2511ICT / 7103ICT

Business Analysis

1.2. Business Analysis

and
1.3. Business Analysts

Readings: BABOK Chapter 1.2, 1.3,

(and see other readings on website)
Lecture outline:
 What is Business Analysis?
 What do Business Analysts do / know?
 Business Analyst vs. Systems Analyst
Lecture outline:
 What is Business Analysis?
 What do Business Analysts do / know?
 Business Analyst vs. Systems Analyst
 What is Business Analysis?
Defined in Chapter 1 of BABOK (p.2)

“Business analysis is the practice of enabling change in an

enterprise by defining needs and recommending solutions
that deliver value to stakeholders. Business analysis
enables an enterprise to articulate needs and the rationale
for change, and to design and describe solutions that can
deliver value.”

I.e., how can business analysis be performed in such a

way that it can deliver a solution which will add value to
the organisation?
 What is Business Analysis (cont.)?
Defined in Chapter 1 of BABOK (p.2)
• Business analysis (BA) may be performed on strategic,
tactical, or operational initiatives within an enterprise.
• Business analysis may be performed within a project, or
throughout enterprise evolution and continuous
improvement.
• BA can be used to understand the current state, to
define the future state, and to determine the activities
required to move from the current to the future state.
• The BABOK Guide also describes some BA perspectives:
agile, business intelligence, information technology (IT),
business architecture and business process management.
Lecture outline:
 What is Business Analysis?
 What do Business Analysts do / know?
 Business Analyst vs. Systems Analyst
 What does a Business Analyst do?

 Understands the enterprise problems and its goals

 Understands the actual needs of stakeholders, not just
expressed desires (requires investigation)
 Identifies and specifies solutions that address these
business needs (i.e. align designed and delivered solutions
with the needs of stakeholders)
But… what is a Business ‘Need’?
A ‘need’ reflects the perceptions of one or more stakeholders that
‘something is a problem’ – i.e., needs ‘fixing’ or improvement.

Examples
• Declining profit despite increasing sales
• High staff turnover
• Inability to meet deadlines
• High rate of errors

In this course you will undertake an analysis of a business need and

solution for an enterprise (company etc.) in order to solve a problem.

Think for a moment of a service or business which you have used and
that you believe had problems (with).
• What were that or those problem/s?
• How would you describe their ‘business need’?
 What does a Business Analyst do (cont.)?
A business analyst is “any person who performs business
analysis tasks described in the BABOK Guide, no matter their
job title or organizational role” BABOK p.2)
Note that although uncommon, Business Analysts may be
also employed in situations presenting only minor IT aspects.
Common job titles (notice the variety!):
• business architect • process analyst
• business systems analyst • product manager
• data analyst • product owner
• enterprise analyst • requirements engineer
• management consultant • systems analyst
 What does a Business Analyst know?
• Understand a domain (e.g. retail, manufacturing) in business / IT terms
• How to plan and monitor business analysis activities (BABOK chapter 3)
• How to elicit actual and expressed business needs (BABOK chapter 4)
• How to communicate and manage solution requirements, to obtain
agreement between stakeholders and maintain knowledge for future
use (BABOK chapter 5)
• How to identify and define business needs and their requirements
based on elicitation, validate and verify requirements and assess and
recommend a solution (BABOK chapter 7)
• How to refine, prioritise and elaborate solution requirements, to enable
implementation of solutions (BABOK chapter 6)
• How to assess proposed and deployed solutions (BABOK chapter 8)
• How to work in an agile environment, and which BA techniques are
applicable (BABOK Chapter 11.1 and BABOK Agile Extension).
 Business Analyst Competencies
Business analysts are expected to have knowledge and skills in three areas:
Technology, Business and People.

The ‘Underlying Competencies’ are described in BABOK Chapter 9.

 Prospects for Business Analysts?
Australia - “Employment for ICT Business and Systems Analysts to 2016-
17 is expected to grow very strongly. Employment in this large
occupation (32 600 in November 2011) rose very strongly in the past five
years and rose strongly in the long-term (ten years).
ICT Business and Systems Analysts have a high proportion of full-time
jobs (91.8%).
Unemployment for ICT Business and Systems Analysts is below average.”
http://joboutlook.gov.au/occupation.aspx?search=alpha&code=2611

USA - Employment among management analysts is expected to grow

22% from 2010 to 2020, faster than the average for all occupations.
http://www.bls.gov/ooh/business-and-financial/management-
analysts.htm
Lecture outline:
 What is Business Analysis?
 What do Business Analysts do / know?
 Business Analyst vs. Systems Analyst
 What next?
 Differentiation between a ‘BA’ and an ‘SA’

• Although there is some overlap between the work of

business analysts (BA) and systems analysts (SA), they
generally differ in terms of the necessary skill set.
• The BA tends to focus more on the business side, while the
SA focuses more on technical aspects.
• At large organisations, the BA role and SA role are often
separate job titles, while in smaller organisations they may
be performed by the same person.
 What does a Systems Analyst do?

• In general, systems analyst roles require a strong technical

skill set and often involve systems design responsibilities.
• Systems analysts tend to dig into the details of how a
requirement might actually be implemented in code.
• Systems Analysts tend to start with a set of good business
requirements and stop when they’ve spec’d out a system
design plan.
 What does a Systems Analyst do (cont.)?

• Usually, the systems analyst can consult with other IT

members in technical jargon foreign to the business
stakeholders.

• The stakeholders are just grateful the job is being done.

 What does a Business Analyst do?

On the other hand, a business analyst might start working

further up the stream in terms of business needs and
problems and stop at the functional requirements
specification, or at what the system will do and leave it to a
systems analyst or a senior developer to determine how to
do it.
 What does a Business Analyst do (cont.)?
• The business analyst has a more complicated position. He /
she must not only understand the way IT speaks but also
how stakeholders speak.
• The business analyst acts as a liaison between
management and IT.
• The main difference between the two roles is one of
emphasis: business analysts are concerned with the
business and how to use IT to achieve business goals,
while a systems analyst is more concerned with software
development and implementation.
BA vs. SA involvement in various project aspects