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 | | From: | JoJo | | Subject: | Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Wed, 12 Jan 2005 23:54:23 GMT |
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 | Can anyone define to me the role of a 'senior' systems analyst.
I have an interview for a job titled as such that *I* didn't apply for---
placed my CV on a job site and they called me ---and have made clear in my
CV that I only have one years experience in said field.
I take it that the company ---who are well known--- are not morons but why
would they offer someone with a years experience a chance to interview for
a 'senior' post?
They specify the applicant should have experience in small to medium sized
projects - which I do (depending on the definition) - although I've also
made clear my experience is in a "global SME".
So I ask, what should I do? Tell that I haven't the experience or just go
fo it? How bad can it get?
I'd really love the job, but I don't want step too far out of my depth.
P.S. Hope this isn't too far OT, but I'd dearly love an insight other
peoples experiences.
Thanks.
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| | From: | David | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Thu, 13 Jan 2005 00:48:32 GMT |
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| JoJo,
They must have seen something in your resume that was of interest to them.
While you may not feel qualified, it doesn't hurt much to participate in
the interview, especially if it isn't a high cost interview where they fly
you in for a two day interview. Participating in the interview gives them
an idea of your qualifications and a first impression. While you may not
fit the position, chances are they might find another use for your talents.
You also get the chance to find out more about what their definition of
"senior" means and certainly what the company and people are like. At
worst each of you may decide it wasn't a good idea and choose further
contacts accordingly.
Good luck,
David
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| | From: | JoJo | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Thu, 13 Jan 2005 02:18:53 GMT |
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| On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 00:48:32 GMT, David wrote:
> JoJo,
>
> They must have seen something in your resume that was of interest to them.
> While you may not feel qualified, it doesn't hurt much to participate in
> the interview, especially if it isn't a high cost interview where they fly
> you in for a two day interview. Participating in the interview gives them
> an idea of your qualifications and a first impression. While you may not
> fit the position, chances are they might find another use for your talents.
> You also get the chance to find out more about what their definition of
> "senior" means and certainly what the company and people are like. At
> worst each of you may decide it wasn't a good idea and choose further
> contacts accordingly.
I think youre right; I should probably ask the question of why my CV caught
their eye and as you say clarify what hey mean by senior. I hope this isn't
going to be a mistake but I think honesty is the best policy here, the
position looks daunting, but tremendously exciting at the same time.
I'm nervous now :-)
Thanks for the advice.
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| | From: | JoJo | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Thu, 13 Jan 2005 14:26:26 GMT |
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| On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 02:18:53 GMT, JoJo wrote:
> On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 00:48:32 GMT, David wrote:
>
>> JoJo,
>>
>> They must have seen something in your resume that was of interest to them.
>> While you may not feel qualified, it doesn't hurt much to participate in
>> the interview, especially if it isn't a high cost interview where they fly
>> you in for a two day interview. Participating in the interview gives them
>> an idea of your qualifications and a first impression. While you may not
>> fit the position, chances are they might find another use for your talents.
>> You also get the chance to find out more about what their definition of
>> "senior" means and certainly what the company and people are like. At
>> worst each of you may decide it wasn't a good idea and choose further
>> contacts accordingly.
>
> I think youre right; I should probably ask the question of why my CV caught
> their eye and as you say clarify what hey mean by senior. I hope this isn't
> going to be a mistake but I think honesty is the best policy here, the
> position looks daunting, but tremendously exciting at the same time.
Update:
Just had the interview, I seemed to have what they wanted, well felt
confident I could manage the role. So lets see!
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| | From: | David | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Thu, 13 Jan 2005 18:01:51 GMT |
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| On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 14:26:26 UTC, JoJo wrote:
> On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 02:18:53 GMT, JoJo wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 00:48:32 GMT, David wrote:
> >
> >> JoJo,
> >>
> >> They must have seen something in your resume that was of interest to them.
> >> While you may not feel qualified, it doesn't hurt much to participate in
> >> the interview, especially if it isn't a high cost interview where they fly
> >> you in for a two day interview. Participating in the interview gives them
> >> an idea of your qualifications and a first impression. While you may not
> >> fit the position, chances are they might find another use for your talents.
> >> You also get the chance to find out more about what their definition of
> >> "senior" means and certainly what the company and people are like. At
> >> worst each of you may decide it wasn't a good idea and choose further
> >> contacts accordingly.
> >
> > I think youre right; I should probably ask the question of why my CV caught
> > their eye and as you say clarify what hey mean by senior. I hope this isn't
> > going to be a mistake but I think honesty is the best policy here, the
> > position looks daunting, but tremendously exciting at the same time.
>
> Update:
>
> Just had the interview, I seemed to have what they wanted, well felt
> confident I could manage the role. So lets see!
Congratulations!
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| | From: | JoJo | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Thu, 13 Jan 2005 21:27:41 GMT |
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| On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 18:01:51 GMT, David wrote:
> On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 14:26:26 UTC, JoJo wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 02:18:53 GMT, JoJo wrote:
>>
>>> On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 00:48:32 GMT, David wrote:
>>>
>>>> JoJo,
>>>>
>>>> They must have seen something in your resume that was of interest to them.
>>>> While you may not feel qualified, it doesn't hurt much to participate in
>>>> the interview, especially if it isn't a high cost interview where they fly
>>>> you in for a two day interview. Participating in the interview gives them
>>>> an idea of your qualifications and a first impression. While you may not
>>>> fit the position, chances are they might find another use for your talents.
>>>> You also get the chance to find out more about what their definition of
>>>> "senior" means and certainly what the company and people are like. At
>>>> worst each of you may decide it wasn't a good idea and choose further
>>>> contacts accordingly.
>>>
>>> I think youre right; I should probably ask the question of why my CV caught
>>> their eye and as you say clarify what hey mean by senior. I hope this isn't
>>> going to be a mistake but I think honesty is the best policy here, the
>>> position looks daunting, but tremendously exciting at the same time.
>>
>> Update:
>>
>> Just had the interview, I seemed to have what they wanted, well felt
>> confident I could manage the role. So lets see!
>
> Congratulations!
Say, thanks David.
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| | From: | Jonathan Allan | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Thu, 13 Jan 2005 07:10:32 -0600 |
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| David wrote:
> JoJo,
>
> They must have seen something in your resume that was of interest to them.
Or the outfit doing the interview is a head hunter and the actual client
hasn't yet been named. I've seen that scam pulled. I think it a fair
question to ask before you invest a lot of time in an interview and
researching the company.
Another possibility is that the company put the "senior" on the
position to avoid getting swamped with new grads or has recently changed
the definition of the job they are hiring to for some internal reason
and now someone with less experience might be a good fit.
Jonathan
--
Jonathan Allan
Neither Mayo Clinic nor I speak for each other unless we explicitly
say so. You should assume I am speaking only for myself.
Please remove the antispam ".6809" to reply direct to me. Thanks!
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| | From: | Juhan Leemet | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Thu, 13 Jan 2005 16:48:21 -0300 |
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| On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 07:10:32 -0600, Jonathan Allan wrote:
> David wrote:
>
>> JoJo,
>>
>> They must have seen something in your resume that was of interest to them.
>
> Or the outfit doing the interview is a head hunter and the actual client
> hasn't yet been named. I've seen that scam pulled. I think it a fair
> question to ask before you invest a lot of time in an interview and
> researching the company.
Yeah, sometimes head hunters (aka pimps?) will "paper a file" to make it
look like they are working hard, and to overwhelm the client's decision
making process. That is not a good head hunter. At a former company, we
had a head hunter who basically dumped her filing cabinet on my manager's
desk. It appeared that she was trying to establish some kind of
"precedent" so that if we hired anybody in town, she could come back and
say "but I sent you the resume first, you owe me". Truly sleazy. We had to
send a formal letter to tell her to "cease and desist".
> Another possibility is that the company put the "senior" on the
> position to avoid getting swamped with new grads or has recently changed
> the definition of the job they are hiring to for some internal reason
> and now someone with less experience might be a good fit.
Sometimes (esp. government positions?) they need to inflate the title in
order to get into an interesting/attractive pay scale. They might just be
looking for someone with talent and "potential" and know that if the
salary is too low, they would not get any good long term candidates.
If they made the offer and the OP did not misrepresent (too much of a
"stretch"?) then the company shares the responsibility in the decision.
That should reduce the stress of "growing into" the role.
--
Juhan Leemet
Logicognosis, Inc.
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| | From: | JoJo | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Fri, 14 Jan 2005 00:42:02 GMT |
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| On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 16:48:21 -0300, Juhan Leemet wrote:
> If they made the offer and the OP did not misrepresent (too much of a
> "stretch"?) then the company shares the responsibility in the decision.
> That should reduce the stress of "growing into" the role.
This is a valid point and is related to confidence (and my original post).
But, one still doesnt want to fail.
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| | From: | rich_cohen at compuserve.com | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | 12 Jan 2005 20:18:38 -0800 |
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| JoJo,
I think of myself as a system analyst, but the term seems to have
lost a lot of it's meaning in the last 10 years. Over the past year or
so I've seem a lot of programmer postions titled system analyst. It
used to be that systems analysts in the information systems area were
primarily responsible for requirements definition and, sometimes,
high-level design. Most of the people I run into with this job title
still do primarily requirements work. However, if you do a search on
a job site today for a systems analyst, very few of the positions you
find will be mainly requirements. Most of what I've seen recently
would be better filled by an experienced programmer.
For most fields, senior means 5 to 8 years of experience or more.
Mid level is 2-5 years. Less than 2 years is a begginer. Those are
rough rules of thumb.
I've been working with computers since 1963. Since about 1985 I've
been primarily a system analyst. When I was in the army I had a
secondary specialty of ORSA (Operations Research/Systems Analyst)
officer. In that contect the term systems analyst has nothing to do
with computers. It refers to system engineering.
There are very few terms in this business that have a consistently
used well understood definition. It is alway good to ask "Just so I'm
not misunderstanding you, what do you mean by X?" I do this a lot and
it's amazing how often I get an unexpected definition.
Rich
JoJo wrote:
> Can anyone define to me the role of a 'senior' systems analyst.
>
> I have an interview for a job titled as such that *I* didn't apply
for---
> placed my CV on a job site and they called me ---and have made clear
in my
> CV that I only have one years experience in said field.
>
> I take it that the company ---who are well known--- are not morons
but why
> would they offer someone with a years experience a chance to
interview for
> a 'senior' post?
>
> They specify the applicant should have experience in small to medium
sized
> projects - which I do (depending on the definition) - although I've
also
> made clear my experience is in a "global SME".
>
> So I ask, what should I do? Tell that I haven't the experience or
just go
> fo it? How bad can it get?
>
> I'd really love the job, but I don't want step too far out of my
depth.
>
>
>
> P.S. Hope this isn't too far OT, but I'd dearly love an insight other
> peoples experiences.
>
> Thanks.
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| | From: | Bradley K. Sherman | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | 12 Jan 2005 23:32:11 -0500 |
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| In article <1105589918.798100.192720@c13g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>,
rich_cohen@compuserve.com wrote:
>
>There are very few terms in this business that have a consistently
>used well understood definition. It is alway good to ask "Just so I'm
>not misunderstanding you, what do you mean by X?" I do this a lot and
>it's amazing how often I get an unexpected definition.
Which illustrates why *pure* OO is such a losing proposition.
We can't even create a taxonomy for what we know best, so we're
not going to be able to write one down for a domain with which
we're only somewhat familiar.
Or, as I was told recently: We now labor on ontologies
because we have abandoned controlled vocabularies as
impossible.
--bks
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| | From: | Gregory Toomey | | Subject: | Re: Senior Systems Analyst -- what?? | | Date: | Sat, 15 Jan 2005 09:20:22 +1000 |
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| rich_cohen@compuserve.com wrote:
> JoJo,
>
> I think of myself as a system analyst, but the term seems to have
> lost a lot of it's meaning in the last 10 years. Over the past year or
> so I've seem a lot of programmer postions titled system analyst. It
> used to be that systems analysts in the information systems area were
> primarily responsible for requirements definition and, sometimes,
> high-level design. Most of the people I run into with this job title
> still do primarily requirements work. However, if you do a search on
> a job site today for a systems analyst, very few of the positions you
> find will be mainly requirements. Most of what I've seen recently
> would be better filled by an experienced programmer.
>
> For most fields, senior means 5 to 8 years of experience or more.
> Mid level is 2-5 years. Less than 2 years is a begginer. Those are
> rough rules of thumb.
>
> I've been working with computers since 1963. Since about 1985 I've
> been primarily a system analyst. When I was in the army I had a
> secondary specialty of ORSA (Operations Research/Systems Analyst)
> officer. In that contect the term systems analyst has nothing to do
> with computers. It refers to system engineering.
>
> There are very few terms in this business that have a consistently
> used well understood definition. It is alway good to ask "Just so I'm
> not misunderstanding you, what do you mean by X?" I do this a lot and
> it's amazing how often I get an unexpected definition.
>
> Rich
>
>
> JoJo wrote:
>> Can anyone define to me the role of a 'senior' systems analyst.
>>
>> I have an interview for a job titled as such that *I* didn't apply
> for---
>> placed my CV on a job site and they called me ---and have made clear
> in my
>> CV that I only have one years experience in said field.
>>
>> I take it that the company ---who are well known--- are not morons
> but why
>> would they offer someone with a years experience a chance to
> interview for
>> a 'senior' post?
>>
>> They specify the applicant should have experience in small to medium
> sized
>> projects - which I do (depending on the definition) - although I've
> also
>> made clear my experience is in a "global SME".
>>
>> So I ask, what should I do? Tell that I haven't the experience or
> just go
>> fo it? How bad can it get?
>>
>> I'd really love the job, but I don't want step too far out of my
> depth.
>>
>>
>>
>> P.S. Hope this isn't too far OT, but I'd dearly love an insight other
>> peoples experiences.
>>
>> Thanks.
Theres also a new-ish job title of business analyst, which is far more
peculiar. It seem to involve business process re-engineering & traditional
analysis as such.
BUT I was told recently that if you had programming experience you couldnt
be considered a "business analyst". WTF?? I was told "business analyst" is
a title purely for business graduates & does not require a programming
background. If your far better qualified you cant do these new-age analysis
jobs!?
This is what I hate about the software industry. I have a relative who's a
nurse, and works full time at one hospital & part time at another (she
picks weekend shifts as they pay lots more).
When they employ a nurse they don't look at a resume and say "you havent
worked in intesive care for two years therefore you know nothing about it".
But with software engineering any skill older than two years doesn't exist
to recruiters. Its the reason I'm diversifying out of software development.
Its not the job, its the myopia of most employers.
gtoomey
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