Principal Business Analyst

At Northrop Grumman UK, our mission is to solve the most complex challenges by shaping the technology and solutions of tomorrow. This mind-set goes beyond our customer solutions; it’s the foundation for your career development and the impact we have within the community.

Opportunity: This is more than just a job; it’s a mission. Our UK Cyber & Intelligence business combines modern software development approaches with a rich heritage and experience in the Defence and security sectors. Our customers have complex and sensitive data and information requirements requiring a mission partner who quickly understands the context, delivering and sustaining a portfolio of challenging technology projects at scale and pace, supporting them through an ambitious digital transformation programme.

Role responsibilities:

• Strategy and governance
  • Ensures strategic business benefits are articulated and used to inform organisational change.
  • Works with a wide range of stakeholders to ascertain the real business problems and drivers behind their expressed needs for change.
  • Contributes to the development of business strategy and/or technology strategy for an organisation or function.
  • Develops suitable target operating models for a business or function based on business strategy and drivers.
  • Prepares business cases which define potential benefits, options for achieving these benefits through development of new or changed processes, and associated business risks.
  • Ensures governance and oversight of the change aligns with the desired business outcomes and user needs.
• Business analysis
  • Provides objective, evidence-based analysis and recommendations for action that helps clients achieve their desired outcomes.
  • Defines an appropriate quantitative or qualitative approach to identifying, gathering and analysing relevant information.
  • Uses methodological techniques to investigate, review and analyse the parts of an organisation related to the solution being delivered, in terms of people, processes, organisation and technology.
  • Produces and communicates abstract, distilled representations of real world situations to inform decision making, tailoring the communication style to the requirements of the audience.
  • Embeds “systems thinking” into their approach.
  • Collaborates with stakeholders at all levels, in order to understand their worldviews, collect relevant data and develop hypotheses.
  • Undertakes investigation, evaluation, interpretation and classification of information from outside the immediate project delivery as necessary, to define and clarify relationships in the broader system of interest.
  • Provides quality assurance for the business analysis of others and makes recommendations for improvements.
• Requirements management
  • Ensures business needs are documented and used to prioritise delivery of the initiative.
  • Works with customer stakeholders to elicit, capture and elaborate their requirements, including business and technical requirements.
  • Documents requirements to a level that enables effective delivery of required changes without prescribing solutions.
  • Identifies and escalates conflicting requirements.
  • Evaluates proposed delivery outputs against business needs and recommends appropriate alternatives and/or enhancements to current IT and business systems and processes where required.
  • Ensures that the strategic goals of the organisation are captured and used to inform decision making.
  • Builds strong relationships with the user community and understands the drivers behind their expressed requirements.
  • Capable of identifying and managing conflicting priorities within the delivery environment.
  • Acts as a proxy product owner where necessary to plan and prioritise work.
  • Ensures traceability from the strategic drivers of the organisation to delivery of solutions.
  • Identifies gaps in requirements and/or delivery and recommends actions to resolve.
  • Identifies potential conflicts outside the scope of the delivery and manages as appropriate.
• Business change management
  • Ensures proposed implementation of change aligns with the user needs and will deliver the desired outcomes.
  • Has knowledge of different delivery lifecycle methodologies and which contexts they are used in.
  • Acts as a liaison between the solution delivery team and their customers in the development and implementation of new solutions, and enhancement of existing solutions to meet business needs.
  • Effectively facilitates meetings and team interactions.
  • Works with customers and users to understand impacts of new solutions on existing processes, organisational design and technology.
  • Recommends potential options to mitigate impacts.
  • Assesses effectiveness, efficiency, and user satisfaction of new products and recommends actions for improvement.
  • Proactively identifies stakeholders and manages relationships, reflecting the priorities and direction of the delivery team.
  • Effectively plans and facilitates workshops and large meetings.
  • Identifies potential impacts of proposed delivery on people, process, organisation and team outside the immediate scope of the delivery.
  • Works with delivery manager and business change professional to develop and implement mitigation strategies for impacts.
  • Is able to communicate the priorities and direction of delivery to a wide range of stakeholders in the context of the broader organisational goals and strategic change agenda.
  • Understands the business change lifecycle and is able to manage stakeholder expectations accordingly.
• Professional and leadership development
  • Contributes to the ongoing growth and success of Northrop Grumman National Security Solutions.
  • Demonstrates the Northrop Grumman Leadership Characteristics at all times.
  • Takes responsibility for own professional Business Analysis development through training, mentoring, professional memberships etc.
  • Supports NG’s growth by providing input to business development and capture activities as required.
  • Manages or mentors junior business analysts.
  • Contributes to the creation of NG Business Analysis practice through documenting and publicising approaches, tools and techniques.
  • Proactively identifies opportunities for NG and feeds them into the relevant account manager.
  • Proactively identifies opportunities to grow the NG delivery team and manages the growth with clients as required.
  • Owns development of a business analysis capability on behalf of NG.
  • Manages delivery teams or staff from outside the business analysis area as part of NG management community.

We are looking for:

• Experience of working directly with clients who want to bring about changes within their organisation.
• Familiarity working in ambiguous and complex situations and can use a range of proven business analysis techniques to bring clarity to the problems at hand.
• Confidence operating in a number of delivery methodologies (for example Lean Agile, Scaled Agile, Prince2 or Managing Successful Programmes) and are able to tailor their role to fit with the delivery context of the project.
• Able to examine business problems and initiatives from a strategic perspective and is also involved in ensuring portfolios of change have appropriate structure and oversight to achieve the desired outcome.
• Experience of working with clients at the initiation of a project, when they are considering how to drive a broad change agenda within the organisation, bringing clarity to the problems at hand.
• Experienced in shaping and influencing a wide range of stakeholders in ambiguous environments with potentially conflicting requirements.

If you don't meet every single requirement, we still encourage you to apply. Sometimes, people hesitate to apply because they can’t tick every box. We encourage you to apply if you believe the role will suit you well, even if you don’t meet all the criteria. You might be exactly who we are looking for, either for this position or for our opportunities at Northrop Grumman UK.

Security clearance: Due to the nature of our work, you must be British National for this clearance type. You must hold the highest level of UK Government security clearance.

Benefits: We can offer you a range of flexible working options to suit you, including optional compressed working schedule with every other Friday off. Our benefits include private health care, cash health plan, holiday buy and sell, career development opportunities and performance bonuses.

Why join us?

• A mission to believe in – Every day we contribute to building a more secure and connected world, expanding our reach from land, sea, and air to space and cyberspace.
• A place to belong and thrive – Every voice matters at our table meaning you can bring your authentic self to work.
• Your career, your way - Shape your career journey with diverse roles, mentorship, and development opportunities that fuel your curiosity, channel your expertise, and nurture your passion.

Ready to apply? Yes – Submit your application online. Your application will be reviewed by our team and we will be in touch.

Northrop Grumman is committed to hiring and retaining a diverse workforce, and encourages individuals from all backgrounds and all abilities to apply and consider becoming a part of our diverse and inclusive workforce.