Skip to main content

Author: Richard Lannon

Facilitating Discovery Meetings; Be Prepared

Written by Richard Lannon on . Posted in Articles.

When I was a Boy Scout we had a simple motto; “be prepared”. The same motto applies to facilitating discovery sessions with your stakeholders. In general, people are tired of attending meetings and discovery sessions. In the business world, business analysts, project managers, senior managers and all other stakeholders are busy people who deserve to have their time leveraged wisely. Here are some of the techniques you can use to get participation, gain consensus and leverage your stakeholders in discovery sessions and meetings.

  • Get your introductions established with key takeaways from the participants. This helps the facilitator align the session objectives with stakeholders expectations. 
  • Establish the “rules of engagement” and “who they are as a team”. The rules of engagement provide a context for the session structure and acceptable behaviours. The team question helps establish how the participants see themselves. 
  • Be clear on the “business problems” being addressed and the “solution context”. Clear business problem definition should be created in partnership with the sponsors and senior stakeholders prior to the session. The solution context provides a framework for the participants to frame their thinking in addressing issues. It does not mean the facilitator is providing solutions. 
  • Use a variety of people and group dynamic tools and techniques. For example,
    Brainstorming in a non-judgemental way to capture the thinking of individuals and teams. Make sure that you follow brainstorming rules.
    Buzz Groups to buzz on an assigned topic for 10 to 20 minutes that have been established by the facilitator.
    Team Pods to group people into working units at common tables facing one-another so they get engaged.
    Play games. Do not be afraid to play games. Games provide a means of getting participation engaged and the information you need to have a successful session. This is where your creativity comes in. Have fun!
    66 Technique. Six people discuss a topic for six minutes. Give the group structure by assigning a chair, a scribe and an auditor to provide feedback on the groups’ efforts.
    POPs. Get the POPs (points of pain) and align them with the organizations maturity.
    Nominal Group Technique. Use the Nominal Group Technique to have team members identify their best solution to business problems through a process of rating and elimination.
    Cost, Ease, Benefit. Use Cost, Ease, Benefit analysis to have participants clearly define and understand the impact of their recommendations.
    SWOT. Get the SWOT, that is strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, and identify those things external and internal that the team needs to focus on.
    Fish Bone. Throw them a Fish Bone (a diagram) to stimulate ideas and thinking as to the root cause of a business problem.
    Debate Teams. Create Debate Teams and have the groups discuss all sides of an issue. Ensure that there is structure and everything is timed and scribed.
    Smart Objectives. Have the groups make objectives SMART through ensuring they are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and timely.
    Implementation Plan. Build an implementation plan with assigned tasks, core responsibilities and timelines. Ensure there is a follow up mechanism.
  • At the end of the session there are a few other things the facilitator should do. Consider these items:
    Summarize and Review all that has been said to ensure clarity and alignment with the sessions key objectives.
    FUDs. Get the FUDs (fears, uncertainties and doubts). Have the stakeholders write these down, in confidence, and hand them in at the end of the session. There is nothing better than knowing the stakeholders concerns.
    Communication. Establish a follow up plan. Communication is key to understanding what the participants expect. Be clear on expectations and follow through.
    Positives and Deltas. Request the positives and the deltas regarding the session. Review these as they will provide the facilitator insight into areas for improvement.
    Scale it 1 to 5 and ask how the stakeholders feel about the decisions, recommendations and the overall initiative. You might find that they see things as just another shade of what they did last year. Be prepared to leverage the information gathered.
    Get yourself evaluated. You need to grow.

There are lots of approaches, tools and techniques that you can apply to creating discovery sessions and meetings that provide value to the participants and stakeholders.

Your job? Be prepared!

Richard Lannon is an international business and technology industry veteran turned corporate speaker, facilitator, trainer and advisor. He specializes in aligning the enterprise and technical skills to common business objectives. Richard helps organizations and professionals identify what’s important, establish direction and build skills that positively impact their bottom line. He provides the blueprint for your organization to be SET (Structured, Engaged and Trained). His clients call him the SETability Expert. He can be reached at [email protected] or 403-630-2808.

In this Edition: Managing Requirements, Getting Motivated, IIBA News and New Blogs

Written by Richard Lannon on . Posted in Articles.

sept15-time.pngOnce again we have a mix of the latest part of a continuing series requirements management plus plenty of other new and interesting contributions about the business analysis world – what’s going on now and what to look for in the future – that are sure to give you something to thinks about. Plus we have an update about what’s new at the IIBA. And, of course, our bloggers are back, including one new one.

  • I Don’t Have Time to Manage Requirements: My Project is Late Already! Part III. In this, the third in their series, Elizabeth and Richard Larson discuss the appropriate requirements management process for different projects; too much can be as bad as too little. 
  • Creating Motivation through Discovery. Richard Lannon talks about the importance of motivating people. He says it’s all about asking the right questions, listening and understanding – and then taking the appropriate steps. 
  • Will the First CBAPs Be a Credit to the Profession? Well Will You? Marcos Ferrer bills his blog as one of the world’s shortest blog. But he puts a very important question to all CBAPs. We hope you’ll answer him! 
  • The Cost of Validation. New blogger, Jonathan Malkin takes a look at how much is invested in developing systems but often nothing to ensure the system works, yet, as he points out, Solution Assessment and Validation is an important area in BABOK.
  • IIBA Launches Computer Based Testing of the CBAP Exam and a Letter from the President September 2008 are two important information pieces from The IIBA section of this site.
  • Defining Roles in the BA Life Cycle. Terry Longo asks if a single BA can be skilled in all aspects of the solution life cycle. He thinks single BA ownership makes sense but finding the right individual can be tricky – but not impossible.

Also don’t forget to check out our webinars and the Business Analyst Times book shop. And let us know what you think about this edition of BA Times.

Many thanks.

Adam R. Kahn
Publisher, Business Analyst Times
[email protected]

Creating Motivation through Discovery

Written by Richard Lannon on . Posted in Articles.

I am often asked by business analysts, consultants, supervisors, managers and leaders, how do you motivate people? Motivation is an endless process. People, teams and organizations are motivated for different reasons. Your job as business analysts, supervisors, managers and leaders is to leverage your own business skills to understand what motivates the people around you.

The reality is people are motivated because they are motivated. Not because you just rewarded them a date night movie pass for two, popcorn and coke included. One size does not fit all. Motivation is all about asking the right questions, listening and understanding – and then, to the best of your ability, facilitating the needs of that person, team or organization.

Consider it requirements gathering and documenting. Take these ten questions into consideration.

  1. What are the primary objectives of your organization? The people around you, your clients and resources might show more motivation if they understood what is going on. Ask clear questions of the organization to establish clarity of mission, values and objectives. Specifically, what is on the strategic agenda of the organization? You should know the answer to that question. 
  2. What obstacles inhibit us from moving forward, getting the information we need, without which people are hindered from doing their best? People have lives, professional and personal. Consider inquiring about what people are tolerating personally and professionally. Maybe you can destroy motivation-sucking activities. 
  3. What motivates the people you are dealing with? Interestingly, they will tell you that they are motivated by a whole range of different things. Motivation could include tending to family needs, reward and recognition, freedom from structure, competition, security, community service or maybe financial reward. The potential list is huge, but on an individual basis, it is most likely only a handful of items. 
  4. How empowered do people, teams and the organization feel? Do people feel like they have autonomy, independence, room to make decisions or are they controlled, manipulated and have the life sucked out of them? These are important considerations. 
  5. What changes have you proposed or put into place that just killed motivation? Maybe you are investigating the feasibility of implementing a new system that will increase efficiency for management but give administration more work. People are just not interested in helping. In this case, go after the FUDs (fears, uncertainties and doubts) about the future or present event. Give people the freedom to express their concerns with respect. Ensure they feel heard and understood. You may not be able to leverage or act on anything they say, but if they feel you are listening to them and you have captured their needs and requirements, it goes a long way towards motivation. 
  6. What are the motivational patterns of your people and teams within the organization? Check out motivation from the perspective of your best people and teams. Start to develop some lessons-learned data that can be leveraged to perform gap analysis, best practices and training opportunities. 
  7. Are the goals of the individual, team and organization aligned? As a professional, you need to recognize where the organization wants time spent. Establish the valued focus areas. Then consider whether resources are focused on those items and their motivation levels based on their activities, whether right or wrong. 
  8. What do people think about this place they hang out at for 40, 50 or 60 hours a week? This is a loyalty and commitment question. Take generations into consideration when answering this question. 
  9. When it comes to individual, team and organization involvement, how involved are your people in the strategic, tactical and operational development of the organization? Do people get randomly transferred or assigned to committees? When they talk or tell you something, do they feel listened to and heard? When putting a program together are they consulted? Consider this stuff – you may have to leverage the leadership skills and attributes of your business analysts or a person who is recognized as a leader to find out. 
  10. How consistent is the organization internally and externally? Maybe externally you are the “green technology company” and people joined because they thought it was true. If the internal reality is inconsistent with the external appearance, this will cause motivation problems. Again gap analysis is needed to determine the problem and challenge ahead.

These are just some areas to consider when it comes to motivation. I recall a situation when I was a senior manager some years ago in a large international company. I had an employee whose performance was suffering. I knew the person had the talent and knew their job but the drive was missing. Unfortunately, they received poor performance reviews for a few years due to this. It took several one-on-one discussions regarding their performance and, more importantly, their personal life circumstances and interests for us to discover that they loved to travel. Once we clued into the travel option we set up a career path where the person was able to travel about twice a quarter to help the organization on various initiatives. The best part is that we dove-tailed their professional development with another senior person who hated to travel but loved to develop other people using telecommunication technology. In the following two years, both people flourished and were promoted two levels above their original.

Ask questions and discover the needs of the individual, team and organization and facilitate it. That is how motivation is created.

Richard Lannon is an international business and technology industry veteran turned corporate speaker, facilitator, trainer and advisor. He specializes in aligning the enterprise and technical skills to common business objectives. Richard helps organizations and professionals identify what’s important, establish direction and build skills that positively impact their bottom line. He provides the blueprint for your organization to be SET (Structured, Engaged and Trained). His clients call him the SETability Expert. He can be reached at [email protected] or 403-630-2808

Group Dynamics and Requirements Elicitation

Written by Richard Lannon on . Posted in Articles.

As an information technology professional, developing your business acumen is important. One of the skills you need is the ability to facilitate. In your case, it is all about “facilitation for elicitation of requirements” to solve business problems. In working with groups, there are a number of dynamics that the facilitator needs to be aware of. It is helpful if you consider the different group characters and how to deal with them.

The Isolator
This is that one person who remains outside the group or is thinking about previous topics. Consider spending time helping people get acquainted or have discussions using pairing and triads. Provide opportunities for debriefing or summarizing what was discussed. Get the participants involved.

The Monopolizer
We all know this person. They monopolize the time and focus of the group. Be clear on your expectations, use your body language to hurry the speaker or, when they take a breath, say “thank you” and ask for other comments. You can also use a parking lot to write their points down. It is best not to interrupt. However, it is OK to watch for the talkers to draw a breath, and then attempt to regain control by leaping into the instant of silence this creates. Move fast, but speak softly and gently.

The Facilitator as Expert
As the facilitator, you should never set yourself up as the expert. You are there to understand the requirements and help establish direction. Consider avoiding answering every question yourself by letting group members respond to each other. Do not feel obliged to comment on everything that everyone says. Reduce your own authority by sitting down with the group.

Group Sharply Divided
This is where the groups are together physically but not together in interests or point of view. Mix the group up and get people to move around the room. Put them in new requirement work teams and assign the groups a specific relevant task to complete.  Have team members present and then debrief. If a solution cannot be reached, get agreement to park it! Make sure you ask the group if they feel comfortable moving on even though the issue dividing them is not settled. Be prepared with several group exercises, tools and techniques. Most important; keep cool, detached, and unhurried. Use a light touch.

Antagonistic Duo
These are the two people exchanging negative vibes and making everyone uncomfortable. Confirm that the conflict is positive and ask them to continue their disagreement. Set the stage by moving them closer together, arrange other group members as observers, and establish a scribe. Most importantly make explicit ground rules for conflict. Ask group members for feedback. Get everyone involved by taking the issue away from the duo by saying, “You have highlighted an important issue for us.” Here is an exercise for the entire group to participate in that continues exploring these issues, but in a different way.

The Cozy Duo
Here two friends are choosing to give each other comfort. They are making side conversations. This is not alright. The best solution is change the teams and rearrange the seating locations at a break to split the cozy duo up. Position the change as an opportunity to get a different perspective.

Unresolved Members
People are not engaged. It happens. Sometimes people do not understand why they are participating; they never wanted to participate; they just do not care or maybe they are bored. Break time! Check the thermostat and drop the heat in the room. Maybe change things around. Consider a group exercise, a short controversial video on the topic, Have the group brainstorm on a new agenda and create consensus. Be brave and leave the room while they do it. The break may help you to refocus and help them to become more active.

Highly Defensive Group
In this case the group members have erected barriers to protect their personal or professional images. This is about self-preservation. You need to get people talking and sharing in a low threat way. Move slowly with no pressure. Focus on facts and intellectual work for a time, gradually introducing small amounts of selective attitude. Avoid role-playing. Be open to revealing more about yourself.  Sometimes this sets the stage for other people to reveal information.

The Big Group
If the group has many members and no sense of inter-relatedness, be prepared to use pairs, triads and work groups. Rearrange the group into round tables so they can see one-another. Get people discussing specific related topic. Make sure you walk around the room making contact with people. Establish “associate facilitators” to manage the different groups. The larger the group the more ground rules, definition of roles and leadership required. Avoid feeling and attitude work with large groups. Keep people on track.

The most important thing as a senior professional, business analyst, manager or leader in developing your facilitation skills is to have fun and enjoy the process. Find ways to enhance being a facilitator and applying requirements elicitation best practices. Develop your group dynamic skills along with the tools and techniques of requirements elicitation. Remember to leverage the group’s unique character and get the members engaged.

Richard Lannon is an international business and technology industry veteran turned corporate speaker, facilitator, trainer and advisor. He specializes in aligning the enterprise and technical skills to common business objectives. Richard helps organizations and professionals identify what’s important, establish direction and build skills that positively impact their bottom line. He provides the blueprint for your organization to be SET (Structured, Engaged and Trained). His clients call him the SETability Expert. He can be reached at [email protected] or 403-630-2808

The Debate Over Blending the Roles of the BA and the PM

Written by Richard Lannon on . Posted in Articles.

may15editpic.pngIn the last Business Analyst Times, Bob Wysocki suggested that, in this day and age, the business analyst and the project manager have much in common with major areas of overlap. He pointed out that the skill and competency profiles of the effective BA and the effective PM are virtually identical. He argued that possibly a new role will emerge combining the competency of both. Boy, did that set the fur flying! As a result, we’ve created a dedicated discussion forum for you to participate in. To go there now, click here.

Part two of Bob’s series, Effective Requirements Gathering and Management Need the Skills of Both the BA and the PM, is in this issue and we invite you to read it and react by contributing to what is an ongoing and, at times, heated discussion.

Contributor Richard Lannon brings his experience in facilitating Information Technology Service Management (ITSM) work sessions in the energy sector to helping IT organizations improve processes and services. He stresses the importance of looking at situations from a broad business perspective rather than a narrower IT viewpoint. In his article, ITSM Work Sessions: Lessons Learned, Richard shares the lessons he’s learned over the years and how to put them to work.

Bloggers John Dean and Terry Longo are back. John shares his views on setting up identity systems, while Terry wonders should the BA be part of the IT department or have a broader role within business.

I know you have your own views – I’ve heard some of them on the road. Please share them with other Business Analyst Times readers.

Best Regards,

Adam R. Kahn
Publisher, Business Analyst Times
[email protected]