Who Is a Business Intelligence Analyst? Making Data-Driven Business Decisions

A BI analyst or Business Intelligence analyst transforms raw data that businesses collect into actionable insights to drive value for the enterprise. They use data visualisation, data analytics and data modelling methods to identify trends. These trends come in handy for other managers, executives and departments while making business decisions that can improve and modernise business processes. 

The role of a BI analyst is increasing in value and demand across industries. More and more businesses are aiming at capitalising on the large volumes of raw data they gather each day. Business Intelligence analysts generally help in identifying areas showing revenue loss and discovering areas of improvement that can drive profitability or reduce expenses. For this, they mine data with the help of BI tools and software, compare data with industry trends and create visualisations to explain their findings to other stakeholders. 

What do BI Analysts Do?

The demand for BI analysts is no longer limited to the IT industry. These professionals use raw data to guide enterprises and help with data-driven decision making. The exact role of a BI analyst varies from company to company and industry to industry. However, the broad sections of a BI analyst’s role in an organisation can be understood as follows:

• Breaking down business information: A BI analyst gathers, cleans and analyses data for business success metrics such as sales, revenue, customer engagement or market trends. They are also sometimes responsible for programming data models and tools that help in visualising and monitoring data.
• Interpreting data: One key aspect of a BI analyst’s job description is looking for patterns or finding areas in the raw that could signal opportunities to improve existing business practices. For instance, BI analysts could find trends that support different ways to adapt a new product to the existing market.
• Sharing results: The results that a BI analyst shares could include anything ranging from data visualisation in charts and graphs to compiling reports to be presented before clients or other teams. A BI analyst also makes recommendations that could grow or improve business processes and profitability based on their research. 

Salary of a Business Intelligence Analyst:

According to data from a June 2021 report by Glassdoor, an average BI analyst earns about $84,635 per annum in the US. One advantage of this role is that it prepares you for a wide range of roles with lucrative packages. Some of the most highly-paying roles and their respective salaries are:

• Data analyst: $65,981
• Business analyst: $75,339
• Product analyst: $76,864
• BI consultant: $91,517
• Senior BI analyst: $103,055
• BI architect: $112,049
• BI manager: $116,684

Every professional BI analyst starts their career as data analysts and in other analytical roles. They generally tend to advance to roles like a Business Intelligence specialist, architect, consultant or manager at a later stage.

Also Read: Top Business Analyst Interview Questions and Answers (2023)

Prerequisites to Become a BI Analyst:

A professional intending to build a BI analyst career requires a wide range of skills. This is a mix of technical, analytical and soft skills. To become a successful BI analyst, the business skills you require include:

• A strong understanding of data collection software and protocol.
• Expertise in program and software integration with data services.
• Knowledge of data modelling concepts, mining tools and warehouse architecture.
• Experience with business administration and database management.
• Excellent critical thinking and problem solving skills.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• strong understanding of data protection and privacy laws at the enterprise level.

Some of the specialised technical skills you will need are:

• Data architecture and database designing skills
• Data analytics and mining
• Data privacy and security
• Data visualisation and tools such as Qlik and Tableau
• Experience handling all the variants of SQL
• Proficiency in extract, transform, load (ETL) 
• Understanding situations that require R, SAS and Hadoop
• Data storage and cloud computing technology like BigQuery and Redshift

Who Should Take Up a BI Certification Training?

Data Analytics and Business Intelligence are increasing in popularity in businesses across the world. BI enables organisations to understand their data and use it for enterprise-level change, market trend adaption and inefficiency mitigation. Professionals who are best suited to BI analyst roles include, but aren’t limited to,

• System administrators
• Business analysts
• System architects
• End users
• Data scientists
• Technology architects
• Implementers
• Reporting analysts
• Business architects
• Change managers
• Business managers
• Quality assurance managers
• Quality assurance professionals
• IT managers
• Aspiring business analysts
• Aspiring BI professionals
• Professionals who wish to clear their BI analyst exams

Reasons to Choose a BI Certification Training Course on Koenig:

• you sign up for a holistic certification training course for all your bi needs. koenig offers bi certifications from various vendors, including oracle , microsoft , sap and many more at various levels of expertise.
• You get a comprehensive BI analytics suite that will enhance your professional prospects in the competitive data-driven market today.
• You train with expert BI trainers who have real-world consulting and training experience in several industries and domains around the world that could help you meet your professional goals. 
• you get bi training resources and materials that have been designed by business intelligence experts, along with interactive activities and case study discussions that will help you understand all bi concepts thoroughly. 
• Unlock your earning potential with an industry-wide recognised certification. You can earn a salary that ranges between US $94,000 and $106,000 per annum.

Benefits of a BI Analyst Training Course:

Some benefits of a BI certification training course are:

• You gain critical insights about customers using BI analysis on buying patterns. This will help in creating services and products with a real demand in the market.
• Stay ahead in the crowd of applicants. Improve your bottom lines through innovative services that are highly marketable.
• Get greater visibility of processes that are critical for your business by using BI systems to identify improvement areas and prepare accordingly.
• You learn how to avoid mistakes by acting on real-time data. BI tools allow businesses and professionals to analyse data in real-time, which provides results in various departments and then goes through analysis after compilation.

Scope of BI Analysis as a Career:

The scope for BI analysts in the job market is quite high. According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, that monitors job market trends, BI analyst job growth is predicted to jump by 11% in the period between 2019 and 2029. The demand for BI analysts is spread across various sectors and fields - healthcare, law, education, finance, defence and many others. Companies across each of these industries are looking for new ways to beat the competition and stay ahead of the crowd. Business Intelligence analysts can help them meet this objective by providing the required insights using their raw data to give them the lead in the market. This is what puts them among the most highly-demanded professionals in the industry. 

If you have even 80% of the required skills, past experience with business intelligence and a deeper interest in problem solving, there cannot be a better career for you today. To take your career a step further, all you’re missing is a professional BI analyst certification. You can start preparing with any of Koenig’s advanced BI analyst certification training courses. Give your career the boost it deserves and enrol in a course today.