Business Analysis

In today's corporate environments, business analysis is key to the implementation of successful projects that deliver business value and create long lasting benefits. Therefore the role of the business analyst has evolved alongside that of the project manager, to initiate and complete increasingly complex projects in today's business environments. For a good understanding and appreciation of business analysis and the business analyst (BA) role, let's look at some definitions: "Business Analysis is the process of understanding business change needs, assessing the impact of those changes, capturing, analysing and documenting requirements and then supporting the communication and delivery of those requirements with relevant parties." Source: Business Analyst Solutions Ltd There are at least four tiers of business analysis: 1. Planning Strategically - The analysis of the organization's strategic business needs 2. Operating/Business Model Analysis - The definition and analysis of the organization's policies and market business approaches 3. Process Definition and Design - The business process modelling 4. IT/Technical Business Analysis - The interpretation of business rules and requirements for technical systems (generally IT) "A Business Analyst (BA) analyzes the organization and design of businesses; and also assess business models and their integration with technology." Source: Wikipedia "The Business Analyst position is uniquely placed in the organization to provide a strong link between the Business Community and Information Technology (IT)." Source: CSBA Body of Knowledge Business Analysis History Back in the 1970's Systems Analysts took responsibility for documenting existing manual paper based processes, identifying problems and new business requirements, and then automating these processes through computerised systems. This provided significant savings in staff as well as improvements to customer service through access to electronic information. Throughout the late 1980's and 1990's, companies started to evolve their IT systems to take advantage of new technology as they attempted to make further savings or improvements in service. Throughout this period, the role of the Systems Analyst evolved into the Business Analyst. 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Business Analysts are responsible for identifying change needs, assessing the impact of the change, capturing and documenting requirements and then ensuring that those requirements are delivered by IT whilst supporting the business through the implementation process. The Business Analyst must be involved from initial concept of the development lifecycle through to final implementation. Employing good Business Analysts makes a real difference to the success of your projects.