Business System Analyst
Position Summary
The Business System Analyst (BSA) serves as a key liaison between business stakeholders and technology teams, driving the analysis, design, implementation, and continuous improvement of systems and processes that support Penn Foster Group's mission of providing accessible, high-quality education and workforce development solutions. This role partners with departments across Student Services, Admissions, Academic Operations, Finance, Marketing, Workforce Development, and Technology to identify business needs, optimize processes, and deliver scalable technology solutions.
Key Responsibilities
Partner with business leaders and subject matter experts to understand operational challenges, strategic objectives, and system needs.
Facilitate requirements gathering sessions, workshops, process reviews, and stakeholder interviews.
Elicit, analyze, document, and validate business, functional, and non-functional requirements.
Serve as a trusted advisor to stakeholders by recommending process and technology improvements.
Build strong relationships across business units to ensure alignment and successful solution adoption.
Act as the ‘Tip of the Spear’ by working with stakeholders to understand the problem statement, business impact, scope and success criteria before pulling in the Technical Leads for level of effort.
Facilitate weekly stakeholder and business domain prioritization sessions for projects and ad hoc requests, ensuring alignment with company Bets.
Push back when requests are unclear or lack a well-defined business need and impact.
Understand when Ad Hoc requests can be bundled into projects with the goal to minimize Ad Hoc requests.
Analyze current-state business processes and identify opportunities for efficiency, automation, and improved user experiences.
Develop future-state process maps, workflows, and business solutions.
Collaborate with technical teams to design scalable solutions that support business and student lifecycle objectives.
Evaluate the impact of proposed system changes on users, processes, integrations, and reporting.
Translate complex business and technical requirements into service blueprints for clarity to non-technical partners to facilitate simplification and prioritization.
Support enterprise platforms including Student Information Systems (SIS), Learning Management Systems (LMS), Financial Services, Data Platforms, and related integrated applications.
Document system requirements, functional specifications, user stories, and acceptance criteria.
Participate in system implementations, upgrades, enhancements, and integration projects.
Afford data quality, reporting requirements, and process standardization efforts.
Work closely with vendors and internal technology teams to resolve system issues and implement enhancements.
Collaborate with Product Managers, Technology teams, and functional domain experts throughout the project lifecycle.
Support backlog refinement, prioritization, sprint planning, and release activities within Agile environments.
Monitor project progress and proactively identify risks, dependencies, and potential roadblocks.
Ensure solutions are aligned with business objectives and organizational priorities.
Act as the Technical Product Manager for the team, helping to run sprint rituals and Jira planning.
Develop test plans, test cases, and user acceptance testing (UAT) scenarios.
Coordinate and facilitate UAT with business stakeholders.
Validate that delivered solutions meet documented requirements and quality standards.
Support defect identification, prioritization, and resolution activities.
Document and maintain business process documentation, system workflows, and knowledge base materials.
Develop training materials and user guides for new processes and system enhancements.
Support organizational change management and user adoption efforts.
Champion our drive for Self Service, acting as an SME and advisor to the business, and recognizing where and when additional training opportunities would be required.
Become a SME on our reporting platforms - PowerBI, Tableau, and Business Objects.
Understand how to navigate our semantic layer on Databricks to answer and research data related questions.
Collaborate with reporting and analytics teams to define business reporting requirements.
Analyze data trends and identify opportunities to improve operational performance and student outcomes.
Support data governance and continuous improvement initiatives.
Required Qualifications
Bachelor's degree in Business Administration, Information Systems, Education Technology, Computer Science, or related field.
5+ years of experience as a Business Analyst, Business Systems Analyst, or related role.
Experience gathering, documenting, and managing business requirements.
Strong understanding of business process analysis and process improvement methodologies.
Excellent communication, facilitation, and stakeholder management skills.
Ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.
Strong analytical and problem-solving capabilities.
Experience with Agile methodologies and tools such as Jira, Azure DevOps, or similar platforms.
Experience with process mapping tools such as Figma, Lucidchart, Visio, or Miro.
Hands on experience with reporting platforms such as PowerBI, Tableau, and Business Objects.
Excellent knowledge of SQL, reporting tools, and data analysis concepts.
Experience using ChatGPT and Claude to accelerate and automate the work process.
Experience using SQL for navigating and querying data on Databricks.
Preferred Qualifications
Experience working within higher education, online education, EdTech, workforce development, or student services environments.
Experience with Salesforce, CRM platforms, SIS, LMS, ERP, or other enterprise applications.
CBAP, CCBA, PMI-PBA, Salesforce, or Agile certifications preferred.
Experience on our reporting platforms - PowerBI, Tableau, and Business Objects.