Senior Business Analyst

Description

About Kinetic Advantage

Founded in 2020, Kinetic Advantage is an independent floorplan financing company built by experienced automotive industry leaders. We combine decades of industry knowledge with an entrepreneurial approach, innovative technology and a commitment to helping independent dealers succeed.

Our success is built on strong relationships with independent dealers, auto auctions and industry partners. Through transparent communication, responsive service and simple, innovative solutions, we help create exceptional experiences for our customers and team members while supporting the broader independent automotive industry.

Role summary

The Senior Business Analyst adds analytical and delivery capacity to our Strategic Initiatives and Business Execution team. The role is split roughly 50% analytical project work and 50% process improvement. It requires deep, hands-on technical analysis: querying and modeling data, quantifying process performance, and turning findings into recommendations leaders can act on. It also requires listening closely to the people who run our processes every day, in both the field and the corporate office.

Key responsibilities

Analytical projects (~50%)

- Lead discovery, analysis, process mapping, and solution definition for complex, cross-functional strategic initiatives across the business.
- Own the analytical process for solving business issues, producing recommendations that are effective and well supported by data.
- Perform deep technical analysis, including writing and optimizing queries against operational and lending data, building analytical models in Excel and other appropriate analytical software, and validating data quality and lineage before drawing conclusions.
- Apply root cause, trend, cohort, and variance analysis to explain performance and quantify the impact of process changes, such as cycle time, volume, exception drivers, and cost.
- Build business cases and scenario models (e.g., capacity, staffing, throughput, and risk tradeoffs) with clearly documented assumptions and sensitivities.
- Seek input and feedback from field employees, corporate employees, and functional leaders through interviews, workshops, surveys, and observation of work as it is performed, and incorporate it into analysis, solution design, and prioritization.
- Partner with senior leaders to understand their objectives and identify opportunities to leverage data to help them reach their desired outcomes.
- Produce and deliver succinct presentations that communicate analytical findings to stakeholders and executives, including what was learned from field and functional input and how it shaped the recommendation.
- Partner with the project manager on scope, risks, dependencies, and stakeholder communication.
- Mentor and review the work of the analyst on the team, including the quality of their queries, models, and data validation.

Process ownership (~50%)

- Own end-to-end design and documentation, including current-state and future-state process maps, KPIs, and the improvement backlog for assigned business processes.
- Engage field and corporate employees and functional leaders at each stage of process work. Gather their input on current pain points, validate current-state maps with the people who do the work, test proposed future-state designs, and collect feedback after implementation to confirm the change is working.
- Produce complete documentation of business process changes for use in operational implementation, employee training, and IT enhancement requirements, including detailed business requirements, data mapping, business rules, and acceptance criteria.
- Support system and technology changes through design reviews, user acceptance testing, defect triage, and validation that delivered functionality meets the documented requirements.
- For assigned business processes, establish baseline metrics such as throughput capacity, turnaround time, exception rates, and rework. Build and maintain the data sources, queries, and Power BI reporting behind those metrics, and report on them at an appropriate frequency.
- Ensure that new business processes are designed to optimize the dealer and auction experience, maintaining or improving Kinetic's competitive differentiation in this regard.
- Identify, prioritize, and lead process improvements using Lean or similar methods, grounding prioritization in both quantitative analysis and stakeholder feedback.
- Provide regular updates to senior leadership on current and completed process improvement projects, including results against baseline and feedback received from the field and functional teams.

Required qualifications

We are looking for someone with 6+ years in business analysis, process improvement, or operations, including 3+ years in floorplan or commercial lending, or a closely related financial services setting.

- Proven track record mapping and redesigning end-to-end processes (ideally in Business Process Model and Notation or equivalent) with measurable results, such as shorter cycle times or fewer exceptions.
- Advanced technical analysis skills, demonstrated by complex SQL (multi-table joins, CTEs, window functions, performance tuning), advanced Excel modeling, and Power BI dashboard development, with a rigorous approach to data validation and reconciliation.
- Demonstrated ability to turn large, imperfect data sets into defensible conclusions, using root cause analysis, statistical or trend analysis, and process performance measurement.
- Experience supporting system or technology implementations, such as a loan origination system (LOS) or servicing platform, from requirements through implementation, including data mapping, testing, and go-live support.
- Familiarity with lending or financial services operations, and the ability to quickly learn new business functions and their processes.
- Demonstrated ability to gather and synthesize input from employees at all levels, including field staff, corporate staff, and functional leaders, using interviews, workshops, surveys, and process observation.
- Ability to facilitate workshops and influence stakeholders without formal authority.
- Exceptional skill in clear, structured writing for requirements, process documentation, and executive updates.
- Skilled in the use of AI for analysis and documentation, with the judgment to verify AI-generated outputs against source data.
- Bachelor's degree in business, finance, information systems, or equivalent experience.

Preferred qualifications

These strengthen a candidate but are not required.

- Experience in floorplan or inventory finance for independent used vehicle dealers.
- Lean Six Sigma Green Belt or higher, CBAP, CBPP, or PMP certification.
- Experience with workflow automation.
- Experience with Python or R for data analysis, or with data modeling and ETL concepts.
- Experience building a process improvement practice or KPI framework from a small starting base.
- Prior experience in a PMO or business execution team and mentoring junior analysts.

This job description reflects essential functions of this position but is subject to change at any time and does not restrict the tasks that may be assigned.

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, age, genetic information, or any other factors prohibited by law.