Question from the BA Community:
I’m part of a small business and I’m wondering how to best use the services of a BA. I know there are a lots of kinks to iron out of what we are doing in running our business, yet at the same time it feels like we need almost group therapy or something in order to get all of us to work in harmony and resolve certain problems. So when would be a good time to start using the help of a BA?
Answer:
What process do I need to review and change?When you are deciding when to employ a business analyst to help you with your business processes, I would say now! Deciding to bring in a consultant requires that you know what you want from them. Do your due diligence and ask yourselves the following questions:
- What are the pain points in our organization?
- Who are the people in my company that need to be involved?
- What do I really want to be the outcome of this engagement?
- Do I need a project plan?
- Are all the documents and stakeholders available to the consultant?
- Do I need a team building event to storm/form and norm?
Once you are prepared, then engage the business analyst. From my experience, people engage my services at different times. I have been brought in part-way through a project, at the beginning of a project and almost at the end.
I wish that everyone could bring the business analyst in at the beginning, but it isn’t always feasible. An example of one of my small consulting projects is where the client needed a quick turn around on a major process change. They wanted to reduce the number of visits the technicians made to the client site during an install. The current process involved the company sending out a data installer, then a regular installer and then sometimes an enhanced data installer. This was costly to the company and very confusing to the customer.
With training and process reengineering, I was able to reduce 90% of the installs to one technician. The business was prepared for me, however I needed to build the new process, negotiate, gather requirements, and train.
In conclusion, I would bring the business analyst in now and you will see the benefits very quickly.
What are your thoughts? When would you bring in the BA?
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By Michelle Swoboda. I am totally passionate about business analysis. I have always loved my work - however when I found this role - I felt like I was home. I have been a BA for 12 years. I have had many roles - project manager, business process analyst, team lead, business analyst - all that I love! I enjoy mentoring people and love to coach and hold webinars to train people. I live in Alberta, Canada with my wonderful husband and three West Highland White Terriers. View more blog posts by Michelle Swoboda |
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Michelle, I loved this article. For one, it addresses something that I think is latent and often not discussed, which is the value of a BA even in small business environments. Two, it’s quite realistic that we don’t always get the privilege of coming in early, sometimes we bring high-value by coming in late and revealing key process changes or whatever.
I just wonder though about the six questions that you suggest the client should prep in advance. Typically those are the questions that the BA brings to the client and even facilitates them in answering. I almost sometimes don’t want my client to have gone too far down the road to answer those things, because they tend to answer with certain organizational biases (or lenses), seeing things through current-state eyes, and not future-state possibilities.
What do you think?
Hi Curtis, good points. I guess I could go either way. I have been dealing lately with customers who do not know what they want or what their vision is. This has not worked well because they do not want to be guided either. I certainly see what you are saying but having had this recent experience, I would take a customer with a clear vision
so, you might use those questions almost as a “pre qualifying tool” to test for organizational readiness for a BA to come in and do their thing. That makes sense, too!
Michelle,
I had the same thought as Curtis when I read this article. Perhaps a desire to find their answer would also qualify…as a BA would be able to help them find the answers!
My answer to this reader’s question would be: As soon as you are aware of a problem and you are committed to solving it.