FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

What are Business Analytics?
Are Business Analytics Different than Business Intelligence (BI)?
Do I Need to Be a Member of IIBA to be a Member of the Business Analytics SIG?
Do you have an example of business analytics?
I’m a BA not a Mathematician, Should I Care About Business Analytics?
What about web analytics?
What are the benefits of joining the IIBA Business Analytics SIG?
What is the difference between statistics and analytics?
What is the IIBA Business Analytics SIG?

ANSWERS

What are Business Analytics?
Business analytics apply techniques from statistics, operations research, and computer science to business data to generate actionable insight.
Business analytics come in various formats:

• Descriptive analytics can be used to understand the patterns present within historical data. Techniques used are familiar statistics (e.g. determining a mean or variance).
• Predictive analytics uses historical data to make predictions about the future. Advanced techniques such as machine learning, data mining and neural networks are used.
• Prescriptive analytics is a new term sometimes used to differentiate when predictive analytics results recommend one or more courses of action with probabilities of the likely outcome of each decision.

Many organizations are very conscious of the fact that they are swamped with data that they have collected about their operations, that this data contains rich stories that can lead to significant improvements in the performance of their business, and that for the most part the value of this data lies untapped and under-utilized. Business analytics creates value from this tremendous data asset.

Are Business Analytics Different than Business Intelligence (BI)?
Traditional BI is mainly used for reporting and ad-hoc queries and more recently for data visualization. Business analytics applies mathematical techniques to the data for a deeper analysis and for predictions about the future. Traditional BI Software vendors are adding more analytics capabilities and traditional analytics vendors are adding for data visualization and reporting. Business analysts need to respond with more sophisticated, decision-centric requirements to ensure these new capabilities are correctly exploited.
 
Do I Need to Be a Member of IIBA to be a Member of the Business Analytics SIG?
Membership of this SIG shall be defined as the membership of our LinkedIn discussion group during for an initial period. Join the LinkedIn Group here. 
However to be able to sign up for SIG Webinars or to vote in SIG Committee elections the member must also be a member of IIBA International. More information about IIBA membership can be found here.
 
Do you have an example of business analytics?
Consider a large company that is facing problems with staff retention. A number of risk factors could be considered for staff attrition including work performance, level of seniority, and salary. Using historical data, an analytical model could be developed to identify those staff members that are of the greatest benefit to the company and who are at the greatest risk of leaving the company. Decision strategies could then be put into place to increase retention of these targeted staff members.
 
Consider also the field of insurance claims. Fraudulent claims can represent a significant cost to businesses, where such claims may represent 3% to 5% of all submissions. In this context business analytics can be used to identify those claims that are different to the norm, that are more likely to be fraudulent. A decision can be made to reject these claims allowing inflated, erroneous, or inappropriate claims to be handled faster and at a lower cost.
 
I’m a BA not a Mathematician, Should I Care About Business Analytics?
Business analytics are powerful tools for driving improved business performance. Modern tools have a variety of interfaces geared to business analysts and business owners as well as analytics professionals. Business Analysts have the opportunity to play a powerful role in driving this next generation of business analytics that is widely used across the enterprise and by a diverse set of users. 

Business analytics have been in use for decades, but were largely applied separately from business processes and systems, or in back office applications. Business analysts can bridge the understanding between the business owners, the advanced analytics professionals and analytic technology. 

BA's also have new tools and techniques to ensure that requirements for business analytics are correctly captured and delivered. Making sure that requirements include requirements for decision-making support or automation by applying new techniques like decision requirements modeling (new in BABOK® v3] ) helps puts analytics front and center. Combined with established techniques like business process modeling and business rules analysis, business analysts can develop process and system requirements that facilitate the integration of business analytics.
 
What about web analytics?
Web analytics are analytics used to report on website usage. Web analytics today are largely descriptive. 
 
What are the benefits of joining the IIBA Business Analytics SIG?
In this formation period, we plan to run educational webinars, moderate discussions and solicit feedback via a dedicated Linkedin Group (a sub-group of the IIBA Linkedin in Group), curate resources useful to Business Analysts and provide a vibrant community to share tips and best practices. 
 
What is the difference between statistics and analytics?
Many of the techniques used in analytics have a mathematical or statistical underpinning. Analytics includes these techniques as well as techniques from computer science and operations research. Statistics also includes a number of techniques that are not commonly used for business applications (such as for example techniques used in medical clinical trials or environmental modelling). Some people use statistics to refer to more familiar analysis (e.g. determining a mean or variance). Predictive analytics is specifically used when data is used to make predictions about the future using probabilities and Predictive Modeling is another term for used for predictive analytics.
 
What is the IIBA Business Analytics SIG?
“A Special Interest Group (SIG) is a community of IIBA® Business Analysts focusing on business analysis within a specific industry. Unlike the IIBA chapters which are geographically based and span all industries, a SIG is a virtual community.” – IIBA
 
With the rising importance of business analytics within the field of business analysis, it has been proposed that a Special Interest Group for Business Analytics be established within IIBA. An IIBA Special Interest Group is an international community of IIBA members who are interested in a specific specialty or theme within the broad arena of business analysis.