Call for comments - on my career.

September 26, 2011 3:00 PM

Currently a business analyst, and wondering where my career could go next. Give me ideas!

I've been in the workforce for about 5 years. I started as a software analyst/business analyst for enterprise healthcare software, got a better-paying analyst job mid-recession, and now I’ve been consulting as an analyst for about 3 months. All of these jobs have been healthcare-related. So far, I’ve been on a pretty good upward trend. But I'm not sure what I want to do as my next step up.

I am interested in managing a team of analysts or possibly branching out into project management (yes, I'm aware those are pretty different jobs), but before I really start targeting those roles I want to think about what my other options might be. I might just be choosing those roles because that's what I've seen - I work with PMs and analyst team leads, so those are the "next step" jobs that are on my mind. I need some help thinking about what else I might do with my background as an analyst. I like IT, and my background in healthcare IT makes it easier to land jobs in that area, but suggestions to work for someone besides a hospital are welcome if they make sense. Can you provide me with other ideas in case I’m pigeonholing myself?

The obvious follow-up question is "What are you good at? What do you want to do?" I'm being purposefully vague so I can gather as many ideas as possible and I'll filter them down. Plus, I'm not very good at explaining I'm good at, so I don't want to prejudice the responses - I want ideas that I can consider.

posted by Tehhund to Work & Money (3 answers total)

Depending on how good you are technically, you could move in to an architect role. This doesn't always involve actually managing the team of analysts. Or, you could move into QA/testing- not sure how much you've been exposed to that. Or you might be able to move into operational IT, depending on how much of the nitty-gritty details you've been exposed to.
posted by thewumpusisdead at 3:06 PM on September 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

Best answer: As a business analyst, you're uniquely placed to move industries if you want to - you have skills and experience in learning about new areas of work / processes - so you don't need to limit yourself to healthcare.

Analyst Team Lead is a natural progression, but it doesn't need to be your only option.

You could also look into getting into business change / implementation type work - in larger organisations / projects, that's often a separate role, and the skills you have as a business analyst are likely to translate well.

Moving into project management is also an option, possibly in a smaller organisation / smaller project setting - where you'll have a chance to continue using your BA skills but also learn other skills as well.

Application support (not IT support) is also an arena to consider - the BA side of things would be invaluable in taking things forward.

All I'd say is don't try all of these at once! If you try and move to a role in another industry where someone else is doing the BA role, in a project which is a lot larger / smaller than your experience, then you may end up at interview looking out of your depth (although there's always the possibility that you may be the breath of fresh air that they're looking for!).

Sorry, it does come back to what you enjoy doing and what your strengths are. And also what kind of organisation you want to work in (small / large) and whether you want to stay in healthcare or whether you're bored or that and want something new.

Good luck!
posted by finding.perdita at 4:52 PM on September 26, 2011 [2 favorites]

Maybe health informatics or community informatics?
posted by jgirl at 6:37 PM on September 26, 2011 [1 favorite]