Marie Halsey - What's in Your BA Toolkit (Nov 2010)

What’s in Your BA Toolkit?
Marie Halsey
November 2010
Marie Halsey Consulting Inc.

November 2010 Marie Halsey Consulting Inc.
Learning Objectives
2
! The different types of BA tools and
when they are appropriate
! The key requirements to consider
when selecting BA tools
! The process to follow when assembling
your BA toolkit

Background
3

One day …
4

BA Role: Liaison Among Stakeholders …
Business
Sponsors Clients
Operational
Support
Suppliers
Business
Analyst
Solution
Delivery Team
Project
Managers
End
Users
Customer
Reps
Regulators
- Solution Architect
- Developer
- DBA
- Usability Specialist
- Tester
- Trainer
- Change Manager

What Tools to Use?
It depends …
! Methodology
"Waterfall, iterative, agile
! Project type
"Custom software, COTS,
infrastructure/hardware-only
! Artifacts produced
! Maturity of BA organization
6

Types of Communication Tools…
7
! Low-tech and hardware-based tools
! Collaboration tools
! Software-based tools, to produce:
"Documents
"Diagrams
"Other Artifacts

Low-Tech & Hardware-based Tools
8

Collaboration Tools
9

Software-based Communication Tools
10

Software-based Tools
11
Let’s look at:
! the various types of software-based
communication tools
! which artifacts are best suited to each type
Refer to “Marie Halsey - Software Tool Categories.xls”

Issues with Office-type Tools?
12
! No supporting database
"No support for meta-data
! No associations, traceability is difficult
! Re-use is difficult
! No integration between diagrams & elements
! Requirements management is very difficult
! Reporting is WYSIWYG, no automated
‘packaging’

How to choose? Follow the process!
Define
BA Toolkit
Req’ts
Identify
BA Toolkit
Needs
Assess
Current
State
Toolkit
Needs
Toolkit Gaps
Select
Product(s)
Identify
Toolkit
Gaps
Processes,
Problems
Conduct
Product
Assessment
Implement
BA Toolkit
Detailed
Toolkit
Req’ts
13

Document Your Requirements
14

Functional Requirements – Usability
15
! Easy to use; intuitive, consistent interface
! Easy to learn; online help, tutorials
! Supports fast data capture & diagramming
"‘Drag and drop’ existing elements onto diagram

Functional Requirements
– Requirements Capture and Presentation
16
! Tree view
"Parent-child hierarchy
"Expand/collapse
! Table/spreadsheet view
"List of attributes
"Parent-child structure maintained
! Traceability
"Matrix view
"Tree view

Functional Requirements – Traceability
17
! Directional
"Hierarchical (‘Traces To’ and ‘Traces From’)
"Parent-child
! Non-directional (peer-to-peer)
! Cross-project (project segmentation, re-use)
! Flag missing traceability
! Flag ‘suspect’ relationships

– Views and Reports
18
! Searching, filtering and sorting
! Tailoring and user-defined templates
! Report on text, tables, diagrams, meta-data
! Multiple formats (e.g., Word, Excel, HTML, XML)
! Metrics (e.g., how many changed req’ts?)
! Impact analysis
! Packaged output appeals to all stakeholders

– Useful Features
19
! Spell checking
! Glossaries (e.g., highlight ambiguous terms)
! Bulk data selection
"Range (SHIFT-Click), non-contiguous (CTRL-click)
! Bulk processing
"Parent-child, re-parent
"Update attribute values
"Traceability

Functional Requirements – Use Cases
20
! Full integration of use case with activity
diagram
"Automatically maintains activity diagram
"Changes to activity diagram automatically reflected
in use case, and vice versa
! Use case has different attributes than use
case steps.
! Automatic numbering of steps, alternate paths
! Supports ‘extends’ and ‘includes’ use cases

– User Interface Prototyping
21
! Sketches, mockups & wireframes (low fidelity)
! Simulations and prototypes (high fidelity)
! Templates and branding
! ‘Look and feel’ widgets, banners, controls
! Images and snapshots of current UI
! Site maps and screen transitions/flow
! User comments
! Associate data model elements

– Requirements Management
22
! Change Management / Change control
"Revision history
"Compare versions; shows revision marks!
"Notification of changes
! Configuration Management
"Baselines and versioning
"Release management (multi-release support)
"‘Living’ Master Requirements List
"Re-use

Functional Requirements - Integration
23
! Associate diagram elements with meta-data
! Associate requirements artifacts with
reference material (e.g., documents, images
and diagrams, URLs)
! Import from Word and Excel
! Package requirements, using all formats of
artifacts

– Associations and Interoperability
24
Integration is critical!

Document Your Requirements
25

Non-Functional Requirements
26
! Work offline?
! Co-located or distributed team?
"Client-side or web-based?
! Team size?
"Concurrent or ‘named’ licenses?
"Multi-user support?
! Project size? How many requirements?
! Data security and user management?
! Scalable for future growth?

Non-Functional Requirements
– Tool Administration
27
! User-defined requirement types
! Different attributes for each requirement type
! Attribute formats (text, $, date/time, URL, etc.)
! Attribute validation – single- and multi-valued
lists, range of values
! Project templates

Keep following the process!
Define
BA Toolkit
Req’ts
Identify
BA Toolkit
Needs
Assess
Current
State
Toolkit
Needs
Toolkit Gaps
Select
Product(s)
Identify
Toolkit
Gaps
Processes,
Problems
Conduct
Product
Assessment
Implement
BA Toolkit
Detailed
Toolkit
Req’ts
28

Prepare for Product Assessment
29
! Weight / prioritize requirements
! Prepare list of candidate vendors
"Check the internet, web reviews
"Talk to peers, professional associations
"Gartner reports, Forrester surveys
"Consider open source software
! Conduct survey based on high-level
requirements, to short-list 3-5 vendors,
! Arrange for demos, training & support

And then … Caveat emptor !
30

Known Toolkit Challenges
31
! Baselining, versioning, release management
! Comparing versions
! Integration of requirements elements
! Packaging / reporting, esp. non-text and
associated elements
! Ease of capturing and reporting traceability
! Support for re-use

Conduct Product Assessment
32
! Assess product compliance against detailed
requirements
"1 – Compliant, with ease
"2 – Compliant, with challenges
"3 – Partially compliant, with workaround
"4 – Partially compliant, no workaround
"5 – Non-compliant
"Write notes for items 2-5 (for later reference)
! Determine workarounds to tool gaps
"Are they worth the cost & effort?

Keep following the process!
Define
BA Toolkit
Req’ts
Identify
BA Toolkit
Needs
Assess
Current
State
Toolkit
Needs
Toolkit Gaps
Select
Product(s)
Identify
Toolkit
Gaps
Processes,
Problems
Conduct
Product
Assessment
Implement
BA Toolkit
Detailed
Toolkit
Req’ts
33

Select Product(s)
34
Consider cost of ownership vs. functionality
! Migration and training
! Licensing, vendor support, maintenance
! BA support (e.g., tool administrator(s), in-
house trainers, customized user
documentation)
! Integration / interoperability of multi-vendor
toolkit
! Hardware (e.g., server, database license)

Implement BA Toolkit
35
! Develop training, guidelines, best practices,
pre-defined templates or reports
! Conduct pilot to test new toolkit, including
testing of the training and documentation
! Consider phased deployment to reduce
project impact, esp. with multi-vendor toolkit
! Provide toolkit support
! Implement feedback mechanism

One Final Thought …
36

What You Learned …
37
! The different types of BA tools and
when they are appropriate
! The key requirements to consider
when selecting BA tools
! The process to follow when assembling
your BA toolkit

Questions?
Thank you!
Marie Halsey
mhalsey@magma.ca
Marie Halsey Consulting Inc.
38

Marie Halsey - What's in Your BA Toolkit (Nov 2010)

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