For one of our Düsseldorf-based clients in the utilities industry we’re looking for a freelance Business Analyst with background in Energy Trading:
Background to this project:
Market volatility challenges companies and requires more flexibility and capability of quick adaptation to rapidly changing environments and market requirements. Furthermore, there are a significant number of business developed applications, processes and data to be assessed and transformed into more efficient, flexible and robust solutions. Expected change exceeds current delivery structure, current organizational set-up as well as available capacity and skills. The Project will have three ‘products’ which do influence each other:
- IT Framework definition
- Operational model
- Implementation of the digital transformation

For the IT Framework and operational model the Technical Business Analyst perspective is needed to create the products in the environment of the client.

Tasks:

• Analyze existent short term trading business processes, tools and data along predefined relevant indicators and parameters. The scope of tools, processes and data will be provided by the Product Owner.
• Consult in form of regular Scrum meetings and separate MS Teams virtual meetings the Product Owner in reshaping the drafted business vision for the digital transformation in short term trading
• Conclude gap analysis between the as-is provided tools and processes towards the business vision with the aim of improvement and optimization of the same. Using this Gap analysis as input into the IT Frameworks and proposing a prioritization to the Product Owner for the transformation in the agile meeting cycle
• Translate and decompose business vision into implementation options (product backlog, IT Framework and operational model) and document these in MS DevOps for the Sprint planning meetings
• Contributing as part of the Sprint execution in describing the IT Framework (technically and operationally) by using the gap analysis to derive common requirements for the Framework and operational model.
• Gather and document business requirements in a standard requirement capturing template (Word+Excel) from the named End-Users in Interviews and translate and decompose them into detailed functional requirements (requirements specification) as part of the 2-weeks Sprint activities. Results will be reviewed and revised in the sprint methodology
• Plan, prepare and facilitate requirements and design sessions and (online) workshops with the Project Team and Product Owner. Tasks will be prioritized by the Product Owner and detailed in the 2 weeks sprint backlog
• Consult the Product owner about the evaluation and selection of new solutions (from business perspective) using the Gap analysis and the provided process, tools and data overview. Prioritization will be decided in the Sprint planning meetings by the Product Owner
• Consult stakeholders to make sound decisions by describing the implications on roadmap design (transforming requirements into projects / product backlogs considering priorities, risks and dependencies)
• Author and review requirements, use case, process flow documents for trading and dispatch solutions (systems, tools and applications) and data
• Define a test strategy as part of the IT Framework using the gap analysis and business criticality described by the Product owner. Task coordination and acceptance will happen via the Spring Planning and Retro meetings.
• Consult business stakeholders and development team to define (functional, non-functional and user acceptance) test cases, acceptance criteria and draft a test strategy
• Perform configurations in systems and applications itself following the IT-Frameworks planned via the Sprint planning and the created test strategy. The specific systems and applications (Microsoft technology) will be defined in the IT Framework prior the configuration
• Create detailed deployment, cut-over plans and a rollback plan including process and required downtime for all cutover activities following the IT Framework for all configuration items
• Plan and execute productive deployments following the IT Framework as per the cut-over plan as part of the task allocation via the Sprint planning meeting
• Provide post go-live hyper-care to monitor business continuity and IT stability; in case issues are observed while monitoring. In case of incidents from End-Users initiate troubleshooting and fixes. Follow the required UIT standards for Change and Release Management coordinated via the Sprint planning
• Used tools & technologies: O365, MS Teams, HPQC, JIRA, DevOps, BI tools (Power BI), Power automate platforms, Excel, Azure Services.

Experience:

• at least 3 years of experience in the energy trading industry
• at least 5 years of experience as business analyst
• experience working with Energy!!! Trading and Risk Management (ETRM) systems
• demonstrable knowledge of business processes within energy trading and dispatch functions
• in-depth knowledge of a variety of development techniques and standards, including but not limited to: ITIL processes, Project Management, and Agile ProjectManagement/Development methods
• Have successfully worked on functional systems e.g. SQL Databases, Data Warehouses, BI solutions (queries & dashboards), application/solution development in HTML / Javascript / VBA / Python etc.
• Solid math computation skills
• Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to think on the fly in a fast-paced environment
• Good communication skills, self-starter, critical thinker, able to operate with autonomy
• Challenge the status quo and continuously drive improvement and innovation
• English: must have, german nice to have

 
Project start: ASAP
Project duration: 5+ months (extension up to 12 months is planned)
Project capacity: 38 hrs./week
Project location: Düsseldorf (post Corona 2-3 days onsite)