Business Analyst/Data Manager - DAU

< back to jobs opening

Job Description:

Position Summary

About Maharashtra - Decision Support System (DSS)

The Decision Support System is envisioned to be the CMOs first port of call for enabling data-driven governance backed by analytical evidence. The key objectives of the DSS include 1) Setting and measuring outcome goals against benchmarks from national and international indices, 2) Triangulating administrative data with own/national surveys to reduce data discrepancies, 3) Improving citizen feedback through efficient use of existing supervision mechanisms at the department level. A Data Analytics Unit (DAU) will be set up to conduct analytics for the DSS.

The primary objective of the DAU will be to deliver advanced analytical work on programmatic data (outputs, outcomes) and its determinants, typically:

  • Utilise administrative data to assess district-level performance of priority schemes and enable benchmarking against relevant national and international indices, thereby informing strategic goal-setting.
  • Address known limitations in administrative data quality by instituting systematic, periodic collection of citizen-level data focused on outcomes across sectors such as health, education and nutrition.
  • Diagnostics to determine causality and correlations
  • Regular and ad hoc data aggregation, analysis, and developing dashboards as required for senior stakeholders

We are seeking a skilled and motivated Business Analyst/Data Manager to join the unit. The Business Analyst/Data Manager will play a critical role in engaging with government stakeholders to understand their needs, translating them into functional and technical requirements, and supporting the design of data-driven solutions and process enhancements. This role sits at the intersection of policy, process, and technology, requiring the ability to navigate ambiguity, align multiple stakeholders, and translate insights into action. You will be responsible for requirement gathering, documentation, workflow creation, and stakeholder management across key public sector projects. The ideal candidate should bring strong communication and analytical skills, a deep understanding of government systems, and the ability to work collaboratively with technical and non-technical teams.

The role will report to the DAU Team Lead and would require active interaction with other team members (Economist, Data Analysts etc.) for effective project delivery.

Roles & Responsibilities

  • Requirement Gathering and Stakeholder Engagement

    Engage with government stakeholders to identify needs, priorities, and contextual constraints.
  • Facilitate structured discussions, interviews, and workshops to gather and validate requirements.
  • Document clear and actionable functional requirement specifications, process maps, and business rules.
  • Translate ambiguous or high-level tasks into specific use cases or solution components.
  • Leverages working relationships with the Lead/Data Scientist/Senior Analyst/Economist and other stakeholders to determine data needs and optimal methods for issue identification and analysis.
  • Research and insights analysis
  • Performs supporting secondary research and conducts analysis to support project delivery.

  • Analyses qualitative and quantitative data from a range of literature to provide actionable insights for informed decision making.
  • Keeps abreast of research and findings in key thematic areas within data and technology, actively sharing this information with colleagues.
  • Synthesize complex findings into simple, concise reports and briefs tailored for decision-makers.
  • Project Management
  • Develop process workflows in collaboration with technical teams.
  • Delivers on tasks in association with the Project Lead / Data Engineers and identifies risks or dependencies as they arise through the project lifecycle
  • Presents/assists the Team Lead in presenting the outputs and findings
  • Conducts workshops/training to functional users, where applicable
  • Documents functional requirements, processes, use-cases, and other project artefacts
  • Provides input to the Lead on timelines, estimates, risks, deviations, and other challenges during the planning and implementation of the project.

Required Qualifications, Skills and Abilities

  • Bachelors or Masters degree in Business Administration, Economics, Public Policy, or a related field.
  • Minimum 6 years of experience in data analysis and management, business analysis and stakeholder management - preferably in public sector projects.
  • Good knowledge of MS Office tools is important. Knowledge of any other productivity tools is a bonus
  • Proficiency in data analytics tools like R/Stata/Python and visualisation tools like Power BI or Tableau, or equivalent
  • Strong command of the MS Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint).
  • Experienced in using large and diverse government datasets, including real-world data and the ability to draw inferences across
  • Expertise in using analytics frameworks for root cause analysis and solution framing
  • Ability to distil volumes of information into easily digestible conceptual frameworks
  • Must be fluent in Hindi and English. Working knowledge of Marathi is highly preferred.

Personal Characteristics and Desired Qualities

  • Exceptional interpersonal and communication skills, capable of articulating complex information clearly and compellingly.
  • Ability to build and maintain positive and collaborative relationships within the organisation
  • Ability to set priorities, plan timelines and meet deadlines.
  • Detail-oriented and ability to manage multiple concurrent tasks
  • Intellectual curiosity and the ability/willingness to constantly learn
  • High ability to collaborate and actively listen to others, understanding and valuing others views
  • Public-spirited and generous temperament
  • Stay abreast of industry trends, emerging technologies, and best practices in data analysis

Location and Compensation

This role will be based out of Mumbai, Maharashtra. Remuneration will be competitive with Indian philanthropy and social sector pay scales and will depend on the candidates experience levels.

Pre-reads

About CEGIS

Centre for Effective Governance of Indian States (CEGIS pronounced See-Jis) aims to improve lives by helping Indian state governments deliver better development outcomes.

The four key characteristics of any high-performing organisation are (a) measuring outcomes through reliable, high quality data that enables goal setting and monitoring progress towards these goals; (b) strategic use of personnel competency based hiring and training, skilling, and performance appraisals to determine job assignments, pay, and promotions to achieve the goals above; (c) strategic budgeting where resource allocation is based on evidence and cost-effectiveness; (d) and creating efficient systems to leverage external actors (including for-profit and nonprofit organisations). The Indian State needs to perform better on all four fronts above, by enhancing its capacity. CEGIS partners with states to improve this capacity by focusing on these four pillars of the State.

Informed by cutting-edge research and evidence as well as a practical orientation toward implementable ideas, CEGIS works with State Governments in India to enable a transformative improvement in their functioning. This vision and Theory of Change (ToC) is an outcome of extensive research done by Prof. Karthik Muralidharan (CEGIS Co-Founder and Scientific Director) and strategic philanthropic support provided by Mr. Ashish Dhawan (CEGIS Co-Founder).

Prof. Karthik Muralidharan is the Tata Chancellors Professor of Economics at the University of California, San Diego. Over the past two decades, he has led extensive research projects in India across education, health, and social welfare. His book, Accelerating Indias Development: A State-Led Roadmap for Effective Governance, systematically analyses Indias governance challenges and provides actionable, evidence-based strategies, emphasising state-level reforms as critical for Indias advancement.

Ashish Dhawan is a leading Indian philanthropist and the Founder-CEO of The Convergence Foundation (TCF). He is also the Founding Chairperson of Ashoka University and the Central Square Foundation, and is a governing board member of the Gates Foundation. Before his second career as a philanthropist, Ashish was among Indias most successful private equity investors.

CEGIS Approach and Model of Functioning

Our solutions to enhance governance are co-created with state governments in a state-led way, where we focus on deep partnerships with states with an iterative cycle of think-demonstrate-document-transfer. We work closely with the top bureaucratic leadership, front-line workers and public officials in Finance, Planning, Human Resources and a few other priority line departments.

In alignment with our four principles or pillars of change - outcome measurement, personnel management, strategic public finance, states and markets, CEGIS is currently working with the governments of Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, NCT of Delhi, Assam, and a few Government of India entities like the NITI Aayog and Capacity Building Commission (CBC) across a range of projects and sectors. Through CEGIS flagship offering, the KPI (Key Performance Indicators) Survey, we are helping enable state governments we are working with to collect better quality citizen level data, make informed, evidence-based decisions, and institutionalise this process of securing periodic citizen-level feedback.

We are setting up a Financial Analytics Unit (FAU) to enhance analytical capacity and increase the effectiveness of budgetary allocations of the Finance Department in another state. In alignment with our personnel management workstream, we are also working with the HR/Administrative Reforms & Training Department to set up and institutionalise an in-house Capacity Building Unit (CBU) that aids the adoption of competency-based Learning Management Systems (LMS) and Performance Management Systems (PMS) with a few of these entities. Similarly, to improve the value of public money, we are working at the interface of states and markets which encompasses procurement, regulation, and policy formulation. Our solutions are constantly being refined based on real-time feedback and are designed to be customised and replicated across contexts.

CEGIS@5: A Journey of Learning & Building Capacity

Since its incorporation in 2019, despite the enormous challenges posed by COVID, CEGIS has gained significant momentum in building strong collaborations with the government(s) as a trusted partner who can provide both thought leadership and implementation support on key governance reforms. CEGIS position as a non-profit that does not take any funding from the government (other than in-kind contributions of office space/staff) has been a key enabler in earning this trust.

Beginning with 2 state government engagements in the first 2 years of its inception, today CEGIS is working across several Indian states with 15+ projects across several sectors, including education, nutrition and local governance. From a small group of founding members, we have grown by leaps and bounds to become a team of 150+ members located across the country. Helmed by a former bureaucrat with invaluable governance experience, state and solution team leads with decades of domain expertise, and enabling functions led by professionals with considerable corporate careers, the team at CEGIS brings together knowledge and experience that spans various sectors - from developmental economics, research, and governance to management consulting and social entrepreneurship.

Over the last 5 years, we have also been able to garner support for our vision and theory of change from a diverse range of foundations and philanthropists whose partnership has enabled us to build our own organisational capacity as well as continue to experiment and improve our solution design to augment state capacity and governance. We believe that this approach will gradually enable all government officials to achieve their goals more effectively, thereby improving the ability of the State to deliver services to all Indian citizens in the decades to come. To explore what the mission of CEGIS is and the impact we hope to have, please take a look at this video of our CEO, Dr Vijay Pingale.

Note: CEGIS has zero tolerance to sexual harassment. We therefore expect each applicant to self-declare related to the same. CEGIS could, if required, initiate a prevention of sexual harassment-based background verification. If an applicant is reported of misconduct, appropriate action that may include employment termination would be taken. Please Click the link for self-declaration.

Compensation: Remuneration will be competitive with Indian philanthropy and social sector pay scales and will depend on the candidates experience levels.

Working Place:

Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

Department :

Centre for Effective Governance of Indian States (CEGIS)
< back to jobs opening