Research Business Analyst

Reporting to the Dev/Ops Program Director, the Children's National Research Institute (CNRI) Research Business Analyst (Research BA) supports implementation and service development of CNRI central research administration applications. The position works closely with project leaders and stakeholder, the App/Dev team and vendors. The primary function of the Research Business Analyst is to understand and map the business requirements to configure or customize technical solutions offered by vendors to support research and innovation at Children's National Research Institute (CNRI). The Research BA ensures that the configure/customize solutions are aligned with the program needs and IT strategies developed are and in compliance with institutional IT architectural standards. The Research BA is involved in the full life cycle of implementing an application and is a critical team member of an agile implementation process. The individual is responsible for liaising with stakeholders and ensuring that user requirements are mapped configured or customized, released and deployed, and meet the stakeholder's business requirements. Other responsibilities include, working with internal business partners to gather requirements, developing workflows, building and executing test plans, performing quality reviews, managing operations and system upgrades, developing training materials and assisting in triaging and troubleshooting operational issues. This position requires the ability to interact, develop, and communicate collaboratively at the highest technical levels with research teams, vendors, collaborators, and at various organizational levels.

Minimum Education
Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or other related field. (Required)
Master's degree in Computer Science or other related field. (Preferred)

Minimum Work Experience
2 years of experience as a business analyst or requirements analyst. IT related experience preferred. Or an equivalent combination of relevant education and/or experience. (Required)
1 year Expertise in academic research administration software, workflows and/or processes preferred. (Preferred)

Required Skills/Knowledge
Ability to design wireframe / story board, documenting processes; requirements gathering, impact analysis, management of technological change.
Development of test scenarios and test cases, and testing activities vital to assess the quality and completion of system implementations.
Requires working knowledge of SQL language.
Ability to evaluate vendor software application
Advanced knowledge in information system development lifecycle methodologies needed to support the integration of software applications into a service-oriented architecture.
Ability to coordinate and execute multiple projects and/or initiatives often with conflicting deadlines and limited resources and maintaining rigorous attention to detail.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills to interact with users at all organizational levels.
Requires a thorough understanding of both theoretical and practical aspects of own professional discipline.
Requires in-depth understanding of the purpose and operations outside own area.
Demonstrated ability to understand internal/external clients.

Functional Accountabilities
RCR and Regulatory

• Ensures compliance with standards for the responsible conduct of research.

• Responsible for appropriate use of research funds and resources.

• Compliance institution policy and procedure related to IT

Project Planning
(Planning / Business Requirements)

• Identify business systems solution requirements by interviewing clients.

• Uses industry standard analysis techniques such as data flow modeling, workflow analysis, functional decomposition analysis, and business rule definition to analyze business objectives/needs and document business requirements.

• Examines and recommends improvements to business processes and identify system integration opportunities.

• Liaise with other business analysts, database analysts, server analysts, developers and programmers, to ascertain the technical problems, test and implement the best solutions.

• Evaluate information systems functionality to identify gaps; measuring the solution impact to business operations.

• Prepare project estimates by completing cost-benefit-risk analyses using an integrated set of analysis and modeling tools.

• Identify resource allocations and equipment costs, establishing timelines and milestones.

• Design high quality business systems solutions by identifying and evaluating options.

• Prepare functional specifications and configuring the system and resolve solution issues.

• Serve as a bridge between the business and the project team.

• Create and deliver related user documentation. and end-user training.

Application Development
(Design / Development / Deployment)

• Verify business systems solutions by creating test plans and scripts.

• Conducting unit and integration testing in conjunction with customers using QA processes.

• Deliver enhancements and contribute to small-scale technology projects.

• Maintain delivered solutions by supporting configuration for existing applications, implementing improvements.

• Maintain business systems standards by applying project management methods, tools and processes as standard practice.

Customer Support

• Provide post go-live support for user problems reported. Document the correction of support cases in order to increase the support knowledge base

• Maintain strong interpersonal communication, problem solving and analytical skills.

• Provide support and encouragement to organization undergoing change.

• Help others in clarifying somewhat complex problems and adapt or modifies established approaches.

• Identify and select appropriate tools, data, and analysis techniques to diagnose problems and develop solutions.

• Create clear and coherent written materials.