Reflecting on 100 posts about bridging the gap between business and IT

Yesterday, Doug Hill had the honor of authoring the 100th post to Bridging the Gap.  While this caught me by surprise it is fitting for where the blog is at and what I envision it becoming. And in the spirit that I want to continue to infuse into this blog, Doug posted a detailed letter of advice to a potential business analyst. One BA reaching out to another and getting the return of some new insights.

In the last few weeks, I’ve begun to turn guest authorship on Bridging the Gap from an informal experiment into a bonafide program. I’ve got some big ideas about where this will go. Suffice it to say that guest posting at Bridging the Gap is not like the experience you might have at most blogs. Start today and you’ll get a monthly email with stats and a tip or two for sharing or promoting your experiences.  And with the latest redesign, you’ll also get an author bio at the bottom of your posts. In the coming months I am planning to provide more support and recognition to help guest authors make the impact they are looking to make.

For me (and many of you) business analysis is about a lot more than creating a collection of documents, dotting the “i”s and crossing the “t”s. Great business analysis manifests itself in how we interact with people on a day-to-day basis, our relationships, how we create value, and the problems we solve. We are in a world of churn and if we’re not careful about our historical tendency to be deliverables-focused we’ll be in a world of pain. This profession has a long way to go to achieve the recognition it deserves–the recognition you all deserve as BAs.

I am honored that this blog has become a successful forum for sharing thoughts from working business analysts on the profession. We started as a small experiment on a WordPress domain last September, transitioned to the new URL and hosting service in November, and then throughout 2009 responded to feedback (explicit through comments and implicit through traffic stats, ignored posts, etc). I’ve been blessed with steadily increasing traffic and subscriber stats, helped along by many readers and fellow-bloggers, and the occasional “spike”.  I’ve been inspired by many positive comments, words of encouragement, and thank yous. But for all the positive momentum, I realize this blog is just at the beginning of a long, potentially fruitful, journey.

I’m personally committed to helping talented individuals become great business analysts and helping talented business analysts become even better at what they do. In the end this means this means more BAs having a greater impact on more organizations and creating more value through technology. And to me, this is how I can contribute to marketing our profession. Better BAs driving better results means a better perception of the profession as a whole.

Of course, that’s a big goal and I can’t do it alone, which is why guest authoring is so important and why there’s more to come to get your experiences heard and your expertise shared.  Let me know what I can do to help you. And, of course, let me know if you have something you want to share on this little platform we call “Bridging the Gap.”

Thank you for reading and participating.

~Laura

By Laura Brandenburg. Laura Brandenburg is an independent business analyst consultant. She is passionate about the BA profession and is committed to contributing by supporting this blog as a forum for business analysts to build on each other's experiences. View more blog posts by Laura Brandenburg

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