Coursera: A List of Courses For Business Analysts

Last Updated: Jan 5, 2017

Coursera is a MOOC (massive open online course) site that provides online courses designed for unlimited participation in partnership with reputable universities like Stanford University & Princeton University, to mention a few. It provides courses to learners across the world at affordable prices and in some cases, for free. Where a course is no longer available for free, prospective students may apply for financial aid.

I browsed through the Coursera website recently, hunting for business analysis-related courses and found quite a number. Most of their courses come with quizzes, videos, recommended texts, final exams, discussion forums and other resources that help deliver a standard learning experience. The courses listed here provide the knowledge needed to recommend effective business solutions, manage stakeholder relationships, cope with stress on the job and assume leadership positions. 

I’ll be updating this list as I discover more courses, so be sure to bookmark this page.

Here they are:

  1. Explore the Client Needs and Software Requirements course which covers the practical techniques needed to elicit and present software requirements from interactions with clients. It is offered by the University of Alberta.
  2. University of Minnesota offers a course titled, Prototyping and Design, aimed at teaching how to create low-fidelity prototypes of user interfaces. Financial Aid is available for this course.
  3. Explore Competitive Strategy by Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU) which uses game theory to teach how businesses can gain competitive advantage. This course can help improve your ability to think strategically about an organization and improve its competitive position.
  4. The University of South Wales offers Introduction to Systems Engineering. This course covers the basics of Systems Engineering and how it can lead to the successful development of complex systems. It touches on all aspects of systems development from requirements engineering and design to construction.
  5. The Process Improvement course from the University of Illinois teaches how to manage process improvement efforts through effective analysis and process improvement strategies using Six Sigma and lean management principles.
  6. Explore Creativity, Innovation & Change from Pennsylvania State University and Leading Strategic Innovation in Organizations from Vanderbilt University. 
  7. The Reasoning, Data Analysis and Writing course is offered by Duke University. It teaches useful skills for day-to-day interaction with stakeholders, like understanding how to reason and develop arguments; expressing an argument clearly; and learning how to write persuasively as is done in business cases and during project justification.
  8. Learn the art of Effective Problem-Solving and Decision-Making, a course offering from UCI aimed at helping learners develop critical thinking skills. Explore a similar course, Creative Problem Solving, from University of Minnesota.
  9. The Inspiring Leadership through Emotional Intelligence course is offered by Cave Western Reserve University. It focuses on building leadership skills and teaching how to manage the stress that comes with it.
  10. The Art of Negotiation is offered by UCI and is aimed at teaching the negotiation skills needed to thrive in organizations. You will learn the concept of negotiation, the types of negotiation and how to manage them. The University of Michigan also offers a similar course on negotiation, Successful Negotiation: Essential Strategies and Skills.
  11. For courses on communication, see Introduction to Public Speaking from the University of Washington and High-Impact Business Writing from UCI.
  12. See also Work Smarter, Not Harder: Time Management for Personal & Professional Productivity from UCI.

If a course is currently unavailable, you may add it to your watchlist so that you can get a notification when it becomes available.

Picture Attribution: "3d Business Man Mascot Hand Is Holding A Chalk And Board. 3d Squ" by Boians Cho Joo Young/FreeDigitalPhotos.Net