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Budget Analyst

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What Is a Budget Analyst? How to Become One, Salary, Skills.

Budget analysts help maintain the financial health of a business by organizing its budget and analyzing its finances, so it is on stable financial ground for the foreseeable future. Here’s what to know about a budget analyst’s needed skills, salary and how to become one.

 

What Is a Budget Analyst?

A budget analyst keeps track of a company’s expenses. Based on their findings, budget analysts make suggestions on how companies can apply their resources to minimize spending and maximize the value with projects, events and other investment areas.

 

What Do Budget Analysts Do?

Budget analysts review financial reports to track company expenses and spending decisions. They may then recommend a business redistribute resources, cut back on certain programs or perform other actions to improve its financial health in the long run.

Budget Analyst Responsibilities

  • Develop budgets that allow businesses to function with the least amount of expenses possible.  
  • Make sure current company costs fall within budget boundaries. 
  • Locate unnecessary expenses and opportunities to reduce company spending. 
  • Ensure a business remains on solid financial footing in the future.

Day-to-Day Responsibilities of a Budget Analyst

  • Review financial reports to assess company expenses.  
  • Analyze financial data to make projections about future company expenses and resources needed to support these expenses.  
  • Organize financial data and reports to justify budget plans to budget managers, finance managers and other finance leaders.
  • Evaluate funding requests and determine value and capacity for each project.
  • Share recommendations for reallocating resources with finance managers, accountants and other relevant finance personnel.

Budget Analysts Within a Company

Budget analysts work within the finance department as entry- to mid-level professionals. They work closely with accountants, finance managers, budget managers and other team members to craft budget plans and determine the best ways to allocate resources. Although budget analysts make suggestions, the decision power lies with budget managers, finance managers and other higher-level personnel.

Importance of Budget Analysts

Budget analysts help ensure a company keeps its expenses manageable while investing in activities that offer the most value. Because of these efforts, budget analysts play a major role in preserving the financial health and profitability of companies months and years into the future.

Budget analyst career video. | Video: CareerOneStop

 

What Skills Are Needed to Be a Budget Analyst?

Qualifications to Be a Budget Analyst

  • Proven success organizing budgets to reduce unnecessary costs. 
  • Experience compiling and analyzing financial data.  
  • Expertise in evaluating the pros and cons of different projects. 
  • Ability to anticipate financial costs and resources needed for support. 
  • Familiar with financial analysis software and tools.

Budget Analyst Prerequisites 

  • Bachelor’s degree in business, finance, accounting, economics or a related field. 
  • Two to five years of relevant professional experience. 
  • Certifications like the Certified Government Financial Management credential.

Budget Analyst Hard Skills

  • Understanding of a business and its different projects. 
  • Strong research and data analysis abilities.  
  • Skilled in financial forecasting and other financial analyses.
  • In-depth business and financial background. 
  • Knowledge of financial analysis technologies and software.

Budget Analyst Soft Skills

Tools and Programs Budget Analysts Use

  • Financial analysis software like Causal, Jirav and Workday.  
  • Spreadsheet tools like Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets. 
  • Budgeting platforms like QuickBooks, Prophix and Xero.
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How to Become a Budget Analyst

Budget Analyst Education and Experience

Aspiring budget analysts often complete a bachelor’s degree in business, accounting, finance, economics, mathematics or a related field. In addition to education, graduates may spend two to five years working in entry-level roles. Examples include financial analyst, junior accountant and personal financial advisor. While it’s not required, certifications can open more career doors for budget analysts. Some professionals go on to complete certifications like the Certified Government Financial Management credential. 

Budget Analyst Certificates and Courses

Budget Analyst Career Path

After earning their bachelor’s degree in a relevant field, budget analysts usually start working as financial advisors, financial analysts or other entry-level finance professionals. With the right amount of experience and certifications, budget analysts can work toward becoming budget managers. However, this managerial role may require up to five years of experience working as a budget analyst.

 

Budget Analyst Salary and Job Outlook

Professionals will have more opportunities to grow their careers as budget analysts as the field slowly expands. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of budget analysts will increase by 3 percent between 2021 and 2031.  

The full compensation package for a budget analyst depends on a variety of factors, including but not limited to the candidate’s experience and geographic location. See below for detailed information on the average budget analyst salary.

Courses

Expand Your Budget Analyst Career Opportunities

Reinforce your financial background by learning new skills through Udemy’s online finance courses.

Udemy

This workshop will provide entrepreneurs and small business owners with the key financial knowledge to ensure that their businesses succeed financially.  We will teach the 'language' of finance - helping you to read and interpret financial…

Udemy

Note: This course may have several lectures reproduced from Financial Management A Complete Study Course and Cost Accounting A Comprehensive Study Course in addition to unique lectures created for this course. So, before buying…

Udemy

As a business owner, entrepreneur, employee or student you may be great in your field but that doesn't mean you're strong in every area of running a business...

  • A great chef may be incredible in the kitchen...…

Udemy

This course introduces Managerial Finance, Financial Tools, Risk and return, Valuation of bonds and stocks, cost of capital, and capital budgeting techniques. It gives students concepts of financial decision in competitive business environment.…

Certifications

Budget Analyst Certifications + Programs

Whether you have coded before or are brand new to the world of programming, this course will put you on the fast track to building confidence with this intuitive, object- oriented language. Learn programming fundamentals and build a custom application. Graduate with the ability to start applying Python within high-growth fields like analytics, data science, and web development. 

 

What you'll accomplish

This is a beginner-friendly program with no prerequisites, although some students may have coded previously. First-time programmers will have access to pre-course preparatory lessons and additional resources to boost their confidence with key concepts and set up their development environments. Throughout this expert-designed program, you’ll:

  • Learn object-oriented programming fundamentals and Python basics that get you coding from day one.
  • Build a Python program and add on increased complexity throughout the course.
  • Troubleshoot Python code and practice common debugging techniques.
  • Push your skills to the next level by adding scripting, modules, and APIs to your Python toolkit.
  • Explore introductory data science and web development as potential career directions for Python programmers.
  • Demonstrate your Python skills by creating apps that pull in data with Pandas or integrate functionality from APIs with Flask.

 

Why General Assembly

Since 2011, General Assembly has graduated more than 40,000 students worldwide from the full time & part time courses. During the 2020 hiring shutdown, GA's students, instructors, and career coaches never lost focus, and the KPMG-validated numbers in their Outcomes report reflect it. *For students who graduated in 2020 — the peak of the pandemic — 74.4% of those who participated in GA's full-time Career Services program landed jobs within six months of graduation. General Assembly is proud of their grads + teams' relentless dedication and to see those numbers rising. Download the report here.

 

Your next step? Submit an application to talk to the General Assembly Admissions team


 

Note: reviews are referenced from Career Karma - https://careerkarma.com/schools/general-assembly

 

General Assembly

General Assembly’s Data Analytics Immersive is a transformative course designed for you to get the necessary skills for a data analyst role in three months. 

The Data Analytics bootcamp is led by instructors who are expert practitioners in their field, supported by career coaches that work with you since day one and enhanced by a career services team that is constantly in talks with employers about their tech hiring needs.

 

What you'll accomplish

As a graduate, you’ll have a portfolio of projects that show your knowledge of data analytics skills, as well as experience with visualization tools and frameworks that employers demand. Throughout this expert-designed program, you’ll:

  • Acquire, analyze, and visualize data sets in real time.
  • Master industry-standard tools like SQL, Excel, Tableau, PowerBI, and Python.
  • Turn data into stories that can influence and inform important decisions.
  • Ask the right questions and answer them with data-informed insights.
  • Demonstrate what you’ve learned with a solid professional portfolio.

 

Why General Assembly

Since 2011, General Assembly has graduated more than 40,000 students worldwide from the full time & part time courses. During the 2020 hiring shutdown, GA's students, instructors, and career coaches never lost focus, and the KPMG-validated numbers in their Outcomes report reflect it. *For students who graduated in 2020 — the peak of the pandemic — 74.4% of those who participated in GA's full-time Career Services program landed jobs within six months of graduation. General Assembly is proud of their grads + teams' relentless dedication and to see those numbers rising. Download the report here.

 

Your next step? Submit an application to talk to the General Assembly Admissions team


 

Note: reviews are referenced from Career Karma - https://careerkarma.com/schools/general-assembl

 

General Assembly
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