Business Intelligence Analyst vs. Data Analyst

Using the respective available databases, a business intelligence analyst combines this information to identify necessary trends and solutions.

A data analyst uses analytics and statistical models to provide insight, solve problems, and drive decisions within an organization. They rely heavily on programming, statistical modeling, and data visualization software.

The work of a data analyst usually starts by working with stakeholders to identify needs, collecting and cleaning primary data sources that can solve the quantitative problem, generating charts, and presenting them to stakeholders and recommended solutions or optimizations.

There are many differences between a business intelligence analyst and a data analyst including differences in responsibilities.

Here are the key differences between a business intelligence analyst and a data analyst:

• A business intelligence analyst is focused on creating business insights

• A data analyst explores complex data sets to identify patterns and trends that are useful for business groups

• A business intelligence analyst focuses only on structured data

• A data analyst uses both structured and unstructured data

• A business intelligence analyst needs to have a solid understanding of the past

• A data analyst focuses on forecasting the future of products or processes