Study Better (as a BA)

29 May, 2022

A good business analyst masters the software his company is providing. A great business analyst masters the learning process.

A good business analyst masters the software his company is providing.
A great business analyst masters the learning process.

You could follow all the pdfs , walkthrough videos and seminars, and get nothing important. Remember, it probably happened during your studies: Some of us (=ME) only reviewed the mock exams before some tests, passed it and quickly forgot about it. A hard pill to swallow.
I can’t tell you anything about banking law obviouslyten years after, but I can tell you why :
I was more involved in the last FIFA video game than on a lot of my teaching subjects. I was not driven by the objective to understand what I studied – I was driven by the objective to have a passing score.
When I entered the labor market, my objectives changed. I wanted to be a great Business analyst, so I added those 3 principles into my learning method, and lemme tell you : It help me a lot grabbing specialized concepts.

  1. The Tutorial Fade, by James Comeau
In this great article available here, Josh Comeau talks about a simple way to do tutorial, but yet, we need to hear it. It is not enough to complete simply a tutorial, because we tend to forget what we are using. So the proper way is to:
  1. Follow them as intended
  2. Try to do the steps again without looking at the help of the tutorial. When you are blocked, you can open again the help, but close it as soon as possible
  3. Repeat until you can complete the entire exercise without looking at the tutorial

  1. Be your own teacher
“What is conceived well is clearly stated”
Nicolas Boileau in L’art poetique
Simple, but true. If you want to understand well a concept, break it down until you can explain it clearly. Talk aloud like you had someone not familiar with the subject and be his teacher. And if you are not crazy like me, you can also use friends and colleagues - it works.

  1. Build a good habit with Anki

It is necessary to test yourself regularly. With Anki, you can prepare flashcards, and in the way home, test yourself. It is great to learn concepts, and it takes 5 minutes per day. You just have to be consistent.

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