Met Council Business Analyst 25P294/25P297

Description of Project

The Metropoitan Council (Met Council) is seeking up to two (2) full-time resources to serve as Business Analysts. The Business Analyst serves as a key liaison between business units, operations, and centralized information services to support, enhance, and optimize enterprise systems and processes. This role combines the analytical, technical, and strategic responsibilities of a Business Analyst with the systems expertise and functional leadership of a Business Systems Analyst.

The BA/BSA is responsible for planning, designing, maintaining, and launching efficient business, financial, and operational systems that support core organizational functions. This includes analyzing business processes, identifying opportunities for improvement, implementing system enhancements, leading change initiatives, and ensuring smooth integration with other enterprise applications.

The role also includes Agile responsibilities, such as supporting, and if necessary filling Product Owner functions, collaborating with development teams, defining features, writing user stories, and ensuring business value delivery.

Examples of systems supported may include PeopleSoft Financials, PeopleSoft HRMS, Hastus, and Regional Fare Collection Systems.

Tasks
Business & Systems Analysis
• Assist QA leads in the creation and maintenance of Requirements Traceability Matrix (RTM) artifacts to ensure test coverage and alignment with requirements.
• Create Business Requirements Specification (BRS) documentation to clearly define functional and non-functional requirements.
• Facilitate requirement gathering sessions with stakeholders and end users.
• Develop and refine wireframes to support solution design and requirements gathering.
• Create current state process flow documentation and future state process maps.
• Act as a bridge between business users, operations, and IT to define requirements and translate them into system solutions.
• Analyze, assess, and recommend improvements to existing business systems and procedures.
• Perform cost-benefit and return-on-investment analyses to support system decisions.
• Identify redundancies, inefficiencies, and process gaps; recommend and implement process improvements.
• Support contract renewals and vendor relationship management for enterprise systems.
• Develop and write user documentation, training materials, manuals, and system guides.
Agile / Product Ownership
• Work within an Agile environment, collaborating closely with development and QA teams.
• Support and if necessary own Product Owner tasks, including defining features, creating and refining user stories, and managing backlogs.
• Participate in sprint planning, daily standups, retrospectives, and other Agile ceremonies.
• Collaborate with stakeholders to prioritize work and ensure delivery of business value.
• Serve as a subject matter expert and advocate for users and stakeholders during the development lifecycle.
System Maintenance & Enhancements
• Review, test, and implement vendor-delivered system enhancements and upgrades.
• Maintain foundation tables, security, and permission structures.
• Support the creation, validation, execution, and documentation of test scripts and system modifications.
• Ensure proper system integration with related applications.
• Troubleshoot and resolve system issues post-implementation.
Reporting & Data Management
• Extract, manipulate, and analyze system data to support reporting and decision-making.
• Create and maintain custom queries and data sets for analysis.
• Integrate data with reporting tools to automate and improve reporting processes.
• Provide guidance and training to users of reporting and data tools.
Leadership & Collaboration
• Provide expertise and guidance to stakeholders, project teams, and junior analysts.
• Lead and coordinate interdepartmental initiatives and cross-functional projects.
• Prepare and manage project plans, budgets, schedules, and deliverables.
• Collaborate with consultants and vendors; review deliverables and monitor quality.
• Train and support staff on system usage, updates, and enhancements.
Minimum Qualifications
• Bachelor's degree in Business Administration, Finance, MIS, or Economics
• Five (5) years' experience as Business Analyst or Systems Analyst
• Two (2) years' experience performing configurations, modifications, or enhancements within enterprise business applications
• Master's degree in business administration, Finance, MIS, or Economics may substitute for two years' experience

Desired Skills
• Experience with large, complex SaaS vendor implementations
• Experience with large transit initiatives
• Experience with large transformation initiatives
• Exceptional soft skills and emotional intelligence to navigate at multiple levels across the organization
• IIBA Certification
• Experience creating and maintaining dashboards in Power BI to support reporting and analytics.
• Experience with Miro, Mural, Microsoft Whiteboard, and other collaboration tools.
• Experience working in waterfall, agile, and hybrid delivery environments.
• Strong knowledge of enterprise systems (e.g., HRIS, PeopleSoft Financials, or equivalent).
• Understanding of interdepartmental processes such as budgeting, procurement, HR, and finance.
• Proficiency in business process improvement, workflow optimization, and change management.
• Experience working in Agile environments and supporting Product Owner responsibilities.
• Advanced analytical skills, including process mapping, data analysis, and metrics reporting.
• Strong technical skills, including proficiency in MS Excel (pivot tables, charts), Word, PowerPoint, Access, and database management.
• Experience with SQL queries or similar reporting tools preferred.
• Ability to develop and deliver clear documentation, training, and presentations.
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, with the ability to collaborate across all organizational levels.
• Strong problem-solving, negotiation, and decision-making abilities in complex, ambiguous situations.
• Ability to foster teamwork and promote an inclusive, respectful workplace culture.
• Local to the Twin Cities area