Business Analyst
Business Analysts figure out how a company actually works, then make it work better.
Don't just read it — play it
Clock in at 9am and make the calls a Business Analyst makes all day. Six decisions, real consequences, a score at 5pm.
What this role really is
A Business Analyst sits between the people who have a problem and the people who can fix it. You map how a process runs today, find where money or time leaks out, and write the requirements that turn a vague complaint into a change someone can build. It is a spreadsheet-and-conversations job, and it is one of the most common first jobs for business majors.
- Map how a process works today
- Interview the teams who live in that process
- Write requirements engineering can build from
- Quantify the cost of the problem
- Track whether the change actually helped
What it pays
- Entry level
- $65k–$85k
- Mid career
- $90k–$120k
- Senior
- $130k+
Typically 9–5:30
Majors that get you here
Entry roles: Business Analyst · BA Intern · Operations Analyst · Process Analyst
Your 9-to-5, hour by hour
A realistic ordinary day — not the highlight reel.
9:00 AM
Requirements review
You walk engineering through the doc you wrote and adjust two rules they say are impossible.
10:30 AM
Process interview
Forty-five minutes with the billing team. You learn about a manual step nobody documented.
1:00 PM
Excel modeling
You put numbers on the manual step: 11 hours a week, roughly $40k a year.
3:00 PM
Stakeholder update
A short deck for the director: here's the problem, here's what it costs, here are two options.
4:30 PM
Backlog grooming
You break the approved option into tickets with acceptance criteria.
Great for you if
- You like untangling how things really work
- You're comfortable asking a lot of questions
- You enjoy writing things down clearly
Probably not for you if
- You want to build the solution yourself
- You dislike documentation