The BA Times
A podcast talking about the role of a business analyst in the UK IT sector
The BA Times
The BA Times - Navigating from Permanent Roles to Contracting as a Business Analyst
Switching gears, we dive into contracting, shedding light on the essential skills and mindset needed to thrive. Learn how to quickly adapt, deliver high-quality work, and master the art of networking, especially on LinkedIn. Pete and Neil discuss the practical challenges of contracting, from self-management to financial risks, and explore strategies to secure ongoing opportunities. Whether you're considering a shift from a permanent role or eager to understand the contracting lifestyle, this episode offers a wealth of insights and tips, underscoring that both career paths come with their own unique benefits and opportunities.
Presenters
Neil Murphy: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neil-murphy-1613601/
Pete Bagnall: https://www.linkedin.com/in/petebagnall/
We don't know what we're going to say.
Speaker 2:And Pete, we're on record.
Speaker 1:Nice one. Hello everybody, welcome to the BA Times podcast, your hosts. To introduce myself, I'm Pete Bagnall. I've been a business analyst around 18 years, predominantly in the financial services sector, and I'm joined by my co-host, neil Murphy.
Speaker 2:Hi everyone. My name's Neil Murphy. I've been a BA for about 23-24 years. Unlike Pete, I've worked across many sectors retail, travel, etc. Probably the two sectors that I haven't worked in are finance and insurance.
Speaker 1:Thanks, neil. Just to set the scene for our intention for the podcast, just looking to have open conversations about the BA role, the BA community, specifically to the UK market where Neil and I work, and hopefully just provide some insights and some tips into our experience and just the BA role in general.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and also what we're going to do is we're going to get guests on over the next few episodes. We're going to get some recruitment consultants on some program managers, some product owners, and so what we're going to give you is a 360 view of the BA role and how it's perceived and what certain people look for skills in BAs when they recruit.
Speaker 1:And today we're going to talk about a subject of BAs and how they're employed. So we're going to talk about the difference between our experiences of being a permanent BA and a contract BA. So I think, neil, all BAs I would say pretty much start as a permanent employee of a company, pretty much start as a permanent employee of a company. Um, so where did you start and what was your sort of experience of starting out as a BA and, obviously, working under an organization?
Speaker 2:Well, I started off at British Airways um, and it really probably wasn't a pure BA role. At the time, uh, I think, was working on kind of the first version of British Airways online check-in, etc. But you're right, pete, I think you need to build up that perm experience of uh being a BA um before you make a jump into contracting. I think, uh, I was quite fortunate that I worked for people like British Airways Honda was permanent, uh, permanent as well, so I kind of got that big office culture experience. What about yourself, pete?
Speaker 1:Yeah, similar.
Speaker 1:I mean, I my first role, I guess was in sort of Lloyd's and again it was a bit of a hybrid role really, where I started as a BA and I think it was a good place to start, got a fairly well-structured organization and the same as that was my sort of first exposure into Agile and both organizations were quite big companies, well-structured, good training, good support, and I think that was important as well for I guess when you're a permanent BA or looking to become a BA, having somewhere that there is that support there so mean having the ability to sort of fail as a people know that you're sort of a either a junior or a BA.
Speaker 1:That's sort of learning the trade, learning the ropes, and you've got peers around you and mentors around you that can give you that support. I think there's definitely some real advantages, especially I guess, in the early stages of your career, working for a sort of an established organization and an established company, especially when you you are that sort of permanent employee, because it sort of allows you to make mistakes and it allows you that I mean, sometimes a BA role might not be for everybody, so having the ability to maybe try out a PM or try out a product owner or a scrum master or or something else.
Speaker 2:I think is always is is always a benefit as well, I think yeah, absolutely, and I think also with with the permanent role you are, you are, you are potentially looking at doing career progression. You know so, you might become such an architect or you might, you know, move on and eventually I think I've worked with someone with who was a BA, who's now a program manager. You know so they've obviously progressed in their career, and that's one thing about contracting you don't progress. It's quite rare to be able to go contract as a role as a ba, then land your next role as a pm, maybe then land your next role as a program manager, because what clients don't want to do is take a risk on a contractor that actually, even though he's been a BA for the last 20 odd years, we believe he can step up and manage a project of, say, two million pounds or something like that yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I think that's the and I think that's what I would say to anybody listening that's thinking oh, how do I, where do I start as a BA? Finding a good company where you can progress your career and I think that's something we'll touch on later is that actually contracting isn't for everybody. So having that safe structure where you've got all your sort of employment rights and holidays and sick pay and you know that you can progress and you've got a sort of a career path that you can follow over a number of years with an organization that you know well, I think definitely has huge benefits to people, and especially when you're starting out or even if you've been doing it a while. I think there's there are some, there are benefits to sort of being that sort of per me employee. But I mean, we've touched on obviously contracting a little bit. That's obviously where we sit.
Speaker 1:Now what was your trigger? I? I mean you said you started as a permie, but what was your trigger? To think, oh, actually, what is this contracting gig? And when did you first sort of hear about contracting, to sort of know what it is and what made you go into it.
Speaker 2:So I used to get calls from recruitment agents way back when and I'd just go no, unless it's perm, I'm not interested. Because my mindset at the time was, you know, career progression, you know, maybe move outside of British Airways, move on to another company, hopefully getting a pay rise, different sort of experiences, etc. But I think basically I was at British Airways the second time actually, because I did go back to them and I just got a call from a recruitment agent saying blah, blah, blah, virgin Atlantic. You know we're looking to redo their website, online check-in etc. And I think I just felt the time was right. You know, I think I probably had eight, ten years experience at that point as being a BA. But again, you know, you do have to take that risk a little bit and I was quite fortunate that British Airways because I was going to Virgin Atlantic.
Speaker 2:Let me go relatively quickly and that's the other thing to consider that if you are Permian, you essentially do think about making jumps to contracts. You may have to take a gamble on a three-month notice period that you know at the end of the three months that you will be able to find a contract. Uh, that you know at the end of the three months that you will be able to find a contract, because that's probably one thing to point out is really in the contracting world, agents aren't interested in someone serving a notice period. You know a client's not going to wait around probably a month for a ba become available. You know it's normally two weeks tops, isn't it people?
Speaker 1:yeah, absolutely yeah, I think so, and I think that's probably another. I mean you could see it as an advantage of being in a permanent role. You do typically get that um longer notice period. So if the worst does happen I mean you see, sort of seems to be every other year in the news there's a tech company or an organization somewhere having mass layoffs and you think the people that have either been there for a long time and get some sort of severance and or have a long notice period, that doesn't typically exist in the, in the sort of contract world.
Speaker 1:I guess, from my side, I think, and I experienced that as in um, I've been a permy for maybe six to eight years and I'd worked with a few contract bas, I think, yourself being one of them, and a few of them uh sort of said why, why aren't you, why aren't you contracting? Why are you still a perm? And that was the first time I'd really ever heard of a. What is a contract ba? What are you even talking about? Uh, I just thought you were a business analyst and everyone was the same and I didn't even know about this other world that sort of existed out there. Um, and I think my hands sort of get got dealt for me in a way.
Speaker 1:I was working for a company that I turned up on a Friday. It wasn't Virgin or Lloyds it's safe to say they still exist but it just went into administration, literally. On the Friday morning I turned up, I was a BA there and they went into administration and that was it. My job was done. So there was no job for me from that Friday onwards and that for me I just thought, as you said, notice periods are an issue, especially for recruiters who are looking to get contract BAs in. And all of a sudden I was immediately available, so went through LinkedIn and started looking at roles out there and was lucky enough to go back to Lloyd's in a contract position working for some of the people I'd worked with before.
Speaker 1:So for me I wasn't really even aware that there was a contract market out there, and then for me the timing just sort of fell into my lap. It is a hard transition. I think, as you said, you've really got to commit to a jump to say, if you've got a long notice period, right, I need to sort of do it and get into that contract world. But I think once you're there, you potentially won't look back, even though there are disadvantages to it, to contracting. But yeah, that was a sort of trigger point for me. But I guess, speaking of contracts, I mean there's a few different types of contracts, neil, I guess from your experience have you seen, especially more recently, in the more recent years, so I'm not going to go into too much detail because they are quite complex.
Speaker 2:But you tend to have three types of contracts in the more recent years. So I'm not going to go into too much detail because they are quite complex. But you tend to have three types of contracts in the UK. One is called outside of IR35. The other one is inside IR35. And then you will also see on job sites, fixed-term contracts. Outside of IR35, contracts are pretty much just standing alone. You've got your own limited company support yourself, et cetera. Inside IR35, sometimes there will be some benefits available to the contractor, so maybe some holiday pay, et cetera. And then fixed-term contracts can have a number of benefits, ie access to private medical care et cetera. But we've got Chelsea Stanton coming on from Simply Commerce in a couple of weeks' time, so I think we'll leave her and her better expertise to explain the nuances of the UK contracting market.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, and, as a disclaimer, we are not tax or contract experts in that respect, so we will leave that to the others to explain. We'll never recommend you should do this, that or the other, because everyone's in a in a different boat, I suppose. But um, and so how do you decide, though, neil, I think, for I guess I mean, I've had a few people reach out to me say, well, how do I become a ba, how do I do this? So I, I guess a sim. A similar question is how do you know that contracting as a ba is right for you? So we've said that you want to start out as a perm, sort of learn the ropes, make sure you're sort of competent, but how do you know, as a BA, that contracting is right for you?
Speaker 2:I think that's a really good question, pete, and I think it's quite a difficult one to answer, I think, if we flip it around a bit and we talk about mentality of a contract BA. So I think you know you've got to hit the ground. Running every contract um, you get performance appraised on a daily basis. If you don't, you don't deliver. You know you'll be out the door. They're quite. If you're normally on a two-week notice period, they're quite happy. So pay you off for those two weeks and then you're back searching um, what about you, pete?
Speaker 1:yeah, I think that's a key one. I think you've just got to hit the ground running, I think, to know that you're sort of ready, um, I think if you're working in an organization where you're, you typically will get to the point where you're the sort of go-to ba where just no matter what, no matter what the project is, I will put we'll put Pete on it, put Neil on it, put whoever on it, because they know that you can sort of just go into a project, understand it fairly quickly, understand what needs to happen, and you know the structure of the company already and you can just go in and sort of affect change and support. And I think when you get to that sort of level of competence, you kind of then just need the confidence to take that to any organization and, like you say, you have to be able to hit the ground running and you have to be able to just think, have the confidence to go in and say, right, I don't necessarily know the makeup of the organization, but I'm going to go in and I'm going to do what I do as a permy in a, in an organization that I don't know, with people I've never met, um, and just have that sort of positive attitude I think we touched on it in the last, uh, a couple of podcasts of just that sort of go in with a bit of empathy, understand what you're doing, not sort of go and impose your way of doing things on someone. And I think, if you're comfortable with that, um, and also I think you get your peers, or you typically will compare yourself to your peers there, even as a contractor or a perm, you'll compare yourself to other contracts and perm employees in your company and you sort of get a gauge of where you're at. And I think if you're doing pretty well and people are asking you well, why are you still a perm? I think that's normally a good indicator of whether you should be making the jump or not.
Speaker 1:But I think one of the scary things of when you do make the jump is, I guess, like contract lengths. I mean, you see it on job adverts and you'll hear it on linkedin and you'll speak to people and it'll be oh, you've only got a job for a month, or you've only got a job for three months or six months or 12 months or whatever it might be. Um, and I think we agree on this. But how important do you think a contract length actually is in in our world?
Speaker 2:I think I'll surprise people by saying it's not really that important at all. Um, I think, if you can see a backlog of work, you know well. For instance, you know you do a website replatform and that's going to be 18 months worth of work but you're on a three-month contract which then renews. They renew it every every three months, I think. Um, you know, I've never seen like a 12-month contract at all. You, probably the longest you'll see in the uk will be will be six months. Um, and it is a you know. You, you have to kind of have confidence in what you're doing, but also, you know, knowing potentially how much work is ahead and yeah, I think that's key and I think I completely agree.
Speaker 1:By the way, I think the contract length, I think, is largely not not irrelevant, but it's just not an important factor. I think when I first started contracting I think I've got a six-month contract I thought, oh great, I've got a job for six months. But the reality is, as you've said, typically you've got a week, maybe two weeks notice period. Yeah, if you are not performing, you will be sort of just removed. You just right as a contract. It's a bit of the protection that you've got as a permanent employees that you're. You're allowed to fail a little bit more and you have it as a learning experience as a contractor. You're going in and you're expected to just provide a high quality of service immediately. Um, so, contract length, as you said, it's not too relevant.
Speaker 1:It's quite common to have just sort of three-month rolling every month and, as you said, if you can see a backlog of work and you can see that there's projects on the horizon, I think that's when you know that actually, even though I've only got a three-month gig, it's quite likely to be renewed at each stage gate.
Speaker 1:It's when you then sort of get to more the end of the of a project that you're working on. I think that's when your mindset potentially starts shifting. As a contractor which is different to a permy, because as a permy you don't really I don't think you necessarily have the the more holistic view of what's going on in a company you just think, oh, I'm finishing a project and you might sit on your hands for a week until they sign you another contract, another, yeah exactly they just they just sit you down until they got another project, whereas a contractor, I feel like when you know your project's coming to an end, you have to do that bit of networking and you there's other responsibilities that you kind of have to pick up just to make sure.
Speaker 1:Well, if there is a project that's that's coming up, you're aware of it, you know, and I think that's important.
Speaker 2:I think you pick up on a really good point and I'll touch upon it a bit more is networking and let's you know. So basically, for me I think LinkedIn is probably one of the most powerful tool now for contractors to find work, et cetera. So you know, when I'm out of contract, coming to an end of contract, I'll shove up the open to work banner, uh, and do some posts, etc. But also what I do even in mid contract is if I see a recruiter asking for, you know, does anyone recommend a ba blah, blah, blah, etc. And I'm not linked in with them, I'll send them a linkedin request. You know you don't want to suddenly, you know, in that way you're always building up your network as recruiters because in recruitment people can come and go relatively quickly. You know that they might, might, do recruitment for six months, eight months, find out they don't like it, don't?
Speaker 1:they want to do another, don't want to do another job yeah, and I think that's really important and I don't know how it works in the sort of non-financial services sector, but definitely in financial services, like, a lot of the organizations will have a pre-approved supply list, so you won't be able to just go in and directly contract with x, y and z company. You'd have to go through a certain supplier. So actually as a contractor again, you you linked using linkedin just to uh link up with. What you've just said is putting your program managers, project managers, uh, business smes, like all of the, the key people that you've worked with on that project, like you say, connect with them, link in with them, um share any posts that they're sort of putting out onto linkedin, because actually I mean, I found it and I'm sure you found it as well, I've done multiple stints with the same organization and actually that's come from a lot of the time. Oh, somebody's seen that I'm available, they've worked with me before. And actually as a contractor, you then sort of that connection is the one that gets you in the door, rather than the recruiter, because the person, the business person, says I need this guy, and actually how do I get him in the door, you know.
Speaker 1:So I think that again as a contract BA. That is that just sort of slightly different mindset to a permie, which is a bit more maybe career focused, a bit more right. How do I move up the chain? How do I get all of my annual reviews done? How do I get all of the things that you need to do to give you a 360 feedback to your colleagues? Where I guess, from a contract perspective, you don't do any of that? There's no sort of performance reviews, there's no annual reviews, or at least not from my experience. Anyway, like you say, your performance review is at your contract renewal to say, yeah, we want another three months, and if they don't, then you're pretty much sure that your performance review's not up to scratch.
Speaker 2:Really, I should repeat, you made a point of you know, talking about recruitment agents. Um, you have gone direct with the clients, not using a recruitment agent, so you, the other clients, paying you good question.
Speaker 1:I think I have um for a couple of the smaller companies that I worked with. I sort of find that the larger organizations um will um always go through a recruitment agent and they'll handle all of the sort of onboarding um and handle the payroll and handle all of those bits and pieces, whereas I find maybe the I've worked for a couple of maybe like fintech startup type things where it's a bit more direct and you just have that direct relationship with the client, but um, I would say 95 percent of the time I'm always through a, through some sort of agent I've only gone direct once and it was with a um, a major international company.
Speaker 2:But getting paid it's quite problematic, was it? You know? And I think you know some people you know will give recruitment agencies a bit of a bashing, etc. And they don't get me wrong, you know there are a few bad ones out there but ultimately at the end of the day they, they, you know you're, you're getting paid on time, etc. Et cetera, via the agency, and then they're chasing the client maybe three months in arrears or something to try and get payment from the client.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely yeah. I think there's definitely value. I mean, there's some exceptional recruitment agents out there. I think we've probably worked with some over our time. No-transcript. The contract market is when you're a perm, you know you're gonna you just get paid a certain day at a certain time every month and you know what you're gonna get. Um, obviously, a contractor. You take a day off sick there's no pay that. You take holiday, there's no pay. Um you, there's obviously that balance where you do need to manage that and, like you say, you'll be sending in invoices and there's a bit of sort of accountancy and management that you have to do on the side. Um, so, and I think that's the thing I mean, contracting is not necessarily for everybody. It doesn't fit everyone, um, so I mean, I know that for a lot of people there's some pros and cons of both, but how do you feel about, I mean, contracting when it's not necessarily for everybody, is it?
Speaker 2:no, um, I think I think you'll be able to take a risk. I think that's that's probably the key thing, and I think you've got to be confident in your ability. I mean, one thing I never do is when I having a chat with the potential new clients or or an agency. I will never kind of wing it a bit and go, oh yeah, I've done financial services before, you know, because I think that's when you get found out very, very quickly and and you'll be showing the door, et cetera. But I think it's not for everyone. But having said that, I want to dispel the image that all the best people go contracting. I think they don't. I think I've worked some very good perms and I've worked some bad contractors as well. So there isn't this kind of cream of the're, the, you know, cream of the crop kind of thing. You know what are your thoughts, pete?
Speaker 1:yeah, no, I couldn't agree more. I'm not exactly the same. I think I've worked some, some permanent bas and just permanent resource. I suppose we could sort of categorize that, as I mean you get project managers, uh, product owners, scrum masters, all sort of in the in the contract space as well, and you're absolutely, absolutely right. I mean some of not necessarily all the best resources go contracting. It is a bit more of a lifestyle choice.
Speaker 1:I mean, as we said, there's some really good positives about being a perm. There's some really good positives about being a contractor or consultant or whatever they decide to call you, and there's negatives as well. And I think you're right. It's not necessarily for everyone, but I mean, if it is for you, then I think, like you say, you've got to sort of take a risk, both from a career perspective, financial perspective, and you've got to be happy in your role. Like you said at the very beginning, if you're a contract BA, you're probably going to be a contract BA for a while, unless you sort of do something drastic and decide to just all of a sudden become a product owner or a project manager. But you're probably likely to go back into a perm space to learn your ropes again and start from scratch again. You know so, um, yeah, you're absolutely right, it's not necessarily for everybody, but um, yeah, I mean, for us it seems to be touch wood so far working don't get me wrong.
Speaker 2:There are stressful times, aren't there, pete? It's not everything smooth in the contracting world at times.
Speaker 1:I think we're good, aren't we now? I think that's a fairly good summary. I mean, I think we could probably talk for a little bit longer. I mean furlough, talking about stressful times, just to touch on before we close off. The furlough was a stressful time during COVID. I mean, I know that it's unlikely to happen again we pray but I mean, yeah, definitely just you. You've refreshed my mind there. I mean when? I mean I was contracting when covid hit and obviously all the permy employees get furloughed and they're. It's nice as a contractor, you just like see you later.
Speaker 2:Uh, that's it, good luck and it was um, yeah, very stressful I mean, I was quite lucky at the time. In some ways I was working on a big project which couldn't really stop during covid. But you know stressful times. You know my day rate was slashed because I knew that I wouldn't walk away to go and, you know, find something else, um, and also then you start going on some months-long contracts you just don't know. You know at the end of the month where they're going to carry on.
Speaker 1:Or tell me yeah, I mean yeah, yeah, it was definitely a stressful time. I mean I think I was the same. I was contracting when covid hit. They furloughed a load of the people that I was working with um and I I actually went permanent for a period of time with the organization. I was working for um because, exactly as you've said, there was, there was very little options. It was kind of like, well, you can, we're getting rid of all contractors because we, we don't want them anymore, we're furloughing all our staff. We can't, we can't say that we're going to keep the contractors so you can become a pern and keep the projects going because, like you said, the world kept spinning, regardless of what was happening inside it, um, or you can just see the door, kind of thing. And at the time and I don't know if you remember, I mean that love to get josie's opinion on what she went through when gov had hit from a recruitment agent's perspective. But the absolute flaw went through the the job recruitment market.
Speaker 2:So I can remember linkedin just being a sea of I think that's when they introduced the, introduced the open to work, wasn't it? Linkedin did that because of covid, and it was just a sea of people looking for contractors that were quite desperate at times yeah absolutely, and I'm sure a lot of contractors went through some real hard times financially and mentally, yeah during that covid period yeah, absolutely, absolutely on that happy note.
Speaker 1:On that very happy note. Yeah, let's leave on a happy note. Yeah, but yeah, that's it for this episode. Thanks everybody for listening. You can find us on LinkedIn. This is available for download on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, but feel free to send us any questions, any feedback, anything you want. I know people already are. So thank you very much for all of those that are listening.
Speaker 2:Cheers, and we'll speak to you soon. Thanks a lot, cheers, neil.
