SureSkills Business Analysis & Agile Breakfast Briefing - Belfast, November 21st 2013


Business Analysis & Agile

Your Way to Success – ensuring economic, effective, efficient quality best

practice service (every time)



– a Collaboration

Ruaidhri McSharry |


Agenda

SureSkills Welcome

Business Analysis & Agile – So What! Ruaidhri McSharry,

SureSkills

Who is the Business Analyst in 2013? Cameron O’Connor, SME

SQS/SureSkills

Agile – an industry story Franco Campione,

Director CME Group

An Agile Approach to Business Intelligence Maurice Lynch, CEO

Nathean Technologies

Q&A / Event Close Event Panel


Global

Delivery EMEA

AJP

USA

Project

Management Program & Project Management Practices

Project office, PMO, Portfolio

Management, Resource Placement:

Program Managers & Project Managers

Education

Development Instructor Led & E-Learning Development

Rapid 2

SureSkills Connect

Service

Management Gap Analysis – Best practice

frameworks & Standards – ITIL®,

ISO20000

Steering – Continual Service

Improvement Programs

LaaS Social Learning

E-Learning

Virtual Labs Capability

Social

Media Social Media for Business

Digital Marketing

Search Engine

Optimization

Business

Analysis Business Analysis Operations

Assess & Recommend: Business

processes

Business Process Modelling

Managed

Services Service Desk Outsourcing

Application Management and

Deployment

Vendor SLA Management

Private Tailored Customized Courses

On site/off site

Groups

1-1

Public Schedule Microsoft

VMware

ITIL

PRINCE2

Business Skills

SQL

Business Analysis

Support Pro-Active Monitoring and Alerting

IT Administration (MAC service)

Remote and On-Site Hands On

Response

Technical

Consulting Data management solutions

Storage solutions

Virtualisation solutions



– So What!

Ruaidhri McSharry |


Business Analysis


Definition of Business Analysis

An internal consultancy role that has the responsibility for

investigating business systems, identifying options for

improving business and bridging the needs of the business

with the use of IT.

But is this correct?

Do you agree with this?


Challenges & Opportunities Facing Bus. Analysts

http://www.batimes.com/articles/would-you-hire-a-project-manager-or-a-business-analyst.html





















Different Versions of Reality


Business Analysis can ensure.....


Is the Requirement for a Duck or a Rabbit?

Similarly, is the

requirement for

a Sales

Solution OR

Marketing

Solution

OR

Manufacturing

Solution

OR all three?

Ill-defined requirements or inability (or reluctance)

of users to articulate their requirements challenges

effective requirements definition

Ummm…. I want something that has some sort of

hearing ability, can See AND can EAT also…

Question.. Does the user

want a Duck or a Rabbit? (after Wittgenstein)

Based on These

requirements, the user will

probably get a Duckrabbit!

Multi-world views

or multi-

Weltanschauung


1

5

“I think my main challenge based on my experience so far as a BA could be

grouped under the banner of engagement. There will always be areas I am

asked to work on that will be outside my expertise. If a BA is very technical

then understanding the bigger picture & the company strategy, economy,

political and other environmental risks takes work. If a BA is very business &

environment driven then understanding IT solutions can be more challenging.

We are trying to be a master of all trades & then mostly condensing that into

one appealing document.”

Business Analyst Feedback - Challenges


Key Skills of a Good Business Analyst

• 30% Capturing business needs & shaping

requirements through dialogue with business

sponsors

• 25% Understanding end user requirements

• 25% Working on solution design & communicating

with solutions team

• 10% Project Management

• 10% Integration planning/dependency management/

business process mapping

Source:

http://www.executiveboard.com/blogs/what-to-look-for-when-hiring-a-business-analyst/


• Challenges Willingly: able to speak up to shape requirements,

influence sponsors and understand the “why” behind requests

• Deals with Ambiguity: Information-intensive projects tend to have

the most unclear requirements. This emphasizes the business

analysts’ ability to reason logically and efficiently through ambiguity-

and be intellectually flexible

• Collaborates Effectively: BAs need to collaborate with host of

stakeholders

• Filters & Analyzes Information: Business sponsors supply BAs with

a large volume of information which they must analyze to understand

priorities and options, as well as filter signal from noise

• Applies a Journalistic Mindset: Being a business analyst often

involves observational and puzzle-solving skills similar to a journalist

or anthropologist, particularly where the requirements are unknown

or difficult to express

Key Skills of a Good Business Analyst


Agile


What is AGILE?

Agile Methodology is an

alternative to traditional project

management, typically used in

software development. It helps

teams respond to

unpredictability through

incremental, iterative work

cadences, known as sprints.

Agile methodologies are an

alternative to waterfall, or

traditional sequential

development.

The Waterfall Model is

a sequential design process, often used in software

development processes, in which progress is seen

as flowing steadily downwards (like a waterfall)

through the phases of Conception,

Initiation, Analysis, Design, Construction, Testing,

Production/Implementation, & Maintenance.


Agile – What It Can Mean

• Agile transforms teams to deliver flexible, efficient, high-quality projects

that enables businesses to meet rapidly changing requirements by

utilising cross departmental teams to produce high-quality projects.

• Agile project development methods are based on iterative &

incremental development feedback loops that can be used to optimise

the delivery of project phases while maximising alignment to

customers’ needs.

• Through collaboration & communication, Agile allows organisations to

assess and adjust any development aspects throughout the project

lifecycle to keep projects on track, minimise risk and maximise ROI.


Why Agile?

Agile Promotes:

• Fast project delivery

• Successful project delivery

• Earlier ROI

• Collaboration

• Communication

• Cross-functional teams

• Lightweight documentation

• Projects delivering against customer needs

• Cultural change

• Organisational change

• Continual assessment of priorities

• Dynamic projects related to changing

requirements

• Maximise return

• Lower risks


IT Project Management Landscape

Project Methods

• Waterfall

• Agile & Lean

Quality Management

• Service Management (ITIL / ISO20000)

• Security (ISO27000)

• Governance (COBIT / ISO38500)

Complexity

• Information Exchange

• Platforms – Smartphone, Tablets

• Global Enterprises & Customers

Service Delivery Models

• Virtualisation, Cloud

• SaaS


Traditional PM Methods

PRINCE2 PMBOK


Traditional PM – PRINCE2 & PMBOK


What is LEAN?

The core idea is to maximize customer

value while minimizing waste. Simply,

lean means creating more value for

customers with fewer resources.

A lean organization understands

customer value and focuses its key

processes to continuously increase it.

The ultimate goal is to provide perfect

value to the customer through a perfect

value creation process that has zero

waste.


What is SCRUM?

Scrum is the most popular way of

introducing Agility due to its simplicity

and flexibility. Because of this

popularity, many organizations claim to

be “doing Scrum” but aren’t doing

anything close to Scrum’s actual

definition. Scrum emphasizes empirical

feedback, team self management, and

striving to build properly tested product

increments within short iterations.

Doing Scrum as it’s actually

defined usually comes into conflict with

existing habits at established non-Agile

organizations.

Scrum has only three roles: Product

Owner, Team, & Scrum Master.


Agile PM – SCRUM


Incremental Development & Delivery

REQUIREMENTS


The Major Agile/Lean Methods

• Scrum (1995) – PM Oriented – Timeboxing

– Prioritized backlog

– Daily standup meetings

– Demo after each iteration

– Correct the process through lessons learned

XP (1999) – Engineering Oriented

• (A)TDD, refactoring, pair programming,

continuous integration, simplicity, whole

team, planning game, …

Kanban(2010) – Max Value & Continuous Improvement

Visualize

Reduce WIP

Manage Flow

Make process Policies Explicit

Build in Feedback Loops

Improve Collaboratively (using scientific method)


Adapted from Don Reinertsen, 2009

Economies of Speed

Shorter Cycle Times

Improved Quality

Less Demand

Less Overhead

More innovation

Manage

Variability

Reduced Risk

More Motivation


Chaos Project Database 2002-10

Adapted from Standish Group 2010

“It is now U.S. law that all DOD contracts are Agile” – Jeff Sutherland Dec 2012


• The Gartner 2012 advisory on

application development to all IT senior

management is:

o Business users are losing

patience with old-school IT

culture

o Relationships are tense &

resentful

o Legacy systems & practices

impede agility

o Adopt a product perspective

o Say goodbye to waterfall

o Improve cross-competency

collaboration

o Launch a deep usability

discipline

Why Change - Business


Why Change - BA Gone Awry

• Communication Barrier

• Lack of Skills

• Out of date (previous experience)

• Undue project influence (requirement priorities)

• Reduce Stakeholder influence

• Reduce feedback

• Reduce opportunities for developers to gain

communication skills

• Over analyse?


Agile Perspective - Pragmatic

Agile Business Analyst

Significant shift in how we look at requirements

When they are defined in the process

BA integrated part of the team throughout the life

of the project

Requires new skills

Collaboration - project team and the business.

Facilitation

Leadership

Coaching


BA Role - Team Organisations

Categories of team organisations (Scott Amber 2006)

1.One Room

Developers & Stakeholders are co-located

2.Over the wall

Single location BUT not co-located

3.Across the network

Dispersed / Distributed Development


The Right Horse?

Barriers to Further Adoption of Agile:

• Resistance from business partners

• Lack of developers with the ability to be successful with Agile

• Lack of support from first line managers

• Funding model in conflict with Agile processes

• Time required to up skill and transition staff

• Complexity of projects

• Lack of confidence in ability of Agile to scale

• Project interdependencies are difficult to manage with Agile

• Challenge of using Agile with distributed teams


So?.....

1. All projects are suitable for Agile ??

2. Business does not always have time / desire to

be ‘Product Owner’

3. Business may lack broad business perspective

(department perspective)

4. “Architecture” perspective

Reality for Business Analysts?


Which Means …..

Revamp Perspectives

Reduce isolation of specialists

More Facilitator than bridge

Collaborate / Facilitate

Leaders

Mentors

Lose Weight

Decouple breadth & depth

Collaborative approach

Flexible Methods Across Project

Types

“Generalising specialists” in

Development

Agile techniques for agile

projects

‘Slimmer’ traditional technique

for ‘waterfall’ projects


Who is the Business Analyst in

2013?

Cameron O’Connor |


What is a Business Analyst?

• “An internal consultancy role that has the

responsibility for investigating business situations,

identifying and evaluating options for improving

business systems, defining requirements and

ensuring the effective use of information systems

in meeting the needs of the business” – Business

Analysis – Paul, Yeates & Cadle


Role of the Business Analyst

• The key agent of Change

• To bring Structure to Change projects

• Planning and Strategic Thinking

• Advocate and Advisor

• Ability to learn a new domain

• This is accomplished using techniques, skills

and experience


Attitudes to Change

Entrepreneur

Formal Planning

Strategy

Intrapreneur, individual

or group


It’s all about getting the Requirements

right


The BA’s Role Covers

• Develop a business strategy

• Identify Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

• Understand stakeholder perspectives

• Model business activities

• Perform GAP analysis

• Identify areas for improvement

• Manage stakeholders

• Propose solutions

• Articulate the costs and benefits

• Develop the business case

• Management the Requirements Process


Business Analyst v System Analyst

Business Analyst System Analyst

Bridge between IT &

Business

Based in IT department

Develops the Business Case Evaluate technical solutions

Stakeholder focused Resource efficiencies

Excellent communication

skills

Good written and mathematical/

analytical skills

Applications focused (IS) Systems focused (IT)

User Acceptance Testing Systems Testing


Skillset of Analyst - Learn

• Access to and understanding of the current

situation:

– the core values, core purpose and vision of the

organisation

– the external environment

– the objectives of the organisation

– the current strategies

– new ideas

– the issues (problem analysis)


BCS Business Analyst Practice

• Develop a business strategy

• Identify Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

• Understand stakeholder perspectives

• Model business activities

• Perform GAP analysis

• Identify areas for improvement

• Manage stakeholders

• Propose solutions

• Articulate the costs and benefits

• Develop the business case


BCS Requirements Engineering

• Hierarchy of Requirements

• Requirements Elicitation

• Use of Models in Requirements Engineering

• Managing Documentation

• Requirements Validation

• Requirements Management


Written Exam

• Open book

• Case study based

• 15 minutes reading time and 1 hour written

• Pass mark 50%

• Practice questions available

• Mock exam at the end of this course


BCS Business Analyst Diploma

• Awarded by BCS (British Computer Society)

Professional Certification

• Passing written exams leads to Certificates

• Once passing 4 exams you can take the oral

exam leading to the Diploma

• More information on BCS website


Agile – an industry story

Franco Campione |


CME Group • World’s largest futures & options exchange

• 3000 staff / 1500 IT

• IT occupies 8 floors in the west edge of the

Loop in Chicago

• Competitors


• In 2009 – all of IT was waterfall

• All developers were in cubes. Is Tom in today? Let me email him.

• Do we even have windows? I can’t wait to go home.

2009


• Agile buy in? In early 2010 – The 12 person

development team moved to sit together

Except the room was:

• Small

• No natural light

• 1 3ft x 3ft whiteboard

• A perimeter desk with everyone facing away from

each other

• The loudest air conditioner you’ve ever heard

• Next to the bathroom

Agile Buy In?


It was a massive success


Success based on what?

The complaining disappeared


End of 2010 – Let’s Build a Proof of Concept

• Idea paint

• No walls

• TVs & projectors

Proof of Concept


2011 – Build 2012 – Move in!

• An entire floor of 175 people

• 16 dedicated agile areas

• The brushed aluminum button

2011 & 2012


• Seating for 10

• 4 simultaneous displays

• Fuzzy pillows and Xbox’s

Mediascape


• Iteration 0

• 2 standups a day

• Retrospectives & showcases

• The role of PM

• Transparency

• Business Involvement

CME Agile Landscape


• Just in Mind

• Jira

• Confluence

• Custom Dashboard

Tools


Business Intelligence

Maurice Lynch |


So What’s The Problem?

Fear of the unknown! How much will it (eventually) cost me?

How long will it take?

Will it work?!

…only 36% of managers in top performing organisations get

information they need in timeframe that supports their decision

making cycle… Aberdeen Group, 2011

…fewer than 30% of business intelligence (BI) initiatives will

align analytics completely with enterprise business drivers… Gartner 20012


• Disparate business systems and data sources

• Set of in-built reports with each system

• Heavy & recurring Excel usage

• Information out-of-date soon after it is published

• Key metrics not always well known

• Reporting driven by IT not business users

• Lack of centralised control over data distribution

• The Project Goal : “Single View of the Customer”

Typical Starting Points


• Create a Project Plan (Waterfall Method):

• Ask every department what reports they want

• Determine all possible data sources for Day #1

• Design and build a Data Warehouse

• Up-skill staff on new BI tools…

• Go Live … and hope the business does not change!

Typical Solution


• The Project has become : “The Data Warehouse Project”

• Moved from the Business to I.T.

• New and unexpected data sources will have to wait for change control

• Uptake on new tools is poor or too advanced for users

• Revert to Excel and Ad-Hoc tools

Typical Problems


How far did we get?

Fear of the known unknowns!

Where are the reports I used to get!?

How much have we spent already!?

How long more will it take?!

The business is changing can we change the

requirements?!


The Agile Approach

Create Value & Momentum quickly

by starting with real world Burning Issues

…and don’t wait for “Perfect Data”


A Customer Story…

Fingal County Council

Deliver a wide range of services to 240,000 citizens

On-going ad-hoc queries from multiple divisions across multiple systems

Implement Cost Savings and Efficiencies

Prepare reports for Government Departments


Finance

Time &

Attendance

HR

Payroll Other… Housing

Rates Water

Meter


Public Sector Times – Aug 2011

Benefits of Better BI for FCC

Improved efficiencies throughout the council

Greater transparency and increased accuracy of

data

Improved debt management and revenue

collections

Enhanced citizen services


Unknown Costs => Incremental Spending

Unknown Timeframes => Iterative Development

Unknown Adoption Rate => Immediate Feedback

Benefits of Agile

From the Unknown to the Known


About Our Company

Nathean Technologies Ltd.

• Founded in 2001, Dublin … 100% Irish Owned … Software & Data Services

• Our product Logix Agile BI™ is in use across multiple sectors

• Enterprise Ireland client since 2008 … Export to UK, US & Canada

• Member of CeADAR – Centre for Applied Data Analytics Research

• Domain Expertise in Procurement/Finance/HR/Payroll/ERP Analytics – Education, Public Sector, Commercial


Logix Agile BI™

Agile Development

Dashboards with Drilldown

Links Multiple Data Sources

PowerPivot Integration

Advanced In-Memory Caching

Multiple Client Applications

Pre-built Data Apps

Social Media Connectors

HTML5 – Mobile


Some of Our Customers…


Join The Debate on LinkedIn

SureSkills Service Management & Project Management Group

http://www.linkedin.com/groups?home=&gid=4839449&trk=anet_ug_hm


Belfast: Callender House, 58-60 Upper Arthur Street, Belfast BT1 4GJ, Northern Ireland

Dublin: 14 Fitzwilliam Place, Dublin 2, Ireland

Austin: 7000 N. Mopac Expressway, Suite 200, Austin, TX 78731, USA

www.sureskills.com

Phone: +353-1-240-2222 Email: [email protected]

http://www.sureskills.com/

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SureSkills Business Analysis & Agile Breakfast Briefing - Belfast, November 21st 2013

Business

Transcript of SureSkills Business Analysis & Agile Breakfast Briefing - Belfast, November 21st 2013