, running a business, finding profitable opportunities and resourcing them. Shit like that. Busy people are not asking for information (the stuff a BA researches and evaluates), they are asking for answers (what a BA should recommend). In other words, fuck your formulas and annotations, just stand by a set of options that will help Client/Boss (a) make more money (b) spend less money.

Now be a good BA and go back to looking at Facebook all day.

>>1151642


If you are able to perform the technical duties of a BA and be content with the work then the job is for you. Reports, configuration, task creation, general management, DATA and leadership, communication and communication again. It's very varied but you already know this. Essentially you need to be able to talk to anyone about anything to a degree because you're Jack.

Clients are too varied to generalise but are just another thing to be managed in knowing what to ask and how. If you're not the type of person who can laugh at the failings of others then you will find things a little more frustrating. Would I like another job? Sure, but BAs make money and I can live with it.

Your question is too general and leaves out too many factors for me to give a meaningful answer.

Anon I used to work for IBM. You wouldn't believe some of the morons I worked with.

The IBM site/office/group was a subsidiary who were responsible for implementing HAMP, the president's mortgage refinance program for struggling homeowners facing foreclosure.

Our backups intermittently failed, and we didn't have a fully functioning comprehensive development or test environment. Deployments took weeks sometimes even months due to bureaucracies and inefficiencies. Our rules engine was on a product built in 2003 and was riddled with flaws.

The result was thousands of inaccuracies every month, forcing agents to recalculate by hand with a calculator and overwrite mortgage terms assessed by the product.

We eventually teamed up with a company who had been responsible for the largest "robocall" operation discovered in 2009, and who had been sued by the federal government and nearly every state attorney general in the nation, eventually paying $127 million. They rewrote our mortgage calculation software.

I was personally paged, myself, at 2 in the morning (give or take) to rectify failed night time processing, hundreds if not thousands of times over a 3 year period working for them.

***
We were FNMA's favorite servicing agency, earning coveted 5-star ratings. We outperformed every other servicing agency in the nation.

Many of our clients were America's largest finance institutions, themselves forbidden by the federal government from processing HAMP modifications due to their sheer number of errors.

Best in the nation.

***
No matter where you go, expect to be surrounded by mediocrity and ineptitude, coupled with arrogance.

At least this ensures us plenty of room to advance.

>>1151654
> "robocall"

Oops, I meant to say "robosign"

Much bigger problem.

>>1151653

I'm probably more interested in being a systems analyst but I'm not sure to what degree the two are overlapping or synonymous.

>>1151648
Yes we'll just stand by an arbitrary configuration that 'we think is right' and the client will be happy with it because 'we think it's right'. We should never contact the client for a review of the system because we have 'answers'.

Do you have any experience whatsoever in this role?

>>1151656
A systems analyst is more technical

BA will tell you exactly what the system will do
SA is more in the territory of devs telling you how the system will do it

They're very close in function.

>>1151654
I've heard IBM isn't a great place to be but that sounds terrible

>>1151658

To do systems analysis do I have to get a comp sci qualification or would information systems (eg with SQL and Java plus a bunch of IT management and BA stuff) be technical enough?

>>1151663
I am not a SA and would advise seeking advice from someone else.

I expect you would need greater proficiency in programming than someone who had just completed an ISYS degree. I did a comsci degree majoring in ISYS.

>>1151663
theses aren't regulated professions - this poster has given you a general distinction between the titles:

>>1151658

but it can obviously vary, some orgs might just use the title business analyst and you might find some business analysts that are more technical than others there are no hard and fast rules here. Yes you probably can get a job with the title 'systems analyst' with that skill set/information systems degree.

>>1151683

Awesome.

I don’t even want to be the next Martin Shkreli or anything like other people on this board. I just want a non-retail, challenging job that won't be replaced by automation by the time I graduate.

>>1151654
>IBM
>Inefficient as fuck
>Red tape and errors everywhere
>Competitors are somehow worse

This describes my time at IBM perfectly, I swear they used a Genie or something.

>>1151661
It'll kill your motivation and layoffs happen by entire groups so you're never safe. That being said it's good pay and connections for normies; if you're top tier don't go there, if you're a random dude wits some experience seeking six figures by 30/35 then go ahead.

>>1151701
I survived two layoffs. I'm actually pretty fucking good at my job (SQL/BI) but man enough to admit that a lot of the people who were cut were smarter than me.

It's a huge resume boost. Hiring managers are like "ooh, IBM eh, that's impressive.."

I telecommuted 4 days a week, sometimes 5. I worked 6am to 7pm, attending a shit load of meetings. Half the time I was busy as fuck and stressed as fuck. The other half I was completely out of work and basically binge-watched tv while waiting for various assholes to get back to me.

Those days when I didn't have shit to do, I still had to look busy. They monitored your network activity. If your PC went to sleep you were kicked off VPN. If you didn't do anything with your computer in a long time, you were kicked off the VPN. VPN down/up times were scrutinized.

I invented the "Swingline Report".

I'd open up MS Word, put a stapler on the space bar, and go about my day, occasionally checking email.

>>1151657
MD here. Hired and trained many BAs
xx

>>1151632
>"I'm sorry I don't understand"

finance has both the smartest and dumbest people of any profession.