SEF-BAP7005 - Determining Business Requirements in Predictive and Agile projects

Course Description

Many of us work on projects as team members, managers, users, support groups or project managers. Most of these projects are cross-functional and/or cross-business, in that they span multiple departments, groups and borders within an organization. This program is for anyone who participates in or leads teams involved in developing and writing business requirements. Participants learn how to create the new wave of Business Requirements documents. The latest thinking is to be able to get to the market ASAP so there has been another revolution in the creation of requirements. For many projects it is no longer acceptable to have extensive Requirements Documentation. The major trends are to reduce text documentation and use different of models targeted at specific Stakeholders, “a picture is worth a thousand words”. Communication should be efficient and effective to each Stakeholder. These deliverables identify what the project will do (and for whom) and what it will not do (also known as in-scope and out-of-scope.) This information is also needed by the Business Sponsors to decide whether or not the project should proceed to the next step, Functional Specifications. Beginning with the second half of this course explore the basics of Agile. Look at how various Agile principles and platforms play into not only collecting requirements but also determining if a project is better run as Waterfall or Agile. Discover the various roles within Agile and how Agile planning and tracking take place. The workshop is endorsed by PMI ® (Project Management Institute) to help participants become better Business Analysts and if they want, prepare for the PMI-PBA SM , Professional in Business Analysis credential. Upon completion, attendees involved with PMI’s Project Management Professional – PMP and/or PBA programs, are awarded 16 PDUs or “Contact hours”. Our Global REP code is 1270. The workshop also complies with the IIBA ® its BABOK ® (Business Analysis Body of Knowledge).

Course Outline

1. Introduction to Business Analysis
   • What is Business Analysis?
   • The need for Business Analysis
   • What are Business Requirements?
   • Identifying Stakeholders
   • Who develops the Requirements?
   • Predictive and Agile environments
2. Business Analysis in predictive environments
   • A “Project within a Project”
   • Determining and managing Business Requirements
     • The Business Case
     • The Business Requirements Document
     • The Solutions Requirements Document
     • The Traceability Index c. Who’s Involved?
     • Stakeholders ii. Key Stakeholder Roles
3. The Business Analyst
4. Collaboration with the Project Manager
   • The Work of the Business Analyst
     • Needs Assessment
     • Requirements Elicitation
     • Requirements Analysis
5. Modeling the Business Domain
6. Common Model Types
7. Disconnects - issues in the PROCESS
8. Analyzing Disconnects
   • Solution Assessment and Validation
9. Pareto
10. MuSCoW
11. Cost-Benefit
12. Transition requirements v. Help management choose the right solution e. “Good” vs. “Bad” Requirements Brief introduction to DBR in Agile Environments (Day 2/Module 2 - “Agile Projects”)
13. From Predictive to Adaptive development
    • Challenges of predictive approaches and the need for agility
    • What approach for what project?
14. The roots of Agile
    • The Lean family
    • Lean history and philosophy
    • Value stream mapping New Course content
    • Empirical process control
15. The Agile Foundations
    • The Agile Manifesto
      • Agile Values
      • Agile Principles
      • Agile Practices
    • Agile Communications
16. Business Requirements in Agile environments
    • Creating the Business Case
    • Supporting the Charter approval
    • Iterative development:
      • Release planning
      • Themes, Epics, Features and User Stories
      • The Product Backlog
17. Agile Estimating
    • Story sizing
    • Agile Estimating techniques (planning poker, T-shirt sizing, analogy, expert judgment)
    • The Iteration Backlog d. Stakeholders and Roles
    • The Product Owner
    • The Servant Leader
    • The Agile Team 5. Brief overview of Agile Tracking
    • Definition of Done
    • Burn-down and Burn-up charts
    • Velocity
    • Lead time, cycle time, work-in-progress
    • Information Radiators

Learner Outcomes

Upon completion of this course, each participant will be able to:

• Understand the concepts of Business Case, Enterprise Analysis, and Business Requirements and Place them within the Project Life Cycle (AGILE and Waterfall)
• Use the PMI-PBASM Handbook as a job aide when fulfilling the business analysis role
• Apply a framework and toolkit for producing Business Requirements for new and/or improved products, services, and processes
• Identify the potential stakeholders and roles needed within the business project environment;
• Work with sponsors to develop the Project’s Mission, Scope and Charter;
• Understand and apply several tools for creating Business Requirements, e.g. Elicitation Methods, Crossfunctional Process Mapping, Fish-bone (Ishikawa, Cause and Effect Diagrams), MuSCoW Analysis, Cost Benefit Analysis, Pareto Analysis, ROI, etc.;
• Use tools to capture and analyze the “current-state” (as-is), identify potential problem and opportunity areas, identify disconnects, and perform gap-analysis to develop the business requirements of potential “end-states” (“to-be” states);
• Write Business Requirement Statements that are meaningful, effective and reflect the needs.
• Understand and address the impact of change on the people, and how this affects the business requirements process.
• State the difference between predictive and adaptive environments and identify which would be the most appropriate in a given situation
• Explain the roots and foundations of Agile • Identify various roles within the Agile environment
• Understand iterative development • Demonstrate Kanban within an Agile environment
• Understand the Scrum Framework
• Explain different means of Agile tracking

Instructors

• Stephen Campitelli

Applies Towards the Following Certificates

• Project Management with Agile Plus Certificate Program : Project Management with Agile Plus Certificate Program