The classic role of a
business analyst is quite same irrespective of the industry he works in. He assumes the
role of bridging the gap between the business and technology i.e. to translate
business processes into functional requirement specifications which developers can understand.
Business Analyst responsibility is divided into different sub-tasks depending
on the project phase. In the Requirements phase, the BA has to gather data
regarding the pain points of the client and understand the client’s/business
users expectations from the technology. The scope and the high
level business requirements are captured at this stage. There are several requirement
gathering techniques like Joint Application Development (JAD) sessions,
surveys, interviews, etc. JAD is a methodology wherein the client/end user
take’s active participation in the design and development phase.
Next, Design
phase involves translation of the high level requirements into detailed level
functional and non functional requirements. In this phase Test Lead would come up with
test cases for the scenarios identified and the different tests were performed. This test cases has to be reviewed and approved by the BA. Trace-ability matrices can also used by
BA to map the business and functional requirements. A BA is responsible for
managing the change requests that can come up mainly during the development and
testing phase of the project. And in the Testing phase, he has to approve the test
results and also conduct BA testing and support UAT.
The above activities are inherent
in a BA profile no matter which domain they work in. The skills related to
these activities are also transferable when a BA moves from one
domain to another. In fact, transferable skills are the key which demonstrates
the competence of an aspiring business analyst. A good BA should be able to
effectively utilize requirement elicitation techniques, soft skills and
analytical skills plus focus on the process rather than the deliverables.
There
are several personality traits which determine how good a BA is. The
ability to negotiate prudently and perseverance are two traits tested most in a
BA. The biggest challenge a business analyst faces is to interview a business user
who would be his most important client. BA needs to convince them to give
their time and effort on actually explaining them their business process. A
business analyst needs to have good comprehension so that he can grasp the
business processes quickly. This will help him ask questions quickly and
thereby nail the client’s pain points sooner. IT skills will also help a BA to
act as an ideal liaison between the business and the technical departments.
Inquisitiveness, strategic thinking and an eye for detail are other important characteristic features a business analyst requires. As far as domain related knowledge is concerned, few basic nitty-gritty’s would always help BA in making his initial days in the new domain easy. However,
as we saw, a good business analyst can easily pick up the domain with a little effort. Otherwise, his skills are the biggest factors which take a business analyst a long way. A
good business analyst can always work his way into any domain with a small
learning curve.
In the end i would say an adventurous business analyst would focus on working in
more than one domain which will give him abundant exposure into several
businesses. A good business analyst can be judged better by the various
analytical skills, soft skills like inquisitiveness, comprehension skills, etc,
his communication skills and his personality traits like perseverance, pleasing
behavior, etc rather than just the domain in which the BA has worked or years
of experience in a particular domain.
About Author:
Onkar Lalla is a Consultant and an important part of the Systems Plus Pvt. Ltd. think tank. Within Systems Plus, he actively
contributes to the areas of Technology and Information Security. He can be contacted at onkar.l@spluspl.com
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