Senior Business Analyst

Reports To: Chief Financial Officer
Job Type: Full-time, Exempt
Region: Central America & Mexico - South America - United States
Location: Remote in the US, Costa Rica, or Peru
Start Date: Immediate
Contact: Please apply on our company site.

Mission & History of Root Capital

Root Capital is a nonprofit whose mission is to grow rural prosperity and build the resilience of farming families around the world. We support the growth of agricultural enterprises, so they can transform rural communities. These businesses purchase crops such as coffee, cocoa, or grains from smallholder farmers. With growth, they become engines of impact that can raise incomes, create jobs for the next generation of leaders, level the playing field for women, and take urgent action against climate change.

We supply these businesses with vital credit and capacity building to foster their growth and resilience. We work in hard-to-serve communities where others don’t. To date, we’ve distributed $1.5 billion to improve the lives of over 10 million people in farming families. Headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Root Capital currently has associated offices in Costa Rica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Colombia, Peru, Ghana, and Kenya.

Summary

The Senior Business Analyst will play a critical role in helping Root Capital achieve our ambitious impact objectives by supporting Root Capital teams that are working to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of current business processes, as well as develop new processes to support the delivery of innovative products and services that support Root Capital’s mission.

The Senior Business Analyst will develop and maintain effective relationships with key stakeholders across the organization in order to share best practices, provide technical advice, and collaborate on business process improvement opportunities. This will include partnering with internal stakeholders to identify deficiencies or desired changes in critical business processes, and help identify opportunities to improve with related benefits, costs, and risks.

The Senior Business Analyst will directly participate in initiatives or projects that support process improvements, leveraging new system capabilities or the integration of data/other applications into existing systems, including leading processes to select business systems and vendors that are optimally aligned with project requirements and budget.

The Senior Business Analyst will be responsible for leading efforts to document functional requirements, and translating those requirements into system features, user stories, and acceptance criteria. The Senior Business Analyst will assist and coordinate work on projects by contributing to developing project standards and processes to improve project delivery, and may play the project manager role for selected projects.

The Senior Business Analyst will be a member of Root Capital’s IT Department leadership team, together with the Chief Financial Officer, IT Operations Manager, and IT Manager, Salesforce & Tableau. As part of this leadership team, the Senior Business Analyst will be expected to collaborate with other IT team members to determine departmental goals and priorities, and establish best in class processes for IT project selection and prioritization.

Responsibilities

Business Process Analysis and Improvement (40%)

• Develop and maintain effective relationships with key stakeholders across the organization in order to share best practices, provide technical advice (in collaboration with IT leadership), and collaborate on business process improvement opportunities.
• Work with departments across the organization to analyze identified deficiencies or desired changes in critical business processes, and help identify opportunities for improvement, scoping related benefits, costs, and risks.
• Conduct root cause analyses, gather data to pinpoint process issues or bottlenecks on which to focus, identify software and service improvement opportunities through understanding of departmental workflows, processes, and pain-points.
• Create reports, dashboards, and process / procedure visualizations to understand business performance.
• Guide process improvements, consulting with cross-functional teams to understand available solutions, solve workflow problems, and ensure automation systems are fully leveraged.

Business System Requirements, Selection and Implementation (40%)

• Participate in initiatives or projects that support process improvements, leveraging new system capabilities or the integration of data/other applications into existing systems.
• Use a variety of techniques (e.g., meetings, workshops, interviews, and job shadowing) to elicit and document business processes and functional requirements for business system projects.
• Translate high-level requirements to create designs that meet the needs of internal customers, are technically sound, maintainable and cost-effective. Includes understanding complex requirements and translating them into understandable solutions, including clear, detailed, and well-documented features, user stories, and acceptance criteria.
• Lead processes to select business systems and vendors that are optimally aligned with project requirements and budget.
• Assist and coordinate work on projects by contributing to developing project standards and processes to improve project delivery; may play the project manager role for selected projects.

Collaboration with IT Department Leadership Team (20%)

The Senior Business Analyst will be a member of Root Capital IT Department Leadership team, together with the Chief Financial Officer, IT Operations Manager, and IT Manager, Salesforce & Tableau. As part of this leadership team, the Senior Business Analyst will be expected to collaborate with other IT team member to:

• Determine IT Department priorities, goals and required resources.
• Establish best in class processes for IT project selection and prioritization, including ensuring this process is transparent and the selection criteria and results are well communicated to the rest of the organization.
• Serve as a member of Root Capital’s Data Governance Council, and ensure Root Capital establishes and enforces clear policies and procedures related to data quality, system documentation, and system integration.
• Champions IT security best practices throughout all phases of work. Makes material contributions to policy improvements alongside the IT Team as needed.

Skills & Experience

• Minimum 7 years experience in a Business Analyst, Senior Business Analyst, or similar role
• Excels at collaboration with stakeholders at different levels of the organization and across diverse cultures, including ability to build consensus and influence decision-makers.
• Proven track record of applying appropriate process improvement techniques and methodologies to drive business process improvement
• Strong project management skill set and experience in the project manager role for process improvements and/or system improvement projects.
• Experience with project management of complex business improvement and/or system implementation projects involving cross-functional teams
• Experience with documenting business processes, use cases, and requirements
• Familiarity with complex business systems, and experience analyzing whether the application structures and functions are well aligned with functional requirements for new business system implementations.
• Ability to quickly learn the objectives, structures, operations, and policies of a new business area
• Adept at navigating organizations with complex structures organizational structures; understanding people's roles, foreseeing obstacles, identifying workarounds, leveraging resources and rallying teammates.
• Experience with Salesforce and/or Tableau preferred, but not required
• Strong organizational skills with the ability to complete work within established time frames, as well as prioritize and coordinate multiple projects and competing work demands.
• Excellent verbal, written, and interpersonal communication skills in English required, bilingual candidates (English/Spanish) preferred
• Commitment to Root Capital’s mission
• Must be authorized to work in the United States, Peru or Costa Rica.