Lead Business Analyst in Leeds

Yorkshire Housing is going through a significant period of transformation, and this role plays a major part in shaping how we deliver change across the organisation. As our Lead Business Analyst, you’ll take a central role in developing a consistent, high‑quality BA function that supports our strategic ambitions and improves how colleagues and customers experience change.

What we’re all about: You might think of Yorkshire Housing as ‘just’ a housing provider, but we’re so much more than that. Yes, we own and manage nearly 20,000 homes across Yorkshire and make it possible for current and future customers to have a place they’re proud to call home, but we’re also all about making a positive difference in people’s lives. We’ve got big plans to overhaul the traditional customer service offer, build new homes that are truly future‑proof and empower our people through flexibility and freedom to do their best work. Our investment in technology is a key pillar of our strategy and our change team are working on exciting, complex and ambitious programmes to deliver a pre‑emptive customer experience.

What will you be doing? As our Lead Business Analyst, you’ll play a central part in how Yorkshire Housing delivers transformational change. You’ll lead, coach, and develop a team of Business Analysts working across a wide range of programmes, ensuring they have the clarity, consistency, and support needed to perform at their best. You’ll also have a key leadership role within the wider Change team: planning and prioritising resources, guiding end‑to‑end analysis activity, and supporting colleagues across Business and Solution Architecture. From contributing to strategic discussions to acting as an escalation point for risks and issues, you’ll help ensure change initiatives are well‑designed, well‑understood, and deliver the outcomes that YH needs.

• Lead and develop a high‑performing BA team, setting objectives, holding regular 1:1s, and creating tailored development pathways to improve consistency across the function.
• Own resourcing and workload planning, ensuring the right people are matched to the right work and maintaining a strong understanding of team capability and performance.
• Drive high‑quality business analysis, including process mapping, requirements capture, user stories, solution options and root‑cause analysis, all aligned to the Target Operating Model.
• Shape and embed better ways of working, improving BA tools, templates, standards and methods to create a well‑defined and consistent BA discipline.
• Play an active role in the leadership team, constructively challenging, contributing insight, and demonstrating a clear understanding of organisational strategy.
• Partner with Business and Solution Architecture to identify opportunities, evaluate impacts, and guide decision‑making that delivers long‑term value.
• Act as a coach and escalation point, supporting the team in identifying costs, risks, benefits and issues early and feeding these consistently into the change funnel.
• Champion change and strong stakeholder engagement, helping colleagues understand the benefits of doing things differently and supporting benefit realisation after delivery.

Who are we looking for? We’re looking for a strong analytical and conceptual thinker with people management experience and significant experience in business analysis and design. You’ll also bring experience leading analysis for major system implementations and be skilled in process and continuous improvement.

• The ability to work across complex change environments and stay calm under pressure.
• To be a clear, confident communicator who can challenge thinking in a constructive way and help shape better solutions.
• The ability to review and document current and future processes, making sound, evidence‑based recommendations.
• Strong influencing skills, with the confidence to work with stakeholders at all levels to reach practical, shared outcomes.
• A good grasp of both qualitative and quantitative investigation techniques.
• An understanding of Waterfall and Agile approaches and how they apply in real‑world delivery.
• Experience contributing to business cases and option appraisals.
• Confidence using Microsoft Office and process‑modelling tools.
• The ability to work collaboratively as part of a team, as well as independently when needed.
• Strong planning and time‑management skills to juggle competing priorities.
• A positive, proactive approach to change — curious, adaptable, and ready to take on new challenges.

The finer details: Salary: £68,558.40 per annum (35 hours/week). Permanent Contract.

We offer a reward package to suit everyone. At YH, you can claim back for prescriptions, eye tests and more with our cash plan, make the most of a variety of retail discounts and take advantage of our pension scheme where we’ll match your contributions up to 9%. Our people’s health and wellbeing are one of our top priorities, and you can make the most of our readily available wellbeing support package. This includes access to a library of free fitness classes, as well as an instant My GP service and free counselling sessions with a trained professional.

At YH, we’re actively building a working environment that’s inclusive as well as diverse, where everyone can contribute their best work and be themselves. We believe difference is what makes us stronger and recognise the importance of our teams reflecting communities we serve, so we welcome and encourage candidates from all backgrounds for this role.