Tag: Requirements

Oh No, You Gave Me What I Asked For!

Written by Elizabeth Larson on August 31, 2007. Posted in Articles. 1 Comment on Oh No, You Gave Me What I Asked For!

Part 1: Common Pitfalls to Uncovering Expectations

Project professionals – specifically project managers and business analysts – realize that no matter how well projects are executed, projects still fail when customer requirements are not clearly defined and customer expectations are not met.

“Uncovering expectations takes a commitment to defining requirements in sufficient detail to understand what those expectations truly are.”

Uncovering expectations takes time and requires the art of consultative questioning. It demands patience with clients who have difficulty articulating their requirements. It requires a process for not only eliciting the requirements, but also for analyzing, documenting, and validating them. Finally, uncovering expectations takes a commitment to defining requirements in sufficient detail to understand what those expectations truly are.

This two-part article discusses five common pitfalls and the associated risks of not uncovering expectations in part one and, in part two, how a consulting approach will help mitigate them.

Requirements and Expectations

According to various standards bodies such as PMI, IIBA, and IEEE, a requirement defines a condition or capability needed to solve a problem or achieve an objective that must be met by a system or system component to satisfy a contract, standard, or specification.

Requirements, then, state a business need and describe how the solution, or final product, will meet that need. Detailed requirements describe such things as what the end-user of the product needs to know or do or have, and how they need to use the product.

It is helpful to think of requirements as being stated, whether spoken and/or documented. Expectations on the other hand, while also requirements, are not usually articulated by the sponsor and client stakeholders. We need to meet both expectations and stated requirements in order to satisfy business needs and produce enduring results. When we ignore expectations, even if we have been meticulous in documenting stated requirements, we are apt to develop unusable products.

Common Pitfalls

1) The Time Trap

One of the challenges cited frequently in our informal research is what we call the Time Trap. There are two parts to the time trap. The first is that project professionals usually feel they are not given enough time to define requirements, let alone uncover expectations.

The second is that clients are not always available to define their requirements. We frequently hear from key clients that they don’t have time to attend requirements workshops, for instance. We’re then left with undesirable alternatives. We can postpone the meetings and delay the project, we can hold the workshops without the clients, or we can proceed with incomplete requirements. Each one of these alternatives has the associated risk of incomplete requirements, surprises, rework, and expense. Research shows the total percentage of project budget due to requirements defects is typically from 25 to 40 percent and costs the economy $59.5 billion annually (SEI study, 7/15/2005).

2) Stated Requirements Don’t Meet Expectations

Another pitfall is assuming that the requirements stated by the sponsor and clients will produce a product that actually works, and will be used. In other words, we mistakenly assume that if we get the sponsor and clients to articulate their requirements, the product will meet their expectations. Having sponsors state their requirements is only the beginning of the process. If we collect the requirements as given without a consultative approach, it is highly unlikely that the end product will meet expectations.

3) Ineffective Questioning

“Project professionals need to master the art of asking questions to ensure expectations are discovered.”

One reason that stated requirements may not meet customer expectations is because ineffective techniques are used to ask questions about the requirements. Project professionals need to master the art of asking questions to ensure expectations are discovered. Asking questions like “what are your requirements for this project?” is not apt to yield successful results. Yes, surprisingly, this is a frequent type of question asked!

Asking the wrong questions, even when asked with good intentions, can lead to unwanted results. The categories discussed here include:

Open- vs. closed-ended questions
Solution presentation
Feature fallacy.
Questioning Style

Open- vs. closed-ended questions. Some project managers and business analysts erroneously think it best to always ask questions that allow the interviewee to expand their thoughts, avoiding what are called closed-ended questions. Asking these expansion questions exclusively can be time-consuming and can make the elicitation process longer than needed.

Solution presentation occurs when we fall into the trap of presenting solutions that sound like questions. Also known as leading questions, these closed-ended questions often force the interviewee into a position of disagreeing with the interviewer or worse yet, feeling foolish. Therefore, by avoiding leading questions, such as “wouldn’t it be better to…” or “have you ever thought about…” we reduce the risk of creating barriers to communication. Listen to yourself during the course of a day and count how many times you ask leading questions.

Feature fallacy occurs when either the interviewer or the interviewee focuses on the features and functions of the product before determining how the product fits into the context of both the business and the project. It is a pitfall that occurs across disciplines. As an example, software engineers and vendors sometimes concentrate on desirable features, rather than determining whether the software will solve real business problems or the impact of the software on the organization.

In a recent article, James Surowiecki discusses the issues related to what he calls “feature creep” (Surowiecki, May 28, 2007,

“People are attracted to features, but will not be happy without usability.”

p28). Citing statistics for consumer returns on defective but difficult-to-use products, Surowiecki shows how many non-defective items are returned annually. Sixty percent of those participating in a focus group picked products with more features. However, when asked to use the product, they became frustrated as “feature fatigue” took over. People are attracted to features, but will not be happy without usability.

Questioning Style. Another pitfall is asking the right questions the wrong way, which can destroy trust and create barriers between interviewer and interviewee. If we are to elicit good requirements, we need to put the interviewee at ease. We need to build trust with our stakeholders and asking questions in a way that does not facilitate communication, even if they are very good questions, can produce unintentional negative results. Here are three sins that can destroy trust.

Asking ‘why’ accusingly. Sometimes the interviewer can give the impression of being a prosecuting attorney. Asking ‘why’ directly can put some people on the defensive and should be avoided.
Showing lack of interest. There are many ways to show that the interviewer is not engaged. Checking cell phones is an obvious one. Less so are neutral non-verbals, such as lack of eye contact, slouching, etc, which while not actively presenting communications barriers, can inhibit the conversation.
Using inappropriate non-verbals, given the culture of the interviewer. How we show that we are engaged in the conversation differs from culture to culture. Making the assumption that everyone responds similarly to engagement signals and affirmation can lead to barriers and distrust.

4) Using The Wrong Techniques

Even experienced project professionals are guilty of using the same techniques repeatedly, even when the techniques are not appropriate for the project at hand. For example, using business process modeling for a reporting function may not uncover the true requirements. Using inappropriate techniques can result in clients answering the wrong questions, thereby providing incomplete or incorrect requirements. This can result in being surprised at the end of a project with sponsors saying, “yes, I know that’s what I said I want. But it’s not what I really need!”

5) Accepting Solutions Presented by the Business and Technical Experts

A final pitfall is accepting a business solution provided by the sponsor and other key stakeholders. Although not a good practice, it’s common for business stakeholders to try to save time by giving specific product details (e.g. fields on a database table) without providing business reasons. Accepting solutions presented by business stakeholders forces project managers into the role of order takers, which usually leads to unusable and unused products.

A related pitfall is feeling constrained by an imposed technical solution, often forcing business needs to be subjugated to technical architectures, rather than having technical architecture support the business need. Forcing business solutions without taking existing business processes or needs into account, invariably leads to customer disappointment.

Overcoming Requirements Pitfalls

Look for the conclusion to this two-part article in the next Business Analyst Times, as we explore overcoming the above pitfalls. The consultative approach described shows how being a consultant to the business helps ensure that expectations are met. Part two explores practical approaches to meeting and exceeding expectations through understanding the business problem, and recommending solutions that meet real business needs, not just stated requirements.

Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, and Richard Larson, PMP, CBAP are Co-Principals of Watermark Learning (www.watermarklearning.com), a globally recognized business analysis and project management skill development company.

Over 15 years, they have used their extensive experience to develop Watermark Learning’s training into a unique approach that combines industry best practices, a practical approach, and an engaging format. Attendees immediately learn the retainable real-world skills necessary to produce enduring results.

Each has presented numerous workshops, seminars, and training classes to thousands of participants on tree different continents. Their speaking history includes regular appearances at Project Management Institute (PMI) North American, European, and Asia-Pacific Congresses and PMI chapter meetings.

Both were recognized in 2006-2007 as two of the world’s first registered CBAPs (Certified Business Analysis Professionals) by the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA). They also serve on the BABOK development and review team. Both are certified project management professionals (PMP) through PMI, and are contributors to the upcoming 4th edition of the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK).

References

Project Management Institute (2004). A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge(PMBOK®) (2004 ed.). Newtown Square, PA: Project Management Institute.
International Institute of Business Analysis (2006). A Guide to the Business Analysis Body of Knowledge, version 1.6. http://www.theiiba.org.
SEI updated May 12, 2005 viewed 7/15/05. System Quality Requirements Engineering (SQUARE) Project, http://www.cert.org/sse/square.html
Surowiecki, J. (2007, May 28) Financial Page Feature Presentation, New Yorker Magazine, page 28.

The Top Nine Requirements Misconceptions: Why Arent YOU Doing Requirements Right?

Written by Ellen Gottesdiener on April 24, 2007. Posted in Articles.

“We don’t need to explore requirements—we know what we need!” “Hey, we’re using agile methods—we don’t need to define requirements!” “Oh, we don’t have time for requirements!” And so it goes. You’ve probably heard—and perhaps yourself offered—any number of excuses or rationales for not doing requirements right. No matter who makes these excuses—technical staff, the business sponsor, the project manager, or even business analysts—failing to carefully define your project’s requirements will put your project in peril. In my twenty years of working with projects, I’ve heard them all. Here are my top nine requirements misconceptions—and how you can refute them.

“We know what we need”

In practice, project team members mostly don’t know what users or customers need. Requirements development takes exploration and learning. It’s unrealistic to expect your team to understand requirements up front.

For one thing, users, product managers, customers, and other stakeholders don’t really know all their needs at the beginning. Requirements naturally thrash and evolve. Indeed, it’s wise to be suspicious of claims to the contrary. Remember, almost half of the requirements you specify never get implemented (Standish Group International, 2003b).

In many projects, the perception that requirements are known is mistaken. Most errors in delivered software (30% to 50%, depending on the study) originate from flawed requirements (Schwaber, 2006; Nelson et al., 1999; Leffingwell and Widrig, 1999; Lauesen and Vinter, 2001).

The top three risks that threaten successful e-projects all relate to requirements— constantly changing requirements, poor requirements specification, and customer involvement issues such as delayed approval, requirements thrashing, and poor communication (Rodrigues, 2001).

Don’t rely solely on product and business managers for defining user needs. Unless they are former users themselves, they will not understand direct user needs without inquiry and exploration. And rarely do product and business managers have the subject matter expertise you need to represent the entire set of requirements.

Ask yourself: have you solicited the voices of all your stakeholders? Do you know who all your stakeholders are? Have you prioritized conflicting needs? Have you explored both technical constraints and possibilities? You may think you know what the needs are, but your list may be shortened by technical realities or lengthened by technology possibilities.

What you think you know can hurt your project more than what you don’t know.

“We’ve got this covered. We’re [pick one: outsourcing/
using agile development methods/ buying a software package]”

Outsourcing, agile development methods, COTS solutions—these are often great ideas, but they don’t eliminate the need to develop excellent requirements. You still need to articulate requirements, adapting your requirements development practices to these scenarios.

The critical need for proper requirements development increases when you outsource your project. You need to communicate requirements with even more rigor when the development staff is not physically co-located with customers and project managers. In addition, you will need top-notch business analysts (Schwaber, 2006).

If you’re adopting agile practices, it doesn’t mean you don’t need requirements. In agile projects, iterations are driven by requirements. They don’t go away—they’re successively elaborated.

And if your product is large and complex, agile projects need to start with a requirements-driven product and release roadmap. From there, the team develops chunks of requirements—based on those roadmaps. Success with agile development means balancing suitable-quality requirements with speedy definition of needs.

Many organizations hope to accelerate delivery by seeking and installing software package solutions (commercial off-the-shelf software, or COTS). In that case, you still need to understand your requirements and the impact your project will have on your business process. Requirements should drive your choice as well as your implementation strategy.

“My staff already knows what good practices are”

Too many projects rely on written requirements, often viewed as the most important good practice. But written requirements are rife with ambiguity (unclear meanings). To top it off, project and product needs are rarely known up front.

In fact, writing textual requirements (“the system shall…”) is not the best way to understand your users’ needs. Textual requirements have their place when you need formal specifications, but most successful projects also adopt other techniques to explore business and user requirements.

Effective requirements development makes use of requirements models that are verified and validated continually and iteratively. Using good practices—such as requirements modeling, facilitated workshops, prototypes, scenario verification, and more—takes practice, coaching, and reinforcement.

Following sound requirements processes, actively involving users, documenting requirements appropriately, validating and verifying requirements, and managing requirements changes—all these skills and techniques are essential to successfully reduce the many risks associated with requirements errors (Leishman and Cook, 2002).

“We can’t afford to get training or consulting”

Roughly one-third of your software project budget is consumed fixing requirements errors. That means you’re spending about $150,000 of your $500,000 project fixing defects or errors that originate from your requirements (Schwaber, 2006; Nelson et Al., 1999; Leffingwell and Widrig, 1999; Weinberg, 1997).

The earlier you discover these errors—missing, wrong, conflicting, and ambiguous requirements—the cheaper it is to fix them. Finding and fixing a requirements error during the requirements phase might cost you $25 to $100. If you don’t find it until the construction or testing phase, fixing that same error is going to cost you $500 to $1000 (20 to 40 times more). Left undetected, that requirements error will cost you as much as 300 to 1,000 times more. That $25 cost becomes $10,000! (Reifer, 2007)

For every dollar you invest in your staff learning good requirements practices that incorporate customer collaboration, you can get a 10:1 return on investment (Jones, 1996a).

You cannot afford not to correct your requirements deficiencies.

Pay now—or pay more, later!

“It will take too much time to do things differently, to take time out for training, or get project help from the outside”

Yes, there will be a learning curve. This is a normal part of change and learning. But there are things you can do to accelerate the process. Schedule formal training to coincide as closely as possible with the project work. Provide real-time coaching to the team. Set up sponsorship contracts so that new practices and behaviors are reinforced in the organization—both top-down and bottom-up. Find out from your staff what they need from you to be successful with requirements, and provide it.

And remember, some requirements work is better than none. On complex projects, one study showed that investing even 10% in the effort before freezing requirements reduces cost overruns significantly (NASA Comptroller Office, reported in Hooks and Farry, 2001).

Many organizations are turning to external service providers, outsourcing their development efforts. And they are learning that highly skilled business analysts who can develop and manage requirements are essential to successful outsourcing (Henschen et al., 2007; Light, 2005).

“Users don’t know what they want”

Users are not supposed to know what they want. Understanding user needs is both an art and a science—a combination of discovery, interrogation, exploration, and decision making.

Involving users in requirements development is widely recognized as one of the—if not THE—most important factor for project success. Yet business people, as well as IT people, continue to complain about their inability to work effectively together to define the right requirements.

Healthy collaboration with users is crucial—and it doesn’t just happen. Both sides of the relationship—business and IT—are accountable to co-develop the right requirements in the most efficient and effective manner possible.

That’s why great analysts employ an appropriate combination of requirements elicitation techniques. It’s one of their most valued skills. These elicitation skills, married with artful choices in requirements models, go a long way toward active and productive user involvement.

Sponsors who pay for the development (product managers, marketing managers, or internal business managers) also need to be engaged. This doesn’t take unlimited time and money. Not all requirements are created equal. User priorities need to be evaluated continually if the team is to make smart product development choices.

“Customers are too busy to participate in requirements work with us”

IT needs to employ techniques that make good use of business people’s time and actively engage them in requirements work. At the same time, business people need to fully participate in defining their requirements. If you do it right, good practices for effective user involvement sell themselves.

Here are some ways to do it right. Represent user needs in ways that “sing” to users and customers. Use a variety of elicitation techniques. Verify and validate requirements as you proceed. And, importantly, conduct continual requirements retrospectives to get feedback that will allow you to adapt your requirements practices.

“Our users are distributed. We can’t get everyone’s requirements”

User requirements are the focal point of your product. When users are scattered, you still need to identify the various types of users, understand their needs, and determine how you might need to alter requirements based on location.

When your users are geographically distributed or there are vast numbers of them, you may have to rely on surrogate users or subject matter experts who can research user needs. Find a small sample of representative users from various locations who are important to product success. Then adapt your elicitation practices to make efficient use of these users in requirements development and verification.

For some products, it’s best to combine surveys and other research methods with deeper representative user involvement.

Regardless of the approach you take, ignoring user needs is a recipe for disaster.

“We got the book We’ll just follow that”

Reading a book (e.g. The Software Requirements Memory Jogger) helps. It gives you awareness and knowledge. Reading does not, however, enable you to apply skills without practice and reinforcement.

Many business and requirements analysts are not trained and skilled in the toolkit of requirements development and management practices they need to be successful (Schwaber, 2006).

Analysts with extensive experience are more successful than novices in analyzing and uncovering user needs. Expert analysts demonstrate the ability to select among elicitation techniques based on the situation and integrate multiple models to represent requirements (Hickey and Davis, 2003).

Gaining expertise in requirements saves time and effort, reducing your total cost of application ownership (Light, 2005).

Training and coaching accelerate the learning curve and will earn you savings in time and money.

Ellen Gottesdiener, Principal Consultant, EBG Consulting, helps you get the right requirements so your projects start smart and deliver the right product at the right time. Her book Requirements by Collaboration: Workshops for Defining Needs describes how to use multiple models to elicit requirements in collaborative workshops. Ellen’s most recent book, The Software Requirements Memory Jogger describes essentials for requirements development and management. In addition to providing training and consulting services, Ellen speaks at and advises for industry conferences, writes articles, and serves on the Expert Review Board of the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA) Business Analysis Body of Knowledge™ (BABOK™). You can subscribe to EBG Consulting’s free monthly eNewsletter Success with Requirements (http://www.ebgconsulting.com/newsletter.php) for practical guidance and requirements-related news. When you sign up, you’ll receive a free .pdf article by our Senior Associate, Mary Gorman, on an essential requirements modeling technique.

References
Henschen, Doug, David Stodder, Penny Crosman, Michael Mcclellan, Neal Mcwhorter, and David Patterson. 2007. “Seven Trends for 2007.” Intelligent Enterprise, January. See http://www.intelligententerprise.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=196603897

Hickey, Ann M., and Alan M. Davis. 2003. “Elicitation Technique Selection: How Do Experts Do It?” Proceedings 11th International IEEE Requirements Engineering Conference. September.

Hooks, Ivy F., and Kristin A. Farry. 2001. Customer-Centered Products: Creating Successful Products through Requirements Management. Amacom.

Jones, Capers. 1996a. Patterns of Software Systems Failure and Success. Thomson Computer Press.

Lauesen, Soren, and Otto Vinter. 2001. “Preventing Requirement Defects: An Experiment and Process Improvement.” Requirements Engineering, June 6:37-60.

Leffingwell, Dean. 2003. “Calculating the Return on Investment from More Effective Requirements Management.” IBM Developer Works, December.

Leishman, Theron R., and David Cook. 2002. “Requirements Risk Can Drown Software Projects.” Crosstalk: The Journal of Defense Software Engineering, April.

Light, Matt. 2005. “Agile Requirements Definition and Management Will Benefit Applications Development.” Gartner RAS Core Research Note G00126310, Gartner, April 18.

Nelson, Mike, James Clark, and Martha Ann Spurlock. 1999. “Curing the Software Requirements and Cost Estimating Blues.” The Defense Acquisition University Program Manager Magazine, November–December.

Reifer, Donald J. 2007. “Profiles of Level 5 CMMI Organizations.” Crosstalk: The Journal of Defense Software Engineering, January.

Rodrigues, Alexandre G. 2001. “Project Goals, Business Performance, and Risk.” Cutter Consortium e-Project Management Advisory Service Executive Update, 2(7).

Schwaber, Carey. 2006. “The Root of the Problem: Poor Requirements.” IT View Research Document, Forrester Research, September.

Standish Group International, Inc. 2003b. Standish Group Study. Reported by Jim Johnson, chairman, XP 2002 Conference.

Weinberg, Gerald M. 1997. Quality Software Management, Volume 4: Anticipating Change. Dorset House.

04/23/07

The Coming of Age of the Business Analyst

Written by Kathleen B. Hass, PMP on March 26, 2007. Posted in Articles.

The dismal success of enterprise-wide IT projects is a matter of national record. According to Meta Group Research (now a part of Gartner), “Communication challenges between business teams and technologists are chronic – we estimate that 60%-80% of project failure can be attributed directly to poor requirements gathering, analysis, and management.” Forrester Research concurs: “Poorly defined applications have led to a persistent miscommunication between business and IT that largely contributes to a 66% project failure rate for these applications, costing U.S. businesses at least $30B every year.” James Martin reports that “56% of defects can be attributed to requirements, and 82% of the effort to fix defects.” Standish estimates that nearly 70 percent of projects are late, over budget or fail outright; Gartner reports that 50 percent of projects are rolled back out of production. Carnegie Mellon states that 25-40 percent of all spending on projects is wasted as a result of rework. And the Office of Management & Budget reported on March 26, 2003 “…771 projects included in the fiscal 2004 budget – with a total cost of $20.9 billion – are currently at risk.”

Those statistics are troubling. So, what exactly is the problem? Project managers are held accountable for getting projects completed on time and on budget. Technical managers are responsible for quality technological solutions. But no one has been accountable for keeping an eye on value as the implementation proceeds. That’s why the new position of business analyst (BA) is fast emerging to fill the gap. The BA’s task is to gather accurate requirements, analyze them and manage them properly throughout the project’s implementation to ensure a value-added outcome that improves an organization’s bottom line. Business requirements, derived from business goals, are the essential activities of the enterprise that must be supported by the system – so much so that at conferences, BA courseware and presentations have become hot topics, and cutting-edge companies are already hiring BAs or investing in professional development for internal candidates.

Defining the Role

In virtually every organization, the pivotal leadership role of the business analyst is beginning to shape the future of IT. In a nutshell, BAs are focused on business needs and on monitoring the value a project has promised to deliver to the organization throughout its implementation. The BA continually scrutinizes costs and compares them to benefits to ensure the project remains sound.

In October 2003, as the role of the BA emerged, the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA, www.iiba.com) was created as an international, not-for-profit professional association for business analysis professionals. “The IIBA was founded in response to a real demand in the business community for more BAs,” says Kevin Brennan, a consultant with blue sands, inc. in Toronto, Canada, who serves as Co-chair of the IIBA’s Body of Knowledge Committee. “Businesses have been facing a shortage of people who are qualified to perform requirements analysis, and proper requirements are critical to developing software effectively, on time and in concert with overall business strategy. When companies hire new employees for these roles, they have no guarantee that these candidates actually have the knowledge and skills required. Without a pool of people who can perform business analysis, it’s difficult for IT departments to deliver what the business needs.”

The impetus for the Institute’s launch came from a group of companies based in the Toronto area that had experienced difficulties in hiring business analysts. “Applicants presented all sorts of skills and all sorts of backgrounds, but could not consistently be expected to be effective in the role,” says Brennan.

The IIBA’s mission is to develop and maintain standards for the practice of business analysis and for the certification of practitioners. It defines the position as follows: “Business Analysts are responsible for identifying the business needs of their clients and stakeholders to help determine solutions to business problems. The BA is responsible for requirements development and requirements management. Specifically, the BA elicits, analyzes, validates and documents business, organizational and/or operational requirements. Solutions are not predetermined by the BA, but are driven solely by the requirements of the business. Solutions often include a systems development component, but may also consist of process improvement or organizational change. The BA is a key facilitator, within an organization, acting as a bridge between the client, stakeholders and the solution team. Business analysis is distinct from financial analysis, project management, quality assurance, organizational development, testing, training and documentation development. However, depending on an organization, a BA may perform some or all of these related functions.”

As with any other profession, there are entry-level, mid-level and senior positions. Senior BAs emerge from talented people current in both technical skills and business acumen, and they represent a critical strategic asset to their organizations. They work with the executive team and with project portfolio planning and management teams on:

Pre-project analysis and feasibility studies
Building business cases for new change initiatives
Comparing initiatives to identify which one can be implemented with the fastest time to market and lowest cost and risk to achieve the highest value
Decision-making to invest in the most valuable projects

Competencies and Skills

Business requirements’ analysis differs from traditional information systems’ analysis in its focus, which is exclusively on adding value to the business. In particular, project managers rely on BAs to assist in providing more detailed project objectives; business needs analysis; clear, structured, useable requirements; trade-off analysis; requirement feasibility and risk analysis; and cost-benefit analysis. Without the key liaison of the BA, requirements’ definitions will remain poor, resulting in disconnects between what IT builds and what the business needs. Although the function of BA is distinct from that of a Systems Analyst who fulfills a primarily technical role, some BAs are former Systems Analysts or IT managers. With additional professional development, technical specialists can advance into a business-focused BA position. A future job opportunities ad for a BA will likely call for the following skill sets and competencies:

The BA is “bilingual” in that he or she speaks the language of management and leadership, as well as the language of the IT organization. This ensures requirements are developed and documents structured for optimum use by technical personnel in the design and development of solutions. At the same time, these requirements and documents need to be understandable to the management team, so it can use them to validate business needs.
Technical proficiency and skills in requirements’ elicitation
A thorough understanding of business process work flows
Ability to plan, execute and facilitate workshops at which requirements are gathered from users, customers, stakeholders and developers
Interviewing and surveying skills to obtain information from business subject matter experts
Prototyping competency to work with technical teams in procuring early validation of projects
Strong communication skills, and specifically expert writing skills, to ensure that statements of textual requirements are unambiguous, accurate and complete. While requirements must be written in business language rather than in technical terms, they must be understandable by technical personnel.
Excellent project management skills to plan and manage business analysis activities
Good knowledge of modeling techniques and risk management
Verification and validation skills, to ascertain that requirements are valid
Problem-solving skills
Organizational change-management skills. Once a solution has been developed, the BA prepares the organization to implement and operate it efficiently, so that the value of the new asset is maximized

While technical knowledge is a prerequisite for the role, it is insufficient for successfully managing the requirements of the large, enterprise-wide, complex, mission-critical projects that are the norm today. “One of the goals of the IIBA is to raise the quality of software requirements analysis and thus improve the overall delivery of IT projects,” says Brennan. “Currently, software requirements analysis frequently takes place without directly considering the strategic goals of the enterprise. While business users are interviewed and their needs synthesized and analyzed, there are always competing interests that don’t necessarily tie into enterprise goals. In the future, BAs will effectively tie IT efforts to the business and help drive change efforts across the enterprise.”

Business Analyst Knowledge and Skill Set Requirements

Training for BAs

Since there appears to be a never-ending demand for new IT products and services, executives across the spectrum are adopting the business analysis process to increase the value IT projects bring to the business. In building the business analysis competency within their organizations, they rely on training companies that have developed leading-edge BA course materials and entire BA certification programs.

Training organizations are working in concert with the IIBA, which is in the process of setting standards and developing a body of knowledge for the discipline. “The IIBA’s Body of Knowledge is similar to that developed by the Project Management Institute (PMI) for project management professionals,” Brennan explains. “It describes industry standards for business analysis based on practitioner input and industry best practices. We surveyed the literature of the field and distributed task surveys to practitioners and asked them to review drafts of the Body of Knowledge in comparison with their day-to-day professional practices. At last count, we have had over 600 responses from Business Analysts around the world. That gives us the confidence to say that the content of the Body of Knowledge is in fact reflective of the realities of a BA’s work day.” The first release of the Body of Knowledge was in July 2006 with an update scheduled for later this year. It will be used by training organizations, individual practitioners and businesses that need to develop BA job descriptions. More information is available at www.theiiba.org “

The IIBA is also developing a certification test to award the designation of Certified Professional Business Analyst. “We are using the task survey to validate the certification process to ensure compliance with ISO standards for professional bodies,” says Brennan. The Business analyst student must acquire mastery of a unique combination of technical, analytical, business and leadership skills. The curriculum of a business analysis certificate program consists of studies of computing and management information systems, coupled with traditional business administration courses. It is designed to enhance participants’ ability to elicit, analyze, document, secure agreement, test, trace and manage requirements throughout the life of a project. Courses may include subjects such as the following:

Fundamental skills for mastering business analysis
Skills for planning and managing project requirements
Business analyst leadership skills
Project meeting management skills
Advanced skills for crafting high-quality requirements, verifying and validating solutions and managing projects for value.

In addition to certification programs, training companies offer half-day and full-day workshops that concentrate on building various key skill sets, such as facilitation, communication, modeling and writing. Of course, effective business analysis career development goes beyond classroom study. Companies will also need to provide mentoring and on-the-job training; advancement based on education, testing and experience; defined evaluation and compensation processes; and suitable titles and advancement opportunities.

How can a BA acquire the stature and influence that will make an executive team listen? It may take some time for BAs to prove themselves and gain recognition. As they conduct expert studies and present solid information to management, either during the strategic planning process or in the course of project selection, they will gradually raise the executive team’s confidence until they become an indispensable strategic asset.

Where Will the BA Reside?

Should mid-level and junior BAs reside in the business-operating unit or in IT? Both solutions have pros and cons. If the BA resides in the business unit, management will take greater ownership of systems problems, gaps and capabilities. It can then collaborate with the BA to develop solutions, which may range from procedural to technical. When the BA resides with the IT group, a possible disadvantage is that the business side may attempt to throw problems over the fence without taking responsibility. On the other hand, if the BA resides in the business organization, he or she may tend to grow increasingly distant from the company’s IT operations. Some organizations have solved this problem by building “communities of practice” in which BAs from all the different business units cooperate according to set standards with the goal of continuous improvement. A good rule of thumb is that mid-level BAs who work on small enhancement projects and troubleshooting should reside in the business unit and consider themselves a team of BAs that are decentralized across the business. In this manner they can work together under a single leader and according to standard processes.

The role of systems analyst will continue to be separate and important. Once a BA documents the requirements from a business perspective, systems analysts will use those requirements to develop systems specifications and solutions. In small organizations one individual might fulfill the role of both BA and systems analyst. He or she will convert business requirements into systems specs and work with IT architects to design the best, most feasible solution. Larger organizations will have teams of systems analysts and teams of BAs who will be exclusive in their roles.

Senior-level BAs can be most effective when they report to a high-level, enterprise-wide project management office or center of excellence where they work to support strategic planning and project selection and to manage major change initiatives. From this vantage point, they will have a perspective of the entire organization rather than being limited by a functional silo. Whether senior BAs are working in a strategic mode on business transformation projects, mergers and acquisitions, new lines of business or multi-million-dollar IT projects, they need a bird’s-eye view of the entire enterprise to ensure that the investment is sound and that the organization will realize the expected benefits.

Creating Value

Depending on the level of responsibility and placement in the organization, a Business Analyst’s duties may include the following:·

Identify and understand the business problem and the impact of the proposed solution on the organization’s operations.
Document the complex areas of project scope, objectives, added value or benefit expectations, using an integrated set of analysis and modeling techniques.
Translate business objectives into system requirements using powerful analysis and modeling tools.
Evaluate customer business needs, thus contributing to strategic planning of information systems and technology directions.
Assist in determining the strategic direction of the organization.
Liaise with major customers during preliminary installation and testing of new products and services.
Design and develop high quality business solutions.

Once a large, high-risk project is funded, the BA becomes one of the full-time, core team members along with the lead developer, key subject matter experts, the project manager, the technical lead and the business visionary who is sponsoring the initiative. While the sponsor need not be a full-time team member, he or she must be available to the team and be fully empowered to make decisions on behalf of the business.

As a member of a project team, the BA’s key role is to keep an eye on the business case and promised value. At each key phase in the project – every time project plans and budgets are updated and when risk is reexamined – the BA revalidates the business case by comparing costs and benefits. He or she manages the entire systems requirements life cycle, from understanding the business need to ensuring that the delivered solution meets the need and adds value to the bottom line. No longer will initiatives be funded for two years only to end in failure because no one performed consistent checks along the way to determine if the investment still made sense. Since projects are negative assets while under way they must be constantly revalidated.

Among the BA’s strategies is the creation and delivery of feature-driven requirements in increments so the business receives value sooner at lower risk. Although each increment is only a small piece of the new solution, feature-driven requirements can be prioritized based on business value. The IT team delivers the highest value features first for immediate benefit.

Once the project is completed, the solution delivered and the project team dissolved, the BA works with the executive sponsor to measure the benefit and report it to all decision-makers. If the benefit does not meet expectations, the BA analyzes what went wrong. For instance, was it a poor investment decision; was it poorly executed; or did it cost more than expected, resulting in poor ROI? This analysis is critical because its results will improve the selection and execution of future projects.

Maturity and Mastery

Companies depend on IT solutions for their very survival. In order to change quickly, respond to new customer demands and beat the competition, they require well designed and built systems. Once management has developed a portfolio of valuable IT projects, the focus is on flawless project execution to maximize the value delivered to the organization.

All too often, however, IT project success is elusive. Projects are late, over budget or may never even be delivered. Sometimes work is incomplete, does not meet requirements or does not deliver the expected benefits or ROI. In many cases, once the results are delivered a few years after the business case was first proposed, the marketplace or company’s needs have changed. Disasters such as these have created a sense of urgency to build a stronger bridge between business and IT. Now, the role of BA has emerged to serve as a liaison between the business community and the technical solution providers throughout the project life cycle. As projects become larger, cross-functional, global and more complex, organizations are realizing that requirements’ management skills are indispensable.

Companies are struggling to manage their portfolios of IT, R&D and other projects. The ideal is to invest in projects that will bring the highest value quickly at the lowest possible cost and risk. But senior decision-makers have neither the time nor the skill sets to analyze competing options, particularly when they involve highly technical solutions. For a mature and effective portfolio management process, leadership needs to be able to depend on a professional trained to perform the necessary analyses, present the best solutions and manage projects for value-added outcomes. The role of the BA is vital to the success of both projects and organizations. Those organizations that are first to acquire and master business analysis competencies and elevate them to a leadership role will more effectively respond to and preempt changes in the marketplace. As a result, the flow of value through the enterprise and to the customer will achieve a significant competitive advantage.