Business Analyst (N000029)

Introduction

NORTH-WEST UNIVERSITY (POTCHEFSTROOM CAMPUS) | DIVISION: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY – ACADEMIC SYSTEMS | POSITION NUMBER: N000029 | VACANCY: BUSINESS ANALYST | PEROMNES GRADE: 8 | EMPLOYMENT TYPE: PERMANENT APPOINTMENT Duties & Responsibilities

PURPOSE OF THE POSITION Provide business analysis for IT solutions across one or more defined business areas by investigating business functions, processes, information flows and application needs. Elicits, analyses, documents and validates business requirements; contributes to options analysis and feasibility assessment; and supports the design, testing, implementation and continuous improvement of effective business solutions. The role works with stakeholders, users, service owners and technical teams to maintain a shared understanding of requirements, solution options, implementation impacts and expected outcomes, ensuring that analysis outputs are clear, traceable, validated and aligned to approved standards, methodologies and institutional priorities. KEY RESPONSIBILITIES: Stakeholder Relationship Management:

• Maintain effective communication between business stakeholders and IT teams for assigned initiatives, ensuring that business needs, priorities, requirements, constraints and solution impacts are understood and documented. • Build and maintain constructive working relationships with stakeholders across defined business areas, facilitates input into requirements and solution decisions, and escalates complex or cross-domain matters through the appropriate management channels. • Communicate business, process and solution information in clear language, adapting technical detail for non-technical stakeholders to support informed decisions and shared understanding. • Contribute to the development of business cases by assessing anticipated benefits, costs, risks, implementation implications, dependencies, operational impacts and value outcomes of proposed solutions. Business Situation Analysis:

• Investigate business situations, opportunities and problems by engaging stakeholders, analysing organisational context, reviewing current-state operations and assessing business impacts. • Conduct root-cause analysis to identify underlying causes of business problems and develops evidence-based recommendations for improvement. • Define problem statements, desired outcomes, business objectives and improvement opportunities to support solution evaluation and decision-making. • Contribute to the assessment of organisational readiness, constraints, risks, dependencies and strategic alignment when evaluating potential solutions. Requirements Definition and Solution Evaluation:

• Assess existing internal and external solution options against business needs, constraints, risks, benefits and feasibility, and provides analysis input for recommended solution approaches. • Document business architecture elements, functional and non-functional requirements, process impacts and solution context in accordance with approved standards, methodologies and architecture guidance. Business Process Improvement:

• Analyse impacted business processes with stakeholders to identify gaps, risks, inefficiencies and improvement opportunities that support cost effectiveness, quality, compliance, user experience and shorter cycle times. Information and Requirements Management:

• Manage requirements throughout their lifecycle, including prioritisation, traceability, validation, baselining, approval and change control to ensure alignment between business needs and delivered solutions. • Maintain analysis and requirements documentation throughout the solution lifecycle, including proposals, business requirements, process flows, user stories or use cases, acceptance criteria, traceability records, test inputs, implementation plans and stakeholder decisions. Change Implementation Support:

• Work with stakeholders and affected business units to assess change impacts on business processes, users, services, data and operational readiness, and supports activities that enable adoption of new or changed solutions. • Contribute to change implementation planning by defining assigned activities, preparing communication and readiness inputs, and supporting stakeholder understanding before and during implementation. • Identify, documents and manages business change requirements, business readiness activities and adoption considerations to support successful implementation and transition into operational use. Solution Validation and Quality Assurance:

• Define acceptance criteria and contributes to test planning, test preparation and validation activities to confirm that solutions meet agreed requirements, quality expectations, compliance needs and auditability requirements. • Review analysis and solution deliverables for completeness, consistency, traceability, testability and alignment with agreed requirements, institutional standards and approved methodologies. Delivery Coordination:

• Coordinate assigned analysis, stakeholder, vendor or technical inputs within smaller work packages to support the development and implementation of business solutions. • Take accountability for assigned analysis deliverables, including requirements artefacts, process documentation, validation inputs, testing support and implementation support within an agreed scope. • Identify cost, effort, risk, dependency and value considerations for assigned solutions and escalates issues, constraints or decisions that fall outside the agreed scope or authority level. • Promote the continuous improvement and standardisation of business analysis methods, templates, artefacts, tools and practices by identifying opportunities to improve analysis quality, consistency and delivery effectiveness. Cybersecurity:

• Support cybersecurity and information-security compliance by considering security, privacy, access, risk and control requirements during business analysis, requirements definition and solution validation activities. Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) (no more than 5%):

• Under health and safety regulations, each employee has the duty to take care of their own health and safety and that of others who may be affected by the former’s actions or omissions at work. Employee must co-operate with management, OHS officials and colleagues to help everyone meet their legal requirements, whilst upholding and maintaining general occupational health and safety standards and practices.

Desired Experience & Qualification

• A bachelor’s degree (NQF level 7) in Information Technology, Computer Science, Business Information Systems or a related field. • Certificates in project management. • A minimum of five (5) years’ experience in business analysis and solution delivery across the solution lifecycle, including requirements elicitation, analysis, validation, process modelling, design support, development liaison, implementation, deployment, testing support and documentation. • A minimum of two (2) years’ experience in analysing information flows, data requirements, data lineage, data modelling, integration needs, system interfaces and reporting requirements to support solution evaluation, requirements definition and implementation planning. ADDED ADVANTAGES:

• Business analysis, business process management (BPMN), project management, systems analysis, data analysis or relevant technology certification would be advantageous. • Certifications in ITIL Foundation, Microsoft Power Platform Fundamentals, and Data Analytics Fundamentals. • Registration with the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA). KEY FUNCTIONAL/TECHNICAL COMPETENCIES:

• Knowledge of business analysis practices, requirements lifecycle management, business process modelling, feasibility assessment, solution evaluation, SDLC practices, quality assurance principles, architecture guidance and institutional solution standards.
• Understand higher education institutional structures, business processes, gov