Should I start from a System Analyst?

[alatus]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

I am an IT manager right now in a hiring position now (who hires system analysts and business analysts), and I can tell you that I won't seriously consider a candidate who has not gone through at least 3 years of very technical work (programming is essential)

Must the 3 years of technical experience be in enterprise projects? What about technical experience gathered in smaller scale developments such as projects in SMEs or personal projects? Do they count?

I had an interview with them. Still thinking about it. Also interested to know more about the role and place.

Originally Posted by alatus

Must the 3 years of technical experience be in enterprise projects? What about technical experience gathered in smaller scale developments such as projects in SMEs or personal projects? Do they count?

depends. A good manager can sniff out the type of experience you have. Those who try to bluff their way through always fall short of certain things. A person who is very solid technically and thinks in a rational and structured manner will usually be able to convince the interviewer of his technical prowess. Once you reach a certain stage in your career, there is so much smoke and mirrors that someone is going to fall for. For a sales/customer fronting role this may impress, but for a system analyst/business analyst role it goes beyond the fluff.

Enterprise projects help to buff up the CV quite a bit due to the several integration issues which usually arise from such projects. Furthermore working with other teams always means communicating and influencing interfaces and designs principals. These are essential skills.

My advise for anyone wanting to be a SA or a BA is to do at least 3 years of very technical work. You HAVE to get your hands dirty and do programming. However much you may/may not like it, programming is essential to structuring your thinking on how solutions look like and to size/estimate them. I have colleagues who are MIS (management information systems) grads who didn't really do technical work in their earlier years, their vendors are able to smoke them to hell and back. They end up getting frustrated and do not perform well. Burnout happens.

Once you become a good SA or BA, management options always open up....

Read this guy's post here. It's a very insightful look at the softer side of IT in sg
Dearth of technically inclined IT PM’s | singaporeprojectmanager

fresh grad also can be system analysts?