Senior Business Analyst
Leawood, KS, US, 66211 Burlington, MA, US, 01803
We Impact Lives Through Purpose-Driven Work in A People First Culture
Ascend Learning, a leading healthcare and learning technology company, is the connection between a powerful portfolio of brands serving students, educators, and employers with outcomes-based, data-driven solutions across the lifecycle of learning. From testing to certification, Ascend Learning products are used by physicians, emergency medical professionals, nurses, allied health professionals, certified personal trainers, financial advisors, skilled trades professionals and insurance brokers.
Headquartered in Burlington, MA, with additional office locations and hybrid and remote workers in cities across the U.S., Ascend Learning was recognized by Newsweek and Plant-A Insights Group as one of America’s 2025 Greatest Workplaces as well as America’s Best Places to work for Mental Well-Being for 2025.
We're always looking for talented, passionate professionals to join us in our mission to help change lives. If this sounds like an environment where you'd thrive, read on to learn more.
WHAT YOU'LL DO
The Senior Business Analyst plays a critical role in the Enterprise Applications team, owning both the clarity and the delivery of our organization’s most complex, ambiguous, or cross-domain business needs. As a senior member of the team, this role partners with business leaders, stakeholders, and technology teams to deeply understand strategic objectives, resolve conflicting or unclear requirements, and set delivery teams up to build meaningful data products that empower decision-making. Combining strong business acumen with deep technical expertise, the Senior Business Analyst independently leads the end –to-end feature lifecycle for enterprise-scale data management and reporting solutions. This role is responsible for balancing competing priorities, making sound decisions in complex environments, and ensuring solutions are accurate, sustainable, and aligned with best practices and organizational objectives.
The ideal candidate is equally comfortable in two modes: the patient, consultative work of untangling an ambiguous ask into clear requirements, and the decisive, day-to-day work of delivering solutions to business problems and opportunities. Through a deep understanding of business processes, data ecosystems, and delivery flow, the Senior Business Analyst helps the team deliver high-quality outcomes end-to-end.
WHERE YOU’LL WORK
This position will work a hybrid schedule from our Leawood, KS or Burlington, MA office locations strongly preferred. Remote work may be considered within the United States.
HOW YOU’LL SPEND YOUR TIME
- Serve as a primary intake owner for incoming business asks, ensuring each request is presented as a clearly stated problem, not a pre-defined solution
- Translate business needs into clear, testable user stories and acceptance criteria
- Document business context and metric definitions in plain language, including grain, filters and exclusions, and source systems
- Reverse-engineer existing SQL queries, Tableau and Power BI workbooks, and Excel models to extract business logic and assumptions
- Profile raw source data in Snowflake to validate assumptions about structure, quality and completeness before handoff to Data Architect
- Synthesize findings into an inventory that gives Architecture, Data Engineers, Data Scientists, and Business Intelligence Analysts a clear set of rules to build against
- Develop early prototypes or wireframes to validate stakeholder understanding before development begins
- Own day-to-day delivery needs for your area – sequencing ready work and accepting completed work against the acceptance criteria you defined
- Track progress throughout the build, flagging early when delivered work drifts from what was coped, and keeping stakeholders informed of where their ask stands
- Partner with Business Intelligence, Engineering, and Architecture to confirm feasibility, usability, and readiness of features
- Support user acceptance testing and feedback loops before, during, and after delivery to confirm the solution solves the business problem, and following through to resolution when issues surface
- Communicate with internal and external stakeholders in a professional and timely manner throughout the delivery cycle
- Act as a mentor to less experienced Business Analysts on translation, requirements-gathering, and stakeholder facilitation, serving as the person the team turns to when a decision needs to be made
WHAT YOU'LL NEED
- High school diploma or GED required. Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Business, or related field or equivalent experience preferred.
- 6+ years of experience researching, analyzing, and leveraging data from internal and external resources
- 6+ years of experience using modern cloud data platforms and BI tools like Snowflake and Tableau; familiarity with AI-assisted analytics tools is a bonus
- Deep, hands-on data experience: either as a senior analyst who’s spent years querying and interpreting data or from real experience working within or alongside a data engineering team
- A skilled translator who can bring clarity to ambiguous asks that others might struggle to scope
- Comfortable with owning a backlog independently with guidance from a product manager
- Naturally curious and a little skeptical: able to surface hidden assumptions and pressure-test existing logic and processes
- Fluent enough in SQL and data structures to reverse-engineer existing queries, models and reports
- Experience working in an Agile development environment, including backlog management, sprint planning hygiene, and prioritization under changing deadlines
- A strong communicator who builds trust easily across business stakeholders, Product, BI, and Engineering
- A natural mentor who helps less experienced analysts sharpen their translation and requirements-gathering skills
HIRING RANGE
The current full-time, annualized base pay hiring range for this role is $90,900.00-$130,020.00. In accordance with applicable state laws, we are providing the expected pay range for this position. Individual compensation will be determined by various factors, including relevant experience, qualifications, current business needs and local market factors. Most regular, full-time employees are eligible to participate in an Ascend incentive bonus or sales plan.
BENEFITS
- Health, dental, and vision insurance
- Company paid life Insurance
- 401(k) with company match
- Paid time off and parental leave
- Employee assistance program
- Other wellness programs such as Headspace and Airvet
- Charitable matching program
Fostering A Sense of Belonging
Our values-driven culture unifies our teams and inspires a mindset of action, innovation, and collaboration, with a relentless focus on customers. We seek out and celebrate all people and perspectives and cultivate an inclusive culture where everyone can thrive, feel valued, and be authentic. Our culture is firmly rooted in the belief that by embracing our differences and drawing on diverse perspectives, we are a stronger, more innovative, and more successful organization where employees experience a sense of belonging.
Ascend Learning, LLC is proud to be an equal opportunity employer (M/F/Vets/Disabled). No agency or search firm submissions will be accepted. Applications for U.S.-based positions with Ascend Learning, LLC must be legally authorized to work in the United States, and verification of employment eligibility will be required at the time of hire.
Nearest Major Market: Kansas City