Senior Business Analyst (Utilities)

North Highland; Reading; On-site; GBP 83,000 - 120,000; Full time

Job summary

North Highland, the leading change and transformation consultancy, seeks Senior Business Analysts and Business Analysts to help UK water utility clients deliver digital, technology and organisational change across the AMP cycle.

This is a 3–6 month contract with up to 3 days on client sites in Reading and may involve extensive travel to other sites. You'll translate business needs into clear requirements, collaborate with delivery teams, and ground solutions in regulatory and operational reality.

Qualifications

• Proven Business Analyst experience in utilities/water or regulated environments.
• Experience supporting digital transformation and multi-workstream portfolios.
• Process mapping and operating model design and change impact analysis.
• Digital journey / service design experience (customer or colleague journeys).
• ERP/CRM migrations and GIS/workforce data systems experience is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Lead requirements elicitation and definition through workshops, interviews, site visits and document analysis.
• Map AS-IS and TO-BE processes, identifying gaps and cross-functional handoffs.
• Document constraints from regulation, safety and asset criticality for assurance.
• Support operating model and workforce change analysis, governance and handoffs.
• Analyse data flows and end-to-end journey requirements to support delivery readiness.
• Maintain end-to-end traceability from objectives to outcomes and manage changes.
• Collaborate with Product, Engineering, Change and Ops to ensure testability and UAT readiness.

Skills

Requirements elicitation

Workshop facilitation

AS-IS to TO-BE mapping

Data flows analysis

Stakeholder engagement

UAT readiness

Agile/Waterfall/hybrid

Tools

Jira

Confluence

SAP PM

Maximo

GIS

Job description

MAKE STRATEGY A REALITY | ACCELERATE YOUR GROWTH | CHOOSE YOUR PATH As the world’s leading change and transformation consultancy and delivery partner, we enable our clients to move from strategy to reality, taking a pragmatic, practical approach to delivering change that lasts. We’re seeking Senior Business Analysts and Business Analysts to help our utility clients deliver the digital, technology and organisation change across the AMP cycle.

*Please note, this is an initial 3-6 month contract that will require up to 3 days working on client site in Reading and may involve extensive travel to other sites.

SUMMARY

You’ll join North Highland’s Energy & Utilities (E&U) practice, working with our UK water utility clients across the South of England analysing and shaping their multi-year transformation and change portfolios, delivered under managed service and consulting frameworks. The sector is delivering the biggest upgrades seen in a century — modernising assets, systems and ways of working to ensure essential water and waste services are provided. These portfolios are delivered against the backdrop of the AMP 8 regulatory period and include various delivery modes: Enterprise Programmes (core platform and technology replacement / modernisation, regulatory-driven programmes etc), Digital Delivery (Agile/hybrid programmes transforming customer journeys, operational decision-making, case management etc), Operational Change (targeted, “deploy and embed” initiatives affecting frontline populations), and Operating model change (people-led restructuring of how teams are organised, governed and held accountable). The portfolios span all core business units of water utilities — Water, Waste, Engineering, Asset Management, Supply Chains, Operations and Control Centres as well as enabling functions such as HR, Finance, Commercial and Procurement.

You’ll play a pivotal role working with stakeholders to translate their ambition and business needs into clear, actionable requirements and helping shape complex change and solutions. You’ll work closely not only with digital delivery teams but be at the heart of our client’s operations - field operatives, control room staff, asset planners, customer operations and compliance teams to ground solutions in operational and regulatory reality.

YOU WILL:

• Lead requirements elicitation and definition through workshops (often multi-disciplinary), interviews, site visits, job shadowing and document analysis; translate outcomes into high-quality artefacts (epics, user stories, acceptance criteria, use cases and walkthroughs).
• Map current-state (AS-IS) and future-state (TO-BE) processes; identify gaps and cross-functional handoffs across value streams and client operations.
• Highlight constraints driven by regulation, safety and asset criticality, producing evidence-based documentation suitable for assurance and audit.
• Support operating model and workforce change analysis — roles and process impacts, decision rights, governance and handoffs so solutions land effectively across teams.
• Analyse data flows, data needs and core use cases; capture end-to-end customer and operational journey requirements to support service design, prioritisation and delivery readiness.
• Maintain end-to-end traceability from business objectives through requirements to delivered outcomes, managing changes through appropriate change control.
• Collaborate closely with Product, Engineering, Change and Ops to ensure requirements are understood, testable and deliverable, supporting UAT readiness and implementation cutover where needed.

IDEALLY, WE'D LIKE:

• Proven Business Analyst experience in utilities/water, or other closely regulated operational environments (power, telecoms, infrastructure, transport, government, field-based or scientific operations).
• Strong experience supporting digital transformation and/or change portfolios with multiple workstreams, dependencies and governance.
• Process mapping and modelling, operating model design and process optimisation, and workforce change impact analysis (roles, skills, ways of working, training/readiness dependencies).
• Digital journey / service design experience (customer or colleague journeys, pain points, outcomes, prioritisation).
• Systems experience across EAM platforms (SAP PM, Maximo), GIS platforms, customer platforms (billing, CRM, CCAS) and analytics tooling; exposure to programmes such as ERP, CRM migration, GIS Utility Network Model, lab data systems or workforce management is a strong advantage.
• Excellent stakeholder engagement, confident facilitating workshops and communicating clearly at all levels; comfortable across Agile/Waterfall/hybrid delivery with tooling such as Jira/Confluence

Applicants must be authorized to work in the United Kingdom, without the need for visa sponsorship by North Highland. Work visa sponsorship will not be provided, either now or in the future, for this position. This is a temporary employee (PAYE) opportunity working via an Umbrella company.

North Highland is an equal opportunity employer, and we adhere to all applicable laws and regulations to ensure a fair and equitable workplace. All qualified applicants will receive fair and impartial consideration without regard to race, color, sex, gender identity, religion, national origin, age, sexual orientation, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. We handle all information in accordance local privacy standards and maintain strict confidentiality.