How To Become A Principal Business Analyst: What It Is and Career Path

What is a principal business analyst and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

4 min read

Quoted expert

Rebecca Sarver

As a business analyst, you will serve as the bridge of knowledge between the information technology and business aspect of your company. Your background in these two areas allows you to analyze data and deliver in-depth reports to executives in the company. Your average day as a business analyst involves discussing the impact of data-inspired adjustments to company products, services, hardware, and software to enhance the business.

You will also be required to draw up several reports on the data analyses you have conducted and deliver them either orally or in written form. It is your responsibility to convey these suggestions coherently and ensure that they are technologically and financially practical. Some of the skills you will require to carry out your role as a principal business analyst include drawing up detailed business plans, the ability to forecast the outcome of your data-inspired adjustments, variance analysis, and reporting.

Thus, you will need to have excellent written and oral communication skills, analytical and consultative skills, cost benefit, and stakeholder analytical skills. You will need a bachelor's degree in information technology and a few business analysis certifications to be successful in this relatively new field.

What general advice would you give to a principal business analyst?

Rebecca Sarver

Lecturer in Human Services Studies, Elmira College

Listen more than you talk. There is so much to be learned from clients, seasoned human service workers, and the community that you work within. By listening and observing versus always feeling compelled to speak, you will learn job skills, people skills, and your clients' needs.

ScorePrincipal Business AnalystUS Average

Salary

8.0

Avg. Salary $115,081

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

6.8

Growth rate 11%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

5.9

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.17%

Asian 14.47%

Black or African American 7.50%

Hispanic or Latino 8.50%

Unknown 4.45%

White 64.93%

Gender

female 39.21%

male 60.79%

Age - 43

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 43

Stress level

6.8

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.7

Complexity level is advanced

7 - challenging

Work life balance

2.2

Work life balance is very poor

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a principal business analyst

Explore principal business analyst education requirements

Most common principal business analyst degrees

Bachelor's

69.7 %

Master's

21.6 %

Associate

5.8 %

Start to develop specific principal business analyst skills

Skills	Percentages
Provide Management	7.27%
Shared Services	6.09%
Project Management	5.60%
Business Analysis	5.06%
Oversight	4.83%

Complete relevant principal business analyst training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 6-12 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New principal business analysts learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a principal business analyst based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real principal business analyst resumes.

Research principal business analyst duties and responsibilities

Manage SharePoint for all the technical and correspondence contents.
Participate in and hold daily scrum meetings to perform iterative and incremental agile software development framework when managing product development.
Create and maintain Microsoft Sharepoint sites for programs design to enhance the customer experience.
Participate in and hold daily scrum meetings to perform iterative and incremental agile software development framework when managing product development.

Get principal business analyst experience

Generally, it takes 2-4 years to become a principal business analyst. The most common roles before becoming a principal business analyst include business analyst, senior business analyst team lead and project manager.

Prepare your principal business analyst resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your principal business analyst resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a principal business analyst resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable principal business analyst resume templates

Build a professional principal business analyst resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your principal business analyst resume.