What does business analysis really mean?
Let’s start: The Business
We start our considerations with the company or the „Business“: Every organization has to reach certain goals on the market. This raises the question: How should IT, processes and organization be aligned and coordinated in order to support the path to the goal? How can we translate the corporate strategy onto the project level? What business needs can be derived and what specific requirements incur from it?
To answer these and other questions is the real job of a business analyst. By taking the ancient Greek word „analysis“ literally, the business analyst „strips down“ the company mentally into its individual parts and build it together into a new large whole.
Job Title: Business Analyst?
Only a small group of those persons doing business analysis activities call themselves business analysts. But: This number is also increasing steadily. With the new discipline of business analysis they all receive consolidated and methodical tools they need to master the complex requirements of this job everyday.
On the other hand this means: You do not have written „business analyst“ on your business card to make business analysis. Behind the following professional titles there is also often hidden business analysis:
Business Consultant, organizer, requirements engineer, system analyst, process manager, IT consultant, management consultant, business architect, enterprise architect or project manager.
Business Analysis Body of Knowledge (BABOK)
If you want to learn more about the duties of business analysis, you should definitely read the BABOK® Guide (A Guide to the Business Analysis Body of Knowledge®) of the International Institute of Business Analysis.
There business analysis is defined as follows:
Business analysis is the sum of the tasks and methods that are used to communicate between different stakeholders with the aim of the structures, principles and processes of a company to understand and to recommend effective solutions.
In the upcoming version 3.0 of the BABOK this definition is simplified and are as follows:
Business Analysis is the practice of enabling change in an organizational context, by defining needs and recommending solutions that deliver value to stakeholders.
This definition consists of the six core concepts that have been defined in the Business Analysis Core Concept Model (BACCM). If you want to learn more about it, I recommend my webinar on the BACCM.
Business analysis in practice
The BA Camp is a platform to discuss methods, tools and tips that work in practice. And that works only with you, the business analyst himself. Because of this fact this community event, in the form of an unconference, will also only be structured through you guys!
More about the Programme.