Business Analyst 

Peer review is the backbone of the scientific process; without it, it's impossible to understand which research matters. However, the existing legacy systems that shepherd scientific manuscripts to journals via editors and reviewers are no longer fit for purpose. The procedures for processing Manuscripts are laborious and researchers worry about their work being scooped before it's published.

To address this problem, Springer Nature is developing a new peer review system. Developed in a truly agile fashion, working closely with business stakeholders and customers to validate every feature we build. 

We're looking for a Business Analyst to join our Editorial Experience team; an area with interesting and complex problems that requires someone to cast a critical eye over to examine and understand this space. 

About Us

SN Digital (SND) is a technology division of Springer Nature. We are responsible for maintaining and delivering millions of articles used by researchers, scientists and students around the globe.
 
We are 230 people based in London, Berlin, Lisbon, Pune, New York, Madrid, Dordrecht, and Heidelberg. We work in collaborative, multi-disciplinary delivery teams, developing digital products and services that answer user problems and support business goals.
 
The work is exciting and meaningful.
Our culture is collaborative and friendly.
We encourage and support growth, both personal and professional.
 
Having a good command of English is essential; collaboration is vital in our day to day work, so being able to communicate your ideas and understand others is critical.
 
This role is a terrific opportunity for friendly, curious people who want to get involved in our work, who love to learn, who will embrace and develop our culture, and help make SND a place where people and ideas can thrive.
 
We are intentionally looking to create teams that are diverse and inclusive. Diversity is the mix of culture, background, experience and personality that we all bring; inclusion is getting the mix to work better together. We want every team member to contribute to our shared goals while respecting each other's skills, knowledge and needs.
     
Visit sndigital.springernature.com to learn more about who we are and what we do.
 

About The Job 

We are looking for a skilled and passionate Business Analyst to join our Editorial Experience team. This is a user driven team, constantly attending to our editors needs and desires matching this with business needs and our passion for a fast, simple and convenient peer review.  A customer-centric approach plays a fundamental role in the way we work. 

The team is at the forefront of our programme and is often involved in cross-team projects. There is often a need to collaborate and coordinate with multiple teams to create end to end customer experiences. From a business analyst perspective, this involves understanding the flow of data and our users' journeys between and within our applications - as well as the business context. It's important for the business analyst to have the ability to "filter" essential information out of different conversations, in order to be able to put together clear and concise pieces of work. 

Current ways of working involve both team sessions, daily stand up and tech catch ups, bi-weekly retrospectives and domain/programme level sessions, weekly board review and team showcases. The team aims to maintain a clear alignment of priorities on all fronts, therefore a weekly check in with the Product Manager should take place. 

You will be joining a cross-functional delivery team with different nationalities, backgrounds and experience levels. All team members collaborate to deliver solutions that best satisfy the needs of our business, and we are working to create a culture that encourages new ideas and innovation but within the boundaries of the technologies that best suit the vision that Springer Nature has defined. 
 

About You 

• You are able to quickly gain context of your product and user space and how it fits into the bigger picture of the programme landscape.
• You are proactive, self driven, make yourself useful, pull information and don't wait to be asked, seek advice when unsure.
• You like working in a collaborative team where there is collective responsibility for the product.
• You can demonstrate experience in working successfully with teams to deliver software in an agile manner. 
• You can demonstrate your experience in facilitating groups to achieve defined goals and outcomes using various facilitation tools and techniques.
• You will have excellent communication skills and articulate concepts and ideas from technical and functional business perspectives. 
• You have proven experience in managing and resolving conflict with stakeholders.
• You can use available data to inform decisions, and build better products.
• You will have a strong focus on high-quality customer experience and sustainable solutions. 
• You proactively identify pain points and openly address any forms of gaps. 
• You can demonstrate the outstanding analytical ability to solve complex problems.
• Have experience working in a dynamic and collaborative environment. 
• You use your drive, creativity and initiative to move the team forward.
• You have experience in driving continuous improvement and innovation across teams.
• You can collaborate with multiple teams across different locations to deliver solutions.
• You are intellectually curious and motivated - constantly looking for more context. 
• You disdain routine and get involved with a wide variety of different activities.

What you will be doing

Within 3 Months, you will:

    •    Strengthen team ceremonies conducted regularly, adding value to the delivery process.

    •    Have an understanding of the team’s context in the broader programme and business.

    •    Have developed relationships with team members and core stakeholders.

    •    Be familiar with the technology stack and data landscape

    •    Can co-plan, organise and lead group sessions that generate ideas and resolve problems.

    •    Can unearth the root cause(s) of pain points and validate business opportunities and problems.

    •    Be an active participant of the Business Analyst communities.




By 3-6 months, you will:

    •    Have a clear understanding of the team’s priorities and be able to communicate this to stakeholders.

    •    Build relationships with key providers and dependent teams.

    •    Be able to monitor, track and communicate progress, risks and issues to stakeholders.

    •    Be able to prioritise competing demands and obtain buy-in from stakeholders.

    •    Map, analyse and validate information flows and user journeys to and from the product/service digital estate.

    •    Gauge the complexity or scope of a piece of work, collaboratively breaking it into smaller pieces as appropriate.

    •    Contribute to blameless post-mortems.

    •    Set context with your team to ensure any solutions co-defined provide business value whilst solving customer problems

 

By 6-12 months, you will:

    •    Onboard new members to the team

    •    Co-define the complexity or scope of a piece of work, breaking it into smaller pieces when appropriate.

    •    Ensure scoped work aligns with programme and company vision

    •    Contribute to the design of the system architecture.

    •    Understand our customers’ needs, both internal and external, and how your work affects their experience.

    •    Give and receive constructive feedback within your team.

    •    Organise and run sessions with your discipline peers within the Business Analyst community.

    •    Actively work alongside your team to define the vision and strategy of your product or service in terms of business and customer outcomes.

    •    Define KPIs to measure product/service performance in terms of business and customer outcomes.

    •    Have a thorough understanding of the potential opportunities and limitations of your product/service offering

    •    Instil a data-driven approach to current and future product/service development.

 

Day to day responsibilities 

As part of an Agile product team, day-to-day, you will:

    •    Engage in and/or facilitate ceremonies such as our daily stand-ups, planning, prioritisation and steering sessions, story kick-offs, collaborative analysis and design workshops, showcases to internal customers and regular retrospectives.

    •    Work with our many and varied stakeholders to understand, analyse and scope new work.

    •    Support your team members in problem-solving activities to remove blockers and complete agreed-upon work. 

 

To apply, please upload a copy of your CV and cover letter stating your salary expectations.
 

SPRINGER NATURE - springernature.com
Springer Nature employs more than 10,000 people in over 50 markets and is home to some of the best-known names in research, educational and professional publishing. 
 
We value and celebrate the diversity of our people. We recognise the many benefits of a diverse workforce and strive for an inclusive workplace that empowers all our colleagues to thrive. Our search for the best talent fully encompasses and embraces these values and principles.
 
Working at the heart of a changing industry, we are always looking for great people who care about delivering quality to our customers and the communities we work alongside. In return, we provide opportunities to learn from some of the best in the business, with a culture that encourages curiosity and empowers people to find solutions and act on their instincts.
 

 
 
*INTERVIEW/HIRING PROCESS DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC
During the pandemic, all interviews will be conducted on the phone or via video conferencing applications. If selected for an interview, we’ll get in touch with the details.
  
 
We have implemented a remote onboarding process to ensure new starters have all the equipment, knowledge and contacts they need to start their new career.
 
You will have a dedicated contact throughout the recruitment process to contact with any questions on this. #LI-CO1

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Internal applicants please inform your line manager when applying for the role.

 

Springer Nature is a Disability Confident Committed Employer and we encourage applications from candidates with disabilities. If you consider yourself to have a disability or learning difficulty and wish to submit your application in an alternative format or would like to discuss reasonable adjustments during the application and interview process, please get in touch either by phone on +44 (0)207 014 4020 or by email SpringerNatureUKCareers@springernature.com so we can make any necessary arrangements. 

 

At Springer Nature we value and celebrate the diversity of our people. We recognise the many benefits of a diverse workforce and strive for an inclusive workplace that empowers all our colleagues to thrive. Our search for the best talent fully encompasses and embraces these values and principles. https://group.springernature.com/jp/group/taking-responsibility/diversity-equity-inclusion.