Comments on: The case for “business analysts” over combining BA with other roles http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles/ Advance Your Business Analysis Career Thu, 09 Feb 2012 00:08:14 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Mary Ann Overbaugh http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles/comment-page-1/#comment-5603 Mary Ann Overbaugh Wed, 05 May 2010 14:29:34 +0000 http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/?p=888#comment-5603 I totally agree with Anand as to the roles we are asked to play as a BA...I do not regret being tossed into roles where I could learn and earn. HR groups and recruiters should focus off the role names and descriptions and try to match the person to the skills requirements needed for the project. Recruiters can do a better job if they have had actual experience in the areas they recruit in and have a deep understanding of how each large corporation they supply is structured. Every company is a little different and have evolved to manage their particular business sectors. In my opinion, top skills of a BA's are great intuition, patience, fast learner, good problem solver, great soft skills and broad technical knowledge. BA's need to be able to manage ideas and solutions as well as people. PM's seem to be more focused on metrics and costs...usually two different personality types, styles and goals. As a 20 year veteran of IT with 10 years of consulting experience, I also know I must manage the recruiter interviews to the same degree of courtesy as when meeting with the client. I try to help recruiters by giving them vocabulary and I request finer distinctions while trying to interpret the job requirement by asking more questions. All in all, there has been a compression of roles that may result in lower project cost at the expense of quality. I totally agree with Anand as to the roles we are asked to play as a BA…I do not regret being tossed into roles where I could learn and earn.
HR groups and recruiters should focus off the role names and descriptions and try to match the person to the skills requirements needed for the project.
Recruiters can do a better job if they have had actual experience in the areas they recruit in and have a deep understanding of how each large corporation they supply is structured. Every company is a little different and have evolved to manage their particular business sectors.
In my opinion, top skills of a BA’s are great intuition, patience, fast learner, good problem solver, great soft skills and broad technical knowledge. BA’s need to be able to manage ideas and solutions as well as people. PM’s seem to be more focused on metrics and costs…usually two different personality types, styles and goals.
As a 20 year veteran of IT with 10 years of consulting experience, I also know I must manage the recruiter interviews to the same degree of courtesy as when meeting with the client. I try to help recruiters by giving them vocabulary and I request finer distinctions while trying to interpret the job requirement by asking more questions.
All in all, there has been a compression of roles that may result in lower project cost at the expense of quality.

]]> By: Twitter Trackbacks for The case for "business analysts" over combining BA with other roles [bridging-the-gap.com] on Topsy.com http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles/comment-page-1/#comment-2884 Twitter Trackbacks for The case for "business analysts" over combining BA with other roles [bridging-the-gap.com] on Topsy.com Tue, 01 Sep 2009 11:38:07 +0000 http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/?p=888#comment-2884 [...] The case for "business analysts" over combining BA with other roles www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles – view page – cached Combining a business analyst role with other responsibilities can be economical in small organizations but potentially result in lower quality work., Combining a business analyst role with other responsibilities can be economical in small organizations but potentially result in lower quality work. — From the page [...] [...] The case for "business analysts" over combining BA with other roles http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles – view page – cached Combining a business analyst role with other responsibilities can be economical in small organizations but potentially result in lower quality work., Combining a business analyst role with other responsibilities can be economical in small organizations but potentially result in lower quality work. — From the page [...]

]]> By: Laura Brandau http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles/comment-page-1/#comment-2737 Laura Brandau Sat, 15 Aug 2009 19:30:10 +0000 http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/?p=888#comment-2737 Hi Anand, I do applaud your enthusiasm and I think it's your kind of attitude that helps individuals advance in their careers. I do think we need to balance our desire to help with an understanding of what it takes (in terms of time, effort, and focus) to be the best at what our core responsibilities are. It can be tricky...but sometimes it is better to "just say no". Hi Anand,
I do applaud your enthusiasm and I think it’s your kind of attitude that helps individuals advance in their careers. I do think we need to balance our desire to help with an understanding of what it takes (in terms of time, effort, and focus) to be the best at what our core responsibilities are. It can be tricky…but sometimes it is better to “just say no”.

]]> By: Anand Mhaskar http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles/comment-page-1/#comment-2736 Anand Mhaskar Sat, 15 Aug 2009 16:57:23 +0000 http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/?p=888#comment-2736 " I don’t believe a single person can perform all these tasks well and in parallel " Of course. I agree. Not in parallel. Only sometimes, you have become 'sooo goood' a worker, everybody wants your participation in their projects. Then it is up to you to manage your time, decide if participating is worthwhile to you from any perspective at all. What can I say, I just enjoy attention and like to be busy! :) ” I don’t believe a single person can perform all these tasks well and in parallel ”
Of course. I agree. Not in parallel. Only sometimes, you have become ‘sooo goood’ a worker, everybody wants your participation in their projects. Then it is up to you to manage your time, decide if participating is worthwhile to you from any perspective at all.
What can I say, I just enjoy attention and like to be busy! :)

]]> By: Adriana Beal http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/the-case-for-business-analysts-over-combining-ba-with-other-roles/comment-page-1/#comment-2734 Adriana Beal Fri, 14 Aug 2009 20:55:25 +0000 http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/?p=888#comment-2734 Anand, I definitely agree with your thoughts on how taking different roles can help enrich your professional experience. As a consultant my BA role is many times expanded into information architect, user experience specialist, developer of prototypes, product manager, etc., and I both enjoy and learn from the variety of experiences. On the other hand, the thing I tried to warn IT management against in my article (quoted by Laura) is the danger associated with asking a person to fill multiple roles simultaneously. As skilled an individual might be in different areas, if you look at the number of activities that a business analyst may be required to perform in the course of a project (from planning the business analysis approach to conducting multiple elicitation activities, defining scope, prioritizing requirements, vetting the new requirements that surface during UAT, etc., etc.), unless we are talking about very simple projects with little change in requirements throughout the development cycle, I don't believe a single person can perform all these tasks well and in parallel manage the project or be responsible for other activities, like programming or testing the solution. In my opinion, it's simply too much for a single person to take care of with the level of attention and detail that most IT projects require to succeed, even for an extremely talented professional. "IT managers looking to economize on technology investments by filling multiple hats with one person", as Laura describes, may be very well be setting themselves up to feed the statistics of IT project failure that we all know are extremely high. Anand,

I definitely agree with your thoughts on how taking different roles can help enrich your professional experience. As a consultant my BA role is many times expanded into information architect, user experience specialist, developer of prototypes, product manager, etc., and I both enjoy and learn from the variety of experiences.

On the other hand, the thing I tried to warn IT management against in my article (quoted by Laura) is the danger associated with asking a person to fill multiple roles simultaneously. As skilled an individual might be in different areas, if you look at the number of activities that a business analyst may be required to perform in the course of a project (from planning the business analysis approach to conducting multiple elicitation activities, defining scope, prioritizing requirements, vetting the new requirements that surface during UAT, etc., etc.), unless we are talking about very simple projects with little change in requirements throughout the development cycle, I don’t believe a single person can perform all these tasks well and in parallel manage the project or be responsible for other activities, like programming or testing the solution.

In my opinion, it’s simply too much for a single person to take care of with the level of attention and detail that most IT projects require to succeed, even for an extremely talented professional. “IT managers looking to economize on technology investments by filling multiple hats with one person”, as Laura describes, may be very well be setting themselves up to feed the statistics of IT project failure that we all know are extremely high.

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