Differences Between Data Analytics vs Business Analytics
Data Analytics is more technical centric than the other in terms of technical skillset as a data analyst would be doing hands-on data cleaning, data purging, finding correlations etc. A data analyst would love to dirty his hands on any of the latest tools out there and test his/her data on the tool and see what insights he/she can draw from it.
Business analytics, on the other hand, is a kind of more process-oriented / functional role where a business analyst would be looking into the day to day operations of the company. A CEO/CMO won’t understand what correlation is or what variables are really having a weight on the transform function, hence a business analyst. A business analyst should be able to interpret the data analyst terminologies and transom them to be presentable to their respective heads. A business analyst would also look into optimizing and would also be the one to call the shorts for upgrading/optimizing any models in the company/campaign.
Below is the extract from Wikipedia for the definition of data analyst:
“Analysis of data is a process of inspecting, cleansing, transforming, and modeling data with the goal of discovering useful information, suggesting conclusions, and supporting decision making. Data analysis has multiple facets and approaches, encompassing diverse techniques under a variety of names, in a different business, science, and social science domains.”
If we go with the definition given by IIBA (International Institute of Business Analysis) then the following defines business analytics:
“The Business Analyst is an agent of change. Business Analysis is a disciplined approach to introducing and managing change to organizations, whether they are for-profit businesses, governments, or non-profits.
Business analysis is used to identify and articulate the need for change in how organizations work, and to facilitate that change. As business analysts, we identify and define the solutions that will maximize the value delivered by an organization to its stakeholders. Business analysts work across all levels of an organization and may be involved in everything from defining strategy, to creating the enterprise architecture, to taking a leadership role by defining the goals and requirements for programs and projects or supporting continuous improvement in its technology and processes.”
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Head to Head Comparisons Between Data Analytics and Business Analytics
Below is the top 8 comparison between the Data Analytics and Business Analytics:
Key Differences Between Data Analytics and Business Analytics
Below are the lists of points, describe the key Differences Between Data Analytics and Business Analytics
- The key tasks of a business analyst will be checking the requirement assessing it with a point of operations and functions whereas a data analyst will only analyze the data in terms of collecting, manipulating and analyzing the data.
- The business analyst goes through all the requirements by scoping and de-scoping the requirements and then assign the tasks to the developers to develop the code whereas a data analyst would be preparing dashboards charts or various visualizations which would help the higher management to take calls on what should be done next.
- The business analyst would research and try to gain valuable insights from the data, finding the optimal model for the business also lies with the business analyst whereas a data analyst would concentrate on developing new algorithms or to optimize the already developed algorithms.
- Let’s take an example and try to differentiate between the two:
1. We have a study where a telecom company needs to segregate their customers in order find the unwanted customers or let’s just say the churn rate. A business analyst would ask the developers to build models by giving them all the data they require and then try to evaluate which model describes the best.
2.Whereas a data analyst would be taking care of cleaning the data, transforming the data so that it could fit good enough for the model, tweaking the model for better results, building visual outputs so as to make the model easily understandable.
Data Analytics and Business Analytics Comparison Table
Following is the list of points that show the comparisons between Data Analytics and Business Analytics
| BASIS FOR COMPARISON | Business Analytics | Data Analytics |
| Focus | A business analyst would be responsible for making the reports, KPI(Key Performance Index) matrix, trends in the data which would help the organization | A data analyst would just play with the data to find patterns, correlations and even build models to see how the data responds to his/her models. |
| Process | A business analyst would do a static and comparative study of the data. | A data analyst would do an explanatory analysis and then will try to experiment with data mining processes so as to give a good visual representation of the data. |
| Data Sources | A business analysts would pre-plan his/her sources of data as to what all are necessary and which should be excluded which is a slow process. | A data analyst finds a correlation on some data which is not a part of his earlier dataset then he/she would add the data source on the fly as needed. |
| Transform | A business analyst would transform the data upfront which is carefully planned. | All the transformations are done in-database and whenever there is a demand to enrich data it is done on the fly. |
| Data Quality | A business analyst would always present the data as a single version of truth | A business analyst would go by the phrase “Good enough” or theoretically with the probabilities |
| Data Model | A business analyst would go with schema on load data model | A data analyst would go with schema on query data model. |
| Analysis | Retrospective, descriptive | Predictive, prescriptive |
| Field | A subset of computer science and management where the study of data is done by using different methods and technologies | Covers entire technological field which is a superset of Data Science
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Conclusion
As a business analyst acts on top of a data analyst here is a glimpse of the salary composition of the two profiles:
The below table shows the average salary of a business analyst.
Whereas a data analyst would have an average salary ranging between $65k – $97k
To conclude it depends on the individual’s interests, if he/she is good with technical stuff he /she go with the data analytics or if he/she is proficient with the functional/process areas then he/she may go with the business analytics part.
Each has its own advantages in terms of the conceptual matters, growth and development in the field of Science and Technology and the expanding technology world needs more of these areas in order to grow further and create some extraordinary inventions that ease not only human life but also saves our atmospheric environment too for the upcoming generations to lead a smooth and happy life.
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