Chapter 3: Role of Business Analyst and Business Analysis Process
Role of Business Analyst
Business analysts perform wide range of tasks; role of the business analyst may vary from organization to organization. However below are the main tasks performed by IT business analysts, it may vary from project to project and organization to organization.
- Investigate business systems (IT systems) and current processes.
- Evaluate actions to improve the operation of a business system.
- Document the business requirements for the IT system development and support using appropriate documentation standards.
- To act as a bridge between the business problems and the technology solutions.
- Assist in integration and testing of new solutions.
- Development of training materials.
- Provide post implementation support.
Business Analysis Process
First step for any project starts with Business analysis phase. Business analysis phase involves multiple steps each with specific tasks. Some steps may be of longer duration while others are of shorter duration. Some steps may not be required in some cases.
Duration of the steps, which steps are required and which are not required depends on depends on the project and organization. However the general flow remains same across projects and organizations.
Business Analysis Process Steps
1. Gather all background information about the project
Project may be new or enhancements/changes to existing project, in both cases business analyst need to gather the background information. Background information includes:
- Existing process and documents (if any)
- Project domain information (domains include banking, insurance, logistics etc)
- Factors that influence the project
2. Identify the stake holders
Stake holders are the people who are interested in the project and involved in decision making. Stake holders may include:
- Owners – person who sponsors the project.
- Project Managers – Responsible for communication & monitoring the progress of the project and remove impediments to project if any.
- Project team members- people who are responsible for delivering the project such as developers and testers etc.
- Partners – Separate group of people or an organization who work with core project team and provide the support and services.
- Customers – People who use the products and services.
- Suppliers - Separate group of people or an organization who supply hardware, software or any other service required for the project.
3. Setup Review Meeting with stakeholders
Meeting is setup with the stakeholders to ask questions and get details related to the project.
4. Analyze the project relevant documents and discover the business objectives
After analyzing the available project related documents business analyst need to discover the business objectives.
We need to make objectives SMART
- Specific — describes an outcome that is clearly visible
- Measurable — outcome should be measurable using some measurement method
- Achievable — objective needs to be feasible to achieve within the given timeline
- Relevant — needs to be in alignment with the company’s vision
- Time bound — There should be sensible time limit to achieve the objective
5. Record the information discovered
From research and analysis business analyst may discover many useful information relevant to the project.Information May include
- Business requirements including reporting requirements
- Functional and non-functional requirements
- Business processes and supporting systems
- Issues and risks that are currently influencing the project
6. Evaluate possible options
In this stage business analyst will evaluate and select the best possible option to achieve the objective.
- Feasibility Study – Looking whether able to build product/service with available resources
- Cost-benefit analysis- looks at cost of pursuing an action and the benefits of that action
- Impact analysis- identifying and presenting actions that affect the project
- Risk analysis- various risks that can be involved in pursuing an action
Possible options may include
- Purchase an existing product/service/system
- Customize/enhance an existing solution to achieve the business objective
- Integrate with other systems to achieve quick to market times
- Build a product or service from scratch
7. Define the Scope
Based on the discussion and discoveries done earlier, business analyst will prepare scope document. It will include In scope requirements and Out of scope requirements.
8. Provide business analysis delivery plan
The business analyst and project owner will provide a detailed timeline for delivering the requirements to the development team. A timeline for the requirements will be provided based on factors such as:
- Project scope
- Stakeholders availability
- Project methodology
In this stage, Business Analyst Delivery Plan document will be shared.
9. Define and present the business requirements
In this step the business analyst will clarify requirements with the business owner and get the approval and deliver requirement to the development team.
Requirements can be divided into functional and non-functional requirements.
Functional requirements are defined using techniques such as flow charts, use case templates, story boards, prototypes, wireframes and text descriptions.
Non-functional requirements include performance, security, scalability, availability etc. These requirements are usually described in texts.
10. Support implementation throughout SDLC
A business analyst is involved throughout the Software development cycle to ensure requirements are implemented as required by business.
- Business Analyst will interact with
- Development team during development stage
- Testing team during testing phase
- End users during user acceptance testing
- Facilitate the movement of the project to production environment
11. Evaluate the project
Once project is implemented evaluation is done to ensure project is on track to achieve business objective.
- Tracking progress
- Identify the improvement areas
- Getting feedback for customers/users
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