I was talking with a Project Manager recently. She said that she thinks most Business Analysts get anxious when a project, or idea for a project, is not well defined. In her organization, the initial phases of a project involve looking for business opportunities, thinking about strategy, considering if the idea is aligned with the organization’s goals. I started thinking about her observations. Is she right? Are we as Business Analysts uncomfortable with an undefined “idea” about a potential project?
As always with business analysis my answer is: It depends! I do think that some BAs may be uncomfortable with the “fuzzy” nature of the task. We do like to get things done and we like to have a detailed understanding of the business needs. Having said this, I also think that some BAs are brilliant at looking at business opportunities/problems from a high level and “thinking outside the box” about options. One of the characteristics of an excellent Business Analyst is the ability to see the big picture and to see details. Even during detailed requirements gathering and analysis we should periodically step back to see the work from a broader perspective.
The reality is that all Business Analysts are not the same. I believe that our profession is going to specialize, just as many of the IT roles are specializing. Some of us will be more big-picture thinkers and some of us will be more detail-oriented. The good news is that there are lots of opportunities for us to bring value to our organizations!
When my role in my technical system switched from coder to BA, one of my chief personal goals was to start teaching the central service organization that provided requirements the ins and outs of the technical processes that had, throughout the years, been implemented to render the business rules. It made sense, since the tech team knew the business rules, that the business should know the technical rules. As time moved on that goal was realized. As the lines between vision, requirement provider responsibility, and technical-process knowledge became blurred, however, it became more and more obvious that the business was relying heavily on the BA to figure out their requirements for them without the BA having actual access to the end-users. Anxiety began at the point that the BA was helpless to gather requirements (since they had no access to the end customer, which was the realm of the central services organization) but was still relied upon to guide the customer meetings, no longer guiding, but doing all the thinking for the central service business based on a vague mission statement or goal. Anxiety is valid at this point, since once the project gets underway, bickering starts as to the actual roles of the BA vis a vis the end user, the logic of the BA determining business rules, and the effectiveness of a service organization that doesn’t have access to the end users. Barbara is right – The roles of BAs are not the same everywhere. In-house technical BAs should insist that their customers are working as hard as they are in the early stages of a project, and refuse to continue with a project if they have to lead every conversation that doesn’t involve the business simply restating their executive summary business goal. BAs should allow their anxiety to guide them into insisting on shared responsibility that ultimately serves the project, stakeholders, SMEs, and BAs best.
I recently read a white paper that discussed competencies needed by Business Analysts. One of the interesting points it made was that different levels of BAs would use different tools, do different tasks, and have different views of their work. For example, in eliciting requirements a junior BA would assist by doing surveys and interviews, an intermediate BA would lead group sessions such as RAD and brainstorming, while a senior BA would identify which people should identify the requirements and what the priorities are. For business process reengineering, they suggest that tasks range from use-case modeling (junior), through workflow analysis (intermediate), to "ensure business goals are met" (senior). It takes time to learn and develop your analysis skills so that you can envision larger parts of the business and how the requirements for one area impact others. Only someone who has the vision to think strategically will be comfortable with the "visioning" part of a project. Those who are still developing their skills should be brought in when the project is more defined.