Tag: Career

The Emerging BA Role

Written by Jas Phul on July 14, 2014. Posted in Articles. 2 Comments on The Emerging BA Role

The BABOK® Guide version 2 was published in 2009 by the IIBA® (International Institute of Business Analysis) and defined our discipline. It brought much needed structure to our work and helped communicate what we do. Fast-forward to 2014; our discipline is 5 years older and 5 years wiser. What are leading BAs doing and where do we see the business analysis profession heading?

The PMI® (Project Management Institute) is introducing a new certification for business analysts – the Professional in Business Analysis (PMI-PBA®). It is too new to determine the impact of this certification on our profession but it is safe to say that its primary goal appears to be to address better requirements management practices within the scope of a project or at a program level. This continues to be a challenging area for organizations with as many as 1/3 of all project failures being attributed to poor requirements management practices.

Additionally, BABOK version 3 is on its way. It’s currently going through the public review process which will conclude in July. I think we’re looking at official publication later in 2014. When you review it, the thing you’ll notice right away is the expanded and higher valued definition of Business Analysis. The focus is considerably different than version 2. Now Business Analysis is the practice of enabling change. In other words it’s about helping your organization achieve strategic goals, taking it from where it is today to where it wants to be in the future.

It’s about helping your organization articulate business needs and it’s about recommending solutions. Now there’s an equal focus on not just understanding requirements but also helping develop solutions. And importantly, it’s about delivering value. Along with the more strategic definition of our discipline there is a new model describing what we do.

BABOK v3 introduces the Business Analysis Core Concept ModelTM. This describes 6 key concepts that we must understand: Needs, Changes, Solutions, Contexts, Value, and Stakeholders. Plus it describes the relationships between those 6 concepts.

This introduces a very dynamic model with highly interconnected elements and I think the model is much more representative of what we BAs should be doing. Which is a great segue to what I see amongst my clients; here’s where they are headed.

Most importantly leading organizations want their BAs to deliver measurable business value. It’s not just about helping define needs although that’s part of it. It’s not just about requirements although that’s part of it. It really is about understanding how your organization makes money or achieves its mandate and it’s about helping your organization successfully transition to a brighter future.

Leading organizations are not executing projects just for the sake of implementing new technology. They want each and every project to deliver business value and they want to measure that value. For them, BAs are involved at project initiation, throughout the project, during implementation, and beyond. They want BAs to measure the actual value being delivered once the solution is implemented and being used.

With that in mind, here’s what leading organizations need from their BAs:

You absolutely must understand your organization’s business model. It describes how your organization creates and delivers value. You must understand your customer segments, the channels through which you reach those customers, and the relationships that are established along the way. You must understand your organization’s value proposition delivered to your marketplace, your cost structure for delivering that value and the revenue streams that flow back. You must understand the key people in your organization responsible for delivering results, partnerships forged to help, and the important activities for success.
You must intimately understand the 2 Cs – Your Competitors and your Customers. Customer knowledge helps you deliver highly valued, relevant products and services and competitor knowledge allows you to stay one step ahead. Who are your primary competitors? Who are the emerging competitors or potential future competitors? How does their business model differ from yours? What makes them an attractive choice in your marketplace? Why would potential customers gravitate towards them?
And as far as your customers are concerned – Why do they buy from you? What keeps them up at night? What problems are they trying to solve that your organization can help with? How are their needs changing?
You must understand how your organization makes money. Both how it generates revenue and what it takes to turn a profit. What products are offered? What services are offered? What is your pricing strategy? What’s your cost structure? How do these compare to your competitors? How well does your pricing strategy align with customer expectations?
You must possess highly-developed communication and collaborative skills. Leading organizations are looking for BAs that can bring people together to deliver value. That means BAs must possess highly developed collaboration and communication skills. They engage stakeholders, develop support for a recommended solution, and focus teams on the desired results. They also bring key facilitation skills to promote innovation, encourage creativity, and develop shared understanding.
You must be able to help your organization fundamentally rethink how it executes business. Leading organizations see their business processes and practices as a source of competitive advantage. They want every project that they initiate to challenge current business practices and redesign processes to deliver measurable improvements in key performance metrics. So they need BAs who are able to quickly understand current business practices and are strong enough to challenge fundamental assumptions about how business is done. BAs need to look past “we’ve always done it that way” and focus people on a better way of doing things
You must be able to help drive out the benefits as described in the original business case. BAs need to be able to help implement their recommended solutions and go beyond this. Leading organizations realize that a potential solution has no value until its implemented and being used. They want savvy business experts to help ensure solutions are successfully implemented and are delivering measurable business value. Where an implemented solution fails to live up to expectations, they want their BAs to tweak that solution to drive out the benefits envisioned in the original business case.

There you have it; the bar has been raised! Leading organizations are looking for a new kind of BA – a much more strategic BA that can help deliver measurable business value. Are you willing to step up to this role?

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Notes
1. BABOK® Guide & IIBA are registered trademarks owned by International Institute of Business Analysis.
2. “PMI” is a registered mark of Project Management Institute, Inc.

New Research Uncovers Five Top Issues that Lead to Requirements Problems

Written by Doug Jackson on July 14, 2014. Posted in Articles.

It seems that the problem of challenged projects isn’t getting any better. Respondents to a recent survey indicated 62 percent of organizations experienced one or more challenges in over 30 percent of projects. Given the number of software and other critical projects that go over budget, get delivered late, or don’t meet business needs, requirements—a major contributing factor to project failures—continue to be a major problem.

Because of the persistence of the requirements problem, The Performance Institute embarked on a research paper to examine the answers to two questions:

Why haven’t organizations been able to effectively address the requirements problem?
In organizations that have made improvements, what actions have had the biggest impact?

Results Aren’t Surprising

The researchers’ findings were recently published in “The Problem with Requirements: Why is it Still a Problem?” . Interviews and answers uncovered five main issues that lead to the “requirements problem” organizations experience today:

Organizations focus on the wrong thing. Software projects delivered results that failed to address a strategic business need were a predominant complaint. The misguided mission of “getting the work done,” instead of enhancing two-way communication with stakeholders about components needed to propel the organization forward, lead to problems.
Not enough time spent on requirements. Time and time again, organizations reporting on challenged projects say that not enough time is devoted to eliciting requirements. Successful projects reported the opposite—that the time spent on requirements was “about right.”
The wrong people “do” requirements. Often, the person who has the time to gather requirements is the person asked to define requirements. In some organizations the vendor is given the responsibility of documenting requirements. No wonder there are problems on these projects.
Often BAs don’t have the right stuff. Research has found that just because someone holds the title “Business Analyst” doesn’t guarantee that a person is qualified to define and manage requirements for difficult, complex projects. Furthermore, holding certification in business analysis doesn’t mean that they are able to navigate successfully in this environment.
Government contracts are too complex. The complexity of the contracting process made requirements problematic for some organizations. Delays between when a request is submitted and when the product or service is actually contracted often meant that the requirements information becomes Overcome By Events (OBE); resulting in a solution that does not meet the business need.

Conclusion

Despite the value of requirements to the enterprise, most organizations apply surprisingly little rigor to their approaches to requirements elicitation and management. Moreover, many executives continue to underestimate the impact of their requirements discipline on organizational success.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

4 Key Skillsets of Seasoned Business Analysts

Written by Deepak Singh on June 23, 2014. Posted in Articles. 1 Comment on 4 Key Skillsets of Seasoned Business Analysts

Why are some business analysts better than others? Is it only experience that sets the best apart from the rest or there are some other qualities that separate the “men from the boys”? How do the most successful analysts implement the necessary changes in an organization and make it a habit to recommend solutions that deliver incremental value to all stakeholders of the business?

The answer to all these question lies in some of the core skillsets these analysts bring to table. Let’s take a closer look at 5 competencies that drive the ability of these business analysts to provide results driven answers to organizational problems.

1. The Ability Ask Questions and Getting the Right Answers

Questions are all about eliciting requirements from the users.

These requirements include functionalities, knowledge of products and/or services, market conditions or any other business activity that has the potential to propel growth. These requirements are tied in to the needs of the business, primarily the need of the business to grow and prosper. The job of a business analyst is to identify what the business wants to achieve; and for that to happen they must be able to gather the necessary requirements to get a deeper understanding of a problem/s holding back the business from achieving its goals or a growth opportunity that the business wants to explore. This allows them to get hands on all the data required to thoroughly make sense of a particular problem and suggest the right solution for it.

This is where the core competency of an analyst kicks into play a role – it is called ‘elicitation’. The best analysts don’t just elicit information using a variety of techniques but they also anticipate, quantify and resolve problems with these requirements. They blend risk management with their penetrative elicitation techniques ensuring they have a clear idea of the fallacies, if any, regarding the requirements on hand.

So, at the end of the day, what they’ve in their hands is the right information that is at the very top of the priority matrix and which has been vetted for accuracy.

2. They are Active Listeners

The process of elicitation involves business analysts asking relevant questions. You might be saying to yourselves, “but I also ask questions”; good, but do you listen to answers, that is really listen to answers? You will have to be an active listener if you want to be a good business analyst. These are the kind of listeners who pay attention and also ensure people know they are listening. They avoid being distracted and take in everything a person is saying without missing a beat; at the same time they provide the necessary encouragement to a person to speak his/her mind. Active listening skills are right up there in the armory of the best business analysts. This allows them to get a truckload of information out of project/business stakeholders.

3. They Don’t Shy Away from Doing the Hard Yards – Documentation

Once you get a truckload of data that covers all the requirements of a business, you need to set about preparing a business requirements document (BRD). Here’s a secret – Even the most experienced business analysts shy away from this task. But they got to do it and many do it in a halfhearted manner. That is not to say that they don’t produce a comprehensive BRD but there is marked difference in output if you have a degree of interest in the job you are doing.

The really successful business analysts consider BRD an integral document in the process of business analysis and make every effort to prepare it to the best of their ability. Each and every aspect of the requirements whether it is functional, non-functional, regulatory or user driven is covered in its deepest detail in this document. Think of this doc as the ready reckoner of a business’s intrinsic requirements and something that offers you clearer insights on what the business wants to achieve and how to go about achieving these goals.

A comprehensive BRD brings the following benefits to the table:

It tells the organization that the business analysts have a very clear idea of the requirements.
It acts as a guide for systems professionals to create the necessary solution that satisfying these requirements.
It identifies the customer/business needs that will be satisfied with a solution for the same.
It allows the different stakeholders of the business to get a detailed overview of the requirements cutting across the organization, allowing them to get their bearing rights about where they want the business to go.

4. Technically Astute

There is a raging debate whether business analysts need technical fluency. The fact is no knowledge technical or otherwise can ever be enough for a business analyst. They need to keep adding new skillsets to their armory which can help them become better at their jobs. The top business analysts are where they are because for them learning never stops and it’s a continuous process. This allows them to learn new tools of the trade; this includes the necessary IT knowledge that allows them to better analyze organizational requirements. This is necessary because most organizations today cannot survive without a robust IT infrastructure in place and many of its requirements can only be satisfied by facilitating specific IT upgrades.

But what if a business analyst has very little technical proficiency? Interesting question and it can’t be answered with a “don’t worry” or “that’s not an option”. The degree of technical proficiency, whether IT or any other, required from business analysts is dependent on the industry vertical that they are working within. If it’s an IT organization, a business analyst’s lack of knowledge about the industry in general and inability to understand the workings of the organization’s products and services will be laid bared during his analysis. In such cases, a degree of fluency in IT is a must.

But this is not really an absolute necessity. If you are able to define the various resources that will help you not only identify but also authenticate requirements and specifications related to a particular project, you’ve done your job. Understanding the technical aspects that are driving the business is a huge bonus. But hey, if you want to be really good at what you do, no harm in getting a bit of technical knowledge under your belt is there?

Conclusion

Seasoned business analysts don’t do anything different; they just do what they must with sufficient passion and enthusiasm. They are detail oriented and are committed towards offering the best possible services to an organization. This, at the end of the day, is what makes them so effective.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

Prepare and be Personal

Written by Kupe Kupersmith on June 16, 2014. Posted in Articles. 1 Comment on Prepare and be Personal

I want to thank all of you for reading my blog posts and always adding to the conversation. We grow by seeking out information and challenging each other’s thoughts. Well, I want to grow too, so I read other people’s blogs. One of my favorites is Frances Cole Jones. Her latest post, Raising a Glass: How to Give a Memorable Toast made some great points beneficial to BA professionals. In short she says be prepared, make it personal, and make it universal. Even though a toast is short, you can’t wing it…be prepared. The toast should be about the uniqueness of your relationship with the person you are toasting…make it personal. Finally, when telling a story try to connect with the larger audience. Talk about something that everyone can relate too…make it universal. For today’s post I am going to focus on the first two, being prepared and making it personal.

When I talk to people around the world a common area of improvement shared is the ability to think on your feet. So many people get nervous just thinking about bumping into a Director or VP because they are not going to know what to say if they are asked a question. Many people don’t like presenting in front of a group because they feel they may freeze when someone asks a question. The only way around it is being prepared. In reality thinking on your feet is not winging it.

Being able to think on your feet comes from being prepared for any situation and then relaxing so you can recognize the situation and recall the information. For the random conversation with the VP, take a few minutes and think about what he could ask about. Then come up with your answers and practice them. Same goes for a presentation. For the topic at hand, ask yourself what can the attendees possibly ask me? Be ready with answers. The more prepared you are, the more relaxed you’ll be. This will allow you to keep an open mind, hear the questions and respond with an answer that you most likely came up with already.

While you are thinking about your responses make them personal to the audience. If you are talking with your CIO and she asks about the projects you are working on. You may want to think about addressing your CIO’s goals. Does she need to know the specifics of your project or maybe more about the goal the project is addressing? It also does not hurt to ask, “How much time do you have and how much detail do you want?”
How do you really make things personal? The way you make things personal is by building relationships with the people you work with. The better you know the people you work with, what interests them, and what drives them, the more personal you can make the response. I realize it is not realistic to build relationships with everyone. If building a good relationship with the director or VP is not doable, find out who does have a good relationship with them. Ask them to help give you the background you need.

It can seem a bit more difficult to ensure you are “making it personal” when it comes to a meeting or presentation with multiple attendees. When you schedule a group meeting you probably think about and know why you are inviting all the attendees. That’s only a piece of the puzzle. Don’t assume the attendee knows why they should be there. You have to make sure they know why they are invited. For some meetings it may be as easy as sending an email to each invitee explaining why they were personally invited to the meeting. Sometimes it takes a conversation. This is a necessary extra step you must take to make sure the meeting or presentation is personal to them. This step also gives the invitee the option of starting a conversation around why they may not need to be there.

Regardless of the situation don’t shy away from these moments even if you are not prepared. Don’t duck in a room if you see a VP coming. You learn through practice. You’ll gain information on what questions people ask and what makes it personal to them.

All the best,
Kupe

The Project Manager vs. the Business Analyst

Written by Vicki James on June 9, 2014. Posted in Articles.

I have a hard time deciding whether “versus” is a good word to compare the two roles. On one hand, the project manager and business analyst should be working collaboratively. On the other hand, the two roles do offer a healthy contest in project related decisions. The issue at hand is that there is a lot of uncertainty about the difference in these roles. The result of this uncertainty is cases where one person plays both roles without enough skills for each, and other cases where the team members do not know who is responsible for what. Hopefully, we can clear this up.

The core of the difference is in the title.

The Project Manager manages the project – “The application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to provide activities to meet the project requirements.”
The Business Analyst conducts business analysis – “The set of tasks and techniques used to work as a liaison among stakeholders to understand the structure, policies, and operations of an organization, and to recommend solutions that enable the organization to meet its goals.

One source of confusion is the activities in both sets of tasks according to the relevant Body of Knowledge[i]. The intent is that planning and monitoring tasks within the BABOK® are limited to business analysis activities as indicated by the task title.

PMBOK® Task	BABOK® Task
4.2 Develop Project Management Plan	2.3 Plan Business Analysis Activities 2.5 Plan Requirements Management 2.6 Manage Business Analysis Performance
4.4 Monitor and Control Project Work	2.6 Manage Business Analysis Performance
5.1 Plan Scope Management 5.2 Collect Requirements	2.5 Plan Requirements Management Process 3.1-4 Elicitation: Prepare, Conduct, Document, Confirm 4.2 Manage Requirements Traceability 4.4.5.1 Requirements Documentation
5.3 Define Scope	5.4 Define Solution Scope
5.4 Create WBS 5.6 Control Scope	4.1 Manage Solution Scope 5.4 Define Solution Scope
5.5 Validate Scope	7.5 Validate Solution
8.3 Quality Control (Testing-monitoring and recording results)	7.6 Evaluate Solution Performance(Results analysis and recommendation)
13.1 Identify Stakeholders	2.2 Conduct Stakeholder Analysis
10.1 Plan Communications Management	2.4 Plan Business Analysis Communication
10.2 Manage Communications 10.3 Control Communications	4.5 Communicate Requirements 2.6 Manage Business Analysis Performance

Stakeholder analysis is one good example of collaboration between project manager and business analyst. The business analyst focuses on stakeholders specific to the requirements and scope of the project. The project manager is looking beyond this to stakeholders whose interest is outside of the project scope. Perhaps the project manager is recording a competitor as a stakeholder to aid in the identification and tracking of potential project risk. The stakeholder analysis is a joint effort. Assign items resulting from the stakeholder analysis to either the project manager or business analyst based on stakeholder interest and influence.

Another point of confusion is in the PMBOK® task of Collecting Requirements. It looks as though the project manager is responsible for collecting requirements. When you look further at the PMBOK® tasks you also find Quality Control, yet we know the project team has members responsible for product quality. The intent of the PMBOK© is that project managers take responsibility to ensure activities for collecting requirements are covered in the project management plan and monitored along with the project. Not the project manager collects the requirements.

Section 5.1 of the CBAP® Handbook does a great job of differentiating “analysis” activities from other activities. Download the CBAP ® handbook from the Certified Business Analysis Professional™ (CBAP®) website for detailed examples of these activities.

Volunteers from both the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA®) and Project Management Institute (PMI©) joined in a collaborative project to “facilitate a shared understanding of the roles.” The conclusion –

Both the PM and BA play leadership roles—the PM for leading the team and delivering the solution and the BA for ensuring that the solution meets the business need and aligns with business and project objectives. And both roles, equally, are required for project success.

You will get decisions based on full information of the impacts to the project and the benefit of the solution when you have both a strong PM and BA playing leadership roles on your projects. The result is a project that brings greatest business value to the organization.

I had the distinct pleasure of joining Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, CSM, as guest experts on PMChat (a weekly Internet radio show/Twitter web chat) to discuss the BA and PM roles on June 1, 2012.

Don’t forget to leave your comments below.

[i] Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) 5th Edition
A Guide to the Business Analysis Body of Knowledge® (BABOK® Guide) Version 2.0

References