Writing and Managing Effective Requirements (BA27)

Course Objectives:

• Obtain a thorough understanding of the core responsibilities of the business analyst
• Understand the main professional associations and standards supporting business analysts in the industry
• Discuss and explore the components of each of the domains/knowledge areas that comprise the work of business analysis
• Obtain a clear understanding of the various requirements types and the significance for eliciting each type
• Discuss requirements packages and types of requirements documentation
• Obtain hands-on experience with a number of business analysis techniques and models

Intended Audience:

This course is intended for intermediate to advanced Business Analysts who are looking to improve their skills for eliciting, analyzing, documenting, validating, and communicating requirements.

Prerequisites:

No prerequisites - This course is suitable for both beginner and intermediate business analysts who want to increase their skills for eliciting, analyzing, writing and managing effective requirements on projects.

Course Outline:

Section 1: Introduction to Business Analysis

• What is business analysis
• Benefits and challenges of business analysis
• Project success factors

Section 2: A Closer Look at the Business Analyst Role

• Definition of a business analyst
• Responsibilities of a business analyst
• Importance of communication/collaboration
• BA role vs. PM role
• Project roles involved in requirements
• IIBA/PMI and the goals of a professional association
• Purpose for having a BA standard
• IIBA’s BABOK® Guide and PMI’s Practice Guide in Business Analysis
• Business analysis beyond project work
• Business analysis core concepts
• Business analysis perspectives
• IIBA and PMI certifications for business analysts
• Workshop: Choose Your Project

Section 3: Supporting the Project Portfolio (Strategy Analysis)

• Define Strategy Analysis
• When to perform Strategy Analysis
• Components of Strategy Analysis
• Defining the business need
• Envisioning the Product and Project
• Defining business requirements
• The importance of stakeholders
• Stakeholder identification
• Tips for analyzing stakeholders
• Techniques for managing stakeholder lists
• Discussion: Who is involved in strategy analysis?
• Workshops:
  • Define the Business Need
  • Write Business Requirements
  • Identify Stakeholders

Section 4: Understanding and Defining Solution Scope

• Defining solution scope
• Techniques for defining solution scope
• Applying the brainstorming technique
• Project scope vs. Product scope
• Finding solution boundaries
• The Context Diagram
• Actors and key information
• Workshop: Draw a Context Diagram

Section 5: Understanding Requirements

• What is a requirement?
• Requirement types
• Business, Stakeholder, Solution, and Transition requirements
• Assumptions and constraints
• Business rules
• Taxonomy of business rules
• Decision tables
• How to write simple calculations
• Requirements vs. business rules
• Document requirements
• Workshop – Document Requirements

   Section 6: Elicitation and Process Modeling

• Why do we model processes?
• What is Business Process Management?
• Using a modeling notation
• “As Is” vs. “To Be” modeling
• Why use BPMN?
• Basic BPM notation
• Business Process Modeling – A case study
• Business Process Realignment
• “As Is” vs. “To Be” activity diagrams
• Workshop: Create a Business Process Model

Section 7: Planning and Eliciting Requirements

• Interviewing – what and why?
• Preparing for an effective interview
• Types of questions to ask
• Sequencing questions
• Active listening techniques
• Planning for elicitation
• Conducting the interview
• Establishing rapport
• Active Listening
• Feedback techniques
• Types of elicitation techniques
• Workshops:
• Planning for Elicitation
• Conducting an Elicitation Session

    Section 8: Use Case and User Story Analysis

• What is an Actor?
• Types of Actors
• How to “find” Use Cases?
• Diagramming Use Cases
• Tips on naming Use Cases
• Explaining scenarios
• The use case template
• Components of a use case
• Scenario examples
• Best practices for writing Use Cases
• Scenarios and flows
• Alternate and exception flows
• Exercises:
• Drawing a Use Case Diagram
• Writing the Main Success Scenario
• Writing Alternate and Exception Scenarios

Section 9: Analyzing and Documenting Requirements

• Requirements and Use Cases
• Non-Functional requirements
• User Interface Requirements
• UI Data Table
• Reporting requirements
• Data requirements
• Data accessibility requirements
• Characteristics of good requirements
• The business requirements document (BRD)
• BRD vs. Functional Requirements Specification
• Preparing the requirements package
• Requirements traceability
• Workshops:
• Develop a User Interface
• Analyzing Requirements
• Tracing requirements

Section 10: Additional Information

• Useful books and links on writing effective requirements