PROFILE
MBA with extensive 8 years of experience as a Business Systems Analyst for applications in Financial, Banking, Insurance, Retail andHealthcare industry. Ingenious, strategic and results-oriented business analyst with successful experience in eliciting, analyzing, and documenting the requirements for business processes, policies, and information systems. Worked as a liaison among business stakeholders to understand business problems and opportunities in the context of requirements and recommend solutions that enable the organization to achieve its goals.

BUSINESS ANALYST SKILLS:

• Expert in business process engineering and software development life cycle, including analysis, design, development, testing and implementation of software applications.
• In-depth knowledge of Rational Unified Process (RUP); risk engineering; data modeling and mapping; and design using UML, Rational Rose, and Visio.
• Familiar with current industry standards, such as HIPAA, SOX, ISO, Six Sigma, and Capability Maturity Model (CMM).
• Extensive knowledge of SDLC and Rational Unified Process (RUP).
• Strong analytical and problem solving skills, capable of addressing relevant and significant facts and recommending out-of-the-box solutions.
• Interacting with stakeholders, gathering and documenting BRD's and FRD's.
• Experience in conducting Joint Application Development (JAD) and Rapid Application Development (RAD) sessions to converge early toward a design acceptable to the users.
• Facilitated (UAT) with stakeholders, senior management, as well as business users.
• Adept at reducing development costs and providing traceability of projects.
• Excellent analytical and communication skills, verbal and written, including the ability to articulate complex technical concepts to non-technical clients
• Experience interfacing with vendors and 3rd parties
• Strong analytic and fact-based decision-making skill.
• Demonstrated organizational and problem solving skills with ability to handle multiple tasks.
• Quantitative, analytical and presentation skills gained through experiences and academics.
• Demonstrated ability to manage multiple projects - prioritizing, planning and task delegation.
• Flexibility and adaptability skills in handling changing priorities requests and multi-task work environment.
• Proficient in use of Microsoft Office suite and Internet applications for work related tasks.

TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGIES

Methodologies: Waterfall, Rational Unified Process (RUP), Agile Methodology, Scrum;
Documentation Tools: Confluence/JIRA, MS Office Suite - Word, Excel, PowerPoint;
Business Modeling Tools: Rational Rose, MS Visio, Enterprise Architect, Balasmiq;
ERP Tools: PeopleSoft, CRM Dynamics
Database Skills: Overview of Database Design, MS Access, SQL, DB2, SharePoint.
Configuration Management Tools: Microsoft Visual Source Safe, Rational ClearCase, Rational ClearQuest;
Requirements Management Tools: DOORS, Rational Requisite Pro, BluePrint Requirement Center.
Reporting Tools: Crystal Reports;
Project Management Tools: IPMS (Integrated Project Management Solutions), MS Project;
Operating Systems: Windows 9x/NT/ME/2000/XP/Vista/7;

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Confidential, Milwaukee, WI Feb 2012 - Aug 2012
Senior Business Analyst

Project: Confidential, ranks among the top 30 accounting and business consulting firms in the nation. The firm serves businesses of various sizes, from large public and private companies, to closely held family-owned businesses. Wipfli helps clients streamline processes, improve performance, leverage the right technology, or increase financial success, by offering innovative, effective, and personalized services to help clients overcome their business challenges today and plan for tomorrow.Worked with Property and Casualty client - Church Mutual.Church Mutual has specialized in insurance for religious organizations. Their market also includes religious-related schools, camps, denominational offices, and senior living facilities. They insure religious institutions of all denominations.Church Mutual markets most lines of commercial property and liability insurance, including multiple-peril, workers\' compensation, and commercial auto insurance. This project focused on Delivering Improved Services to Customers and the Organization Via Effective Re-engineering (DISCOVER).

Responsibilities:

• Performed Gap Analysis to check the compatibility of the existing system infrastructure with the new business requirements.
• Utilized the 80-20 rule to prioritize and incorporate the critical features. Used Time-Boxing techniques to finish within set time frames.
• Accumulated system requirements from Policy/Claims/Billingdepartments through surveys and interviews.
• Conducted JAD sessions with management, SME, vendors, users and other stakeholders for open and pending issues.
• Planned and defined system requirements to Wire Frames with Use Case, Use Case Scenario and Use Case Narrative using the UML (Unified Modeling Language) methodologies.
• Created Use Case Diagrams, Activity Diagrams, Sequence Diagrams and ER Diagrams in MS Project.
• Assisted in the development, design and implementation of new relational or multi-dimensional databases, including the analysis of user needs.
• Created and managed project templates, Use Case project templates, requirement types and traceability relationships in Confluence.
• Developed user specifications, use case statements and diagrams and documents to produce a statement of work. All data modeling and user interfaces were prototyped using Microsoft Visio. The CRM UI developed were for Service Dashboards, Sales Dashboards, and Ribbon for various screens and entity UI.
• The user interface (UI) screens were prototyped in Microsoft Visio and reviewed with the end users prior to programming to solicit user acceptance.
• Involved in Performance Measurement to develop measurable indicators that can be systematically tracked to assess progress made in achieving predetermined goals.
• Developed and managed creation of product documentation to communicate features, benefits, positioning and impacts to different audiences and ensured that documentation deliverables from various groups are produced as needed.

Environment: Windows XP/2000, MS-SQL Server, MS Office Suite, SharePoint, MS-Project, Confluence, JIRA, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, IBM WebSphere, XML.

Confidential, Naperville, IL Aug 2011 - Jan 2012
Senior Business Analyst

Project: BlueCross BlueShield focuses primarily in the health industry, but BCBSIL is more than a health insurer. In response to a vastly changing marketplace, BCBSIL is involved with companies to meet the diverse needs of the health industry overall. Worked on a project that would improve the cycle time and effectiveness of the Direct Marketing Process. It is also to reduce the cost of the campaigns which is generally too high for supporting profitable growth. This project is to correct outdated processes and concepts in the Member Fulfillment process. This project focused on reducing the cost of printing and mailing post-fulfillment materials and to provide the capability to request and view online specific member fulfillment materials. Requests need to be on demand by members, customer advocates, and other internal business partners

Responsibilities:

• Involved in auditing the functional documents.
• Involved in conducting the review meetings.
• Involved in gathering Business Requirements by close interaction with business teams.
• Performed the Analysis & Design workflow for various processes by following the Rational Unified Process (RUP) and OOAD to document Business Use Cases.
• Conducted one on one interviews with Business Leads.
• Created Business Process Diagrams, Use Case Diagrams and Activity Diagramfor business problem and solution requirements.
• Used Rational Clear Case version control system to keep track of different versions of artifacts generated within the life cycle.
• Performed Lean Analysis for various business processes by following the Rational Unified Process (RUP) to document Business Use Cases and create Process scenarios.
• Setting up document hierarchy and standers to define different level of requirement using RequisitePro.
• Conducted walkthrough with the development team and stake holders.
• Identified critical areas of business risk and modified the business process to reduce the same.

Environment: Windows XP/2000, MS-SQL Server, MS Office Suite, Visual Studio, MS-Project, PowerMHS, Rational Rose, Test Director,Cognos

Confidential, Beaverton, OR Oct 2010 - Aug 2011
Senior Business Analyst

Project: Project involved setting up ecommerce web enabled access to customers to manage their accounts online. The user had to login and then he could review his payment information, view transaction history and make payment online

Responsibilities:

• Organized workshops with Subject Matter Experts to obtain domain level information. Developed vision plans that defined the primary goals and objectives of the project.Successful liaison between creative and development groups managing all consumer facing eCommerce web sites.
• Identified actors and use cases to create use case diagrams that described the behavior of the system. Facilitated collection of functional requirements from system users and preparation of business requirement documents using Rational Requisite Pro. Created data, functional and quality requirements.
• Gathered user and systems requirements through interviews, surveys, prototyping and observing from account managers and User Interface of the existing system. Used BlueprintRequirement Centre/Quality center to gather and elaborate the requirements.Rapid visual and interaction prototyping of e-commerce, transactional systems based on requirements, use cases and information architecture.
• Involved in version control management for storage and distribution of documentationand created the Business Architecture document to provide an overview of different aspects of the application. Documented how business goals were reflected in the requirements.
• Followed the UML based methods using Rational Rose to create Use Cases, Activity Diagrams.
• Worked with management to create and communicate critical information to the user community via email and discussion boards.
• Functionality, Integration testing during the various phases of the development.
• Analyzed the functional requirements, writing Test cases Functionality in Rational Test manager
• Change Request Management (CRM) to assess the cost, and schedule, impact of a requested change to the existing product.
• Arranged Review meetings and discussed the issues with Developers and Other Team Members

Environment: UML, MS-Office, MS Visio, MS Project, Rational RequisitePro, Blueprint Requirement Centre, Rational ClearQuest, Quality Center, SQL, FTP, Crystal reports, Cognos

Confidential, Mclean, VA Feb 2009 - Oct 2010
Business Analyst

Project: This project focused on the business side of Freddie Mac with single-family loans. The project dealt with automation of various tasks performed by the Decentralized Accounting Units. Worked on the reconciliations of various accounts for the Seller Revenue Accounting and Service Fees Accounting.

Responsibilities

• Interacted on a daily basis with the business users of the application being developed.
• Worked independently to gather, analyze and document the requirement.
• Chaired Brainstorming sessions where talked with various SME's and users and the Project managers to gather and develop various ideas to automate the process.
• Worked on various modules of PeopleSoft Financials such as PSAR and PSGL used internally by Freddie Mac.
• Analyzed the system specifications, business requirements for full understanding of the project.
• Interviewed area experts, asking detailed questions and carefully recording the requirements in a format that can be reviewed and understood by both business people and technical people.
• Involved in converting the User requirements into business requirements, functional requirements and technical requirements and also created business process models from the requirement specs.
• Created Use Case specifications, business flow diagrams, Activity diagram using MS Visio, so the developers and other stake holders can understand the business process according to their perspective with possible alternate scenarios.
• Verified the business scenarios on new builds for testing by QA team.
• Experience using retirement plan administration solutions such as Omni SunGardfor recordkeeping, trading and reconciliation, check writing, and benefit disbursement processes for various financial planning & asset allocation plans.
• Helped the testing team to port the non-critical data from the production database to the test environment and contributing in overall testing effort by identifying the key testing areas.

Environment: RUP, Rational Rose, Clear Quest, Requisite Pro, UML, SQL, MS-Office, MS Project, Omni SunGard, SAP SD.

Confidential, New Jersey Jan 2008 - Jan 2009
Business Analyst

Project: Confidential, provides property and casualty insurance for New Jersey only customers. Palisades promises to provide a real, long-term insurance solution for drivers in the Garden State that would make them feel lucky to be insured with Palisades.
The project was a web based application developed for a customer claim management system and integrated with their insurance system that enables a prospective policyholder to interactively pursue quotes. The claim file utility developed enables policyholders to file claims and the GUI developed walked them through the claim file process.

Responsibilities

• Understand and articulate business requirements from user interviews and then convert requirements into technical specifications.
• Implemented RUP and followed iterative, Use Case driven process for requirement documentation and deployment.
• Held regular meetings with the system architects, developers, database developers, quality testers during the entire project to assure that the critical as well as the minute details of the project were discussed and issues were resolved beforehand.
• Worked with the Release Manager in defining scope and planning releases.
• Analyzed Business Requirements and created Use Cases, high level and low level Activity Diagrams / State Chart Diagrams using Rational Rose.
• Participated in meetings with Developers, Project Managers and Quality Analysts to discuss business requirements, test planning, resource utilization, and defect tracking.
• Worked closely with the UI team to model the screens, which met user, defined requirements and also company standards.
• Develop user manuals, presentations and training manuals as per project specifications and timelines.

Environment: MS Office, Quality Center, Crystal reports, SQL Server, MS Project, MS Visio, Rational ClearQuest and Rational ClearCase,

Confidential, Hartford, CT Nov 2005 - Dec 2007
Business Analyst

Project: Confidential, is a leading provider of investment products, life insurance and group and employee benefits; automobile and homeowners products; and business insurance. The company is the largest seller of individual annuities in the U.S. and has been a provider of auto and homeowners insurance to members of AARP since 1984. Worked on the generic mass retailers (GMR) project. The project has been divided into two phases. The first phase included making of connection to the GMR using XML and the quote/issue information communicated using ACORD XML for auto only transactions. The second phase has various initiatives.

Responsibilities

• Worked extensively on writing the Business requirements and making the user requirement documentation.
• Acted as a liaison between stakeholders: system users, clients and managers, who have a business problem to gather requirements.
• Conducting meetings/interviews and JAD sessions with stakeholders to collect business requirements.
• Managing, linking, tracing and analyzing requirements
• Creating and managing project templates, use case project templates, requirement types and traceability relationships.
• Wrote the Business Requirement documents for the various initiatives for phase 2.
• Created use case diagrams which will be used by the IT department to estimate the cost for the implementation.
• Conducted walkthroughs of the Business Requirement Document with the business users and the IT project managers.

Environment: MS Office, SQL Server, Waterfall, MS Project, MS Visio, MS SharePoint.

Confidential, Bangalore, India Sep 2003 - Oct 2005
Business Analyst

Project: Confidential, is multinational Server, Storage, offshore software development and HPC Solutions Company in India. It was the first company to introduce Server products for the Intel® Xeon processor along with Supermicro. The offshore project was implemented on behalf of MEDCO Health Solutions, Franklin Lakes, NJ. This project aimed at integrating elements of a patient's health history, medication information, test results and treatment plans in an electronic format by creating Electronic Medical Record (EMR).

Responsibilities

• Extensive experience in creation of Use Case Scenarios, Business processes, work flow diagrams, state chart diagrams and data process flows.
• Gathering user requirements performing gap analysis and translating them into structured data, functional and usability requirements.
• Assisted the project manager in preparing Project charter, Project Plans, Project Schedules, and Milestone Tracking using MS Project.
• Identified, assessed, and recorded project deadlines, deliverables, schedules and business requirements.
• Expert in elicitation techniques such as interviews, questionnaires, brainstorming sessions, Prototyping, and Focus Groups.
• Used MS SharePoint for the purpose of managing documents and for hosting websites which was used to access shared work spaces and documents.
• Experienced in creating training materials, SOPs and handling documentation.
• Documented business processes and communicated potential business and systems impact based on analysis of the data.

Environment: MS Project, UML, Microsoft Office, SPSS, AMOS, Microsoft Office, Microsoft SharePoint, Windows NT/2000.