Session Overview and Relevance

Starting a new business analyst (BA) role or project can be challenging when there’s no how-to guide, and every organization approaches business analysis differently. You start your first day (where they give you a bunch of hyperlinks and say “read this”), and then what? This workshop gives business analysts a practical playbook for navigating those critical first weeks and months: what your actual job is (versus what you were told it would be), who to ask for what, and how to build strategies that move work forward when no one is handing you a roadmap.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Apply strategies to ramp up starting on day 1, including identifying the help you need and from whom.

• Generate the right questions to ask (and the right people to ask them of) during the first pivotal days.

• Build personal strategies for moving work forward in ambiguous environments where ownership is unclear.

• Apply a practical onboarding checklist to turn early-days uncertainty into concrete progress.

Target Audience

• New BAs entering their first BA role.

• Tech workers transitioning from adjacent roles (e.g., Dev, QA, PM, operations, product management).

• Experienced BAs starting at a new organization or on an unfamiliar project.

• Career changers and recent graduates preparing for their first BA role.

• Managers and mentors of early-career BAs looking to better support new hires.

Expected Outcomes / Takeaways

Participants will leave with:

• A concrete first-90-days checklist for orienting in any new BA role.

• Practical scripts and questions for stakeholder discovery and relationship building.

• Strategies for self-directing work when no clear roadmap exists.

• Increased confidence in turning ambiguity into early, visible contributions.

This session moves beyond generic onboarding advice to give you a realistic, experience-driven playbook for the first chapter of any BA role, helping you stop waiting for clarity and start creating it.