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What do Analyst Programmers do???

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by angelabut

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I am currently a DBA and I am looking for another job. I have registered with an IT recruitment agency and they are putting me forward for a Analyst Programmer role in a large corporate company. I really don't know the first thing about what an Analyst Programmer does and have never really thought of myself in terms of being a "programmer". I have done database testing in 2 previous roles and in my current role I have been examining data soloutions for my current employer. I do want to eventually be a Database Developer. Is an Analyst Programmer role way over my head? Can someone enlighten me as to what Analyst Programmers do?

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by xxx123

I've had that title (among others.)

Analyst Programmer, like all IT titles, can mean different things. But so can DBA! In some places, the DBA is in charge of running backups, maintaining security groups, tuning database operational parameters, installing patches & upgrades, that kind of thing. In other cases, the DBA plays an active role in the design of new databases in terms of naming conventions, index structures, normalizing or denormalizing data, developing code for triggers & stored procedures, etc. So you see how job titles can be deceptive.

Traditionally, a "programmer" wrote code from specifications someone else gave them. An "Analyst Programmer" probably wrote the specs AND the code. The "analyst" part involves working with the clients/users to define requirements and then designing the solution. (Use of existing data, new database structures, code design.) I think this definition fits quite nicely with your prior experience.

As with all jobs, you have to ask a lot of questions in the interview. If they are expecting you to write a lot of code in a language you've never heard of, then you might be in for a hard time. But if the job is weighted more towards the "analyst" side, you'd probably be fine.

by angelabut

Thanks for the reply.

I believe the job is going to be more "analyst" then "programmer" simply because I know the team they are putting together for this particular project already has had several programmers positions filled.

Thanks for the reassurance.

by bakana

OOPS. The analyst is also expected to be able to look over the code produced fron his/her specifications and know if it actually _Does_ what it is supposed to do.

This is the second place where the job requirement for "excellent communication skills" comes in to play. The first being in talking to the users to find out what they Need.

Need being the key word (as opposed to what they Want).

The third and most crucial part of the job is maintaining communication between the Users and the project/programmers so that the final product actually performs some useful function(s) for the users. And hopefully for the business.

It really sounds as if the recruiting company you are working with is not doing a good job of matching you up with prospective employers. For one thing, they should NEVER schedule you to interview for a position whre you don't know up front what the duties of the job ARE.

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