Business Analyst with Financial institution experience

 We are looking for a strong BA!!!!     Candidate must have prior experience working in a financial institution.

Type: Contract to hire

Location: E. Camelback Rd. Phoenix Arizona 85016 (24 St and Camelback)

This company is about to embark on an extended (5 year) program to upgrade our their administration system and this BA will play a key role interfacing with the team and future vendor. We need someone well versed in project documentation, requirements, user stories, test scenarios, and test cases.

If they have a technical development background that is a plus, but not a requirement.

Position Summary:

The Business Analyst position reports directly to the Application Development Senior Manager and will support the upcoming Commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) Pension Administration System (PAS) implementation efforts. Under the direction of the PAS Project Manager (PM), the Business Analyst discovers, synthesizes, and analyzes information to elicit business needs, document processes, develop test scenarios and to devise strategies and solutions that will be implemented in the PAS.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

• Leading business analysis and testing initiatives related to the Pension Administration System (PAS) Project and other assigned projects
• Documenting to-be process definitions gathered during work sessions with SMEs and Product Owners
• Creating project documentation including to-be process documents, requirements, user stories, test scenarios, test cases, etc.
• Providing RFP documentation support as-needed
• Coordinating with project stakeholders and end users to identify, understand and document business and technical processes and requirements to successfully deliver the project
• Providing expert IT project business analysis and advice to project stakeholders
• Communicating business and technical processes and requirements to external PAS solution vendor
• Documenting major policy decisions and any other major project-related decisions made during work sessions
• Working closely with PM and PAS vendor to align designs with organizational and technical goals
• Assessing proposed PAS vendor solutions to determine which fit the business need, identify gaps and shortcomings in solutions and determine necessary workarounds and/or changes to the solutions proposed
• Reviewing application designs and system test results
• Acting as a liaison between the PAS vendor and subject matter experts
• Performing user acceptance test training and coordination
• Assisting with creation of test plans, developing test cases, conducting and coordinating business acceptance testing as well as regression testing
• Providing other project support and task coordination throughout the project

Qualifications: To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required.

• 6+ years of Business Analysis experience required, ideally with a focus in pension and/or retirement related services, banking or financial services
• Strong knowledge of pension benefit administration is preferred, including ability to analyze summary plan descriptions and understanding of pension benefit calculations; preferred
• Experience with business process flows/procedures, system requirements, user story development, test planning, test case development and test execution; required
• Experience working within Agile / Scrum strongly preferred
• Ability to translate and explain complex technical concepts to end-users
• Knowledge of Project Management practices and/or experience in Project Management strongly preferred
• Experience with data analysis required
• Excellent MS office skills including Excel, Visio, PowerPoint and MS Project required
• Experience with Agile software development planning and tracking tools such as Jira preferred