Modeling requirements, on the surface, to many of our stakeholders often seem easy or simple, but they are actually quite complex and can take a long time to master. This “complexity” is driven by many things including; different types of modeling (process, data, use case, interface, and scope modeling) size of project, methodology, approach, stakeholder preferences, and time to model. As a result, I often see Business Analysts frequently needing to repair, reconstruct, or renovate their requirements models which is not always a good thing nor does it always make sense. One of these works for me and the other two do not.

Renovation – it works. When I think of renovation, I often think of process improvement efforts. Continuous improvements. To reinvigorate something, make new, revive. It is about keeping value, being future focused. This concept for any business makes sense to me. This type of remodeling works because it is often driven by ideation, some kind of Enterprise Analysis, Six Sigma, Lean, or other approach. It, perhaps, can even be seen as an attitude or force that drives how you work, but it is different than repairs or reconstructions, which do not work for me.

Repairs and reconstruction – do not work. Why do we have to repair or reconstruct our requirements models? When I think of repairing or completely reconstructing requirements models, I think of rework. I do not like to work much as it is, so the idea of doing it again is not exciting to me. A classic example is the process flow diagram. Let’s run through a scenario:

1. Business Analyst schedules meeting with stakeholders to discuss process.
2. BA interviews stakeholders during meeting.
3. BA takes notes and goes back to cube to work on process flow.
4. BA schedules new meeting for review.
5. BA reviews process flow with stakeholders at meeting.
6. Stakeholders rip the process flow to shreds.
7. Go to step 3.

And there you have it. A potential infinite loop of rework! And this loop is costing a lot of time and money. Time you probably did not have to begin with. So we need to ask some questions. Did you understand your stakeholder’s point of view? Did you have the correct stakeholders? What approach to your model did you take? The approach is very important. It drives how and when you model. Is there a different way of doing this? How about this as an alternative:

1. Business Analyst schedules interactive process modeling meeting with stakeholders to discuss process.
2. BA facilitates stakeholders during meeting to “interactively” develop the process model together as a team during the meeting using white board, post-its, or other preferred materials.
3. BA gains agreement/consensus on the process model at the meeting.
4. BA takes picture of agreed upon process flow with smart phone and goes back to cube to create a final version in the company’s diagramming tool of choice.

Less steps, less rework = less cost and less chance of needing repairs! If you do your stakeholder analysis up front you can get the right people. The stakeholders, together as a group, will provide their viewpoints during the meeting. The approach requires less time. Remember, for this approach to work, the BA must be a strong facilitator (a theme in the BABOK®).

So with regard to repair and reconstructing requirements, I am not a big fan. An anonymous salesman once said, “Genius is the ability to evade work by doing something right the first time.” What you are really doing is evading the rework. I cannot agree more. Renovation will be needed some year in the future, but if we can avoid the repair and reconstruction on our current projects our work lives will be more enjoyable. Modeling is complex, but if we can do something proactively to limit repairs and reconstruction, well, that is where the true value of your requirements “home” will be kept up and you will not have to wait for the market to rebound.

The Big Remodel was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

Of course, there is no “right” a lot of the time.  In my classes, for example, I instruct and inform, but I also facilitate discussions about the options, and the students decide what’s going to work for them.

This brings me to the recent Facilitation Skills Workshop class I taught.  In this class, we learn about different facilitation techniques and then the students do the work; they actually facilitate each of the 12 sessions throughout the class.

Maybe you are like many of the students in this class who are terrified of speaking in front of groups. Their hands shake, they sweat, and some have a hard time breathing.  This fear is not unlike other fears and there is often a visceral response.

It is amazing to watch those folks who are terrified of facilitating get up in front of a group and, with some preparation, tools, and guidance, actually help the group accomplish a goal.  It is enormously validating- for them, the participants, and me.

The last session of the 12 sessions is one in which the facilitator brings the class to consensus on the top 5 characteristics of a good facilitator.  My last class came up with the following Top 5 Characteristics of a Good Facilitator:

1.     Neutrality
The facilitator cares that the group achieves their goal in the session, but they don’t care what the results look like specifically.   

2.   Preparedness
A facilitator needs to be prepared for their session. Facilitation might look easy, but it is hard work. Taking time to understand the group and issues, as well as practice the skills and techniques to be used make for a far more effective facilitator and one who will be much more likely to help the group achieve its goals.

3.   Energetic
A facilitator needs to be neutral, but that doesn’t mean they should be comatose.  Bringing some energy to the session helps keep people focused and engaged. 

4.   Clear idea of Purpose/Agenda
A good facilitator needs to start with a clear understanding of the goal of the session and the tools they might use to achieve that goal.  In short, be flexible, but have a plan. 

5.   Positive
An effective facilitator makes the participants want to achieve the session objective.  Even if it’s addressing a problem, a positive tone will encourage participants to own their part of the outcome.

It wasn’t necessarily the list I would have come up with, although those are certainly things we talk about in the class.  As I sat in the back of the room watching them come to this conclusion together as a group, facilitated by one of the students, it was an interesting and, in some way, teachable moment.  For me.

Facilitation Top 5 was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

Before you get too far, I recommend taking a look at the blog from Rich and Elizabeth Larson (7 Trends…) on Business Analysis in 2012. Do your plans take into account these upcoming trends and predictions? Over the last 20 years I have found it extremely helpful to stay on top of trends, predictions, and the general goings on of your industry. The more you can stay in touch with them the better prepared you will be to address any given situation or need. However, have you been waiting for the New Year to make your resolution and plan? We talk predictions and address trends all year long and I recommend that you should make resolutions and plans that way too. Why?

Consider this; there were over 24 million references to New Year resolutions on various search engines this year. People coach all the time to start the New Year right with a “realistic” resolution. Whereas I like the idea of “realistic”, there are a few problems that can get in the way of making a New Year’s resolution successful. Timing, commitment, and lack of understanding about what you truly need. This is why I do not like New Year resolutions. Most resolutions are made without a basic understanding of these things.

We often make resolutions because we think we want something. It is so easy to get caught up with what society expects, influenced by friends and family and the next thing you know, you have a New Year’s Resolution to live up to. What we should be focused on is what we actually need. Sound familiar? All good Business Analysts know that we should elicit needs right? Not to mention, what we “need” is rarely found at the beginning of the year and does it really make sense to wait all year to make a resolution?

I suggest that we need to create resolutions when the need arises or becomes evident. When the need is actually known you can determine your level of commitment and plan appropriately. Hmm… now does anyone see a problem with the way most companies run their planning process? A lot like New Year’s resolutions! Then a BA gets assigned and they spend half the year trying to find out what the true need is… well I think you get my point. So my challenge to you is to take control of your resolutions and make them when they make sense whether in March, July, October or the New Year, if they really do happen then. Just make sure you understand your timing, commitment, and most importantly, what you truly need and then you can build a plan for success in 2012 and beyond!

A New Year’s Resolution? was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

 As an instructor, I am happy to own the success of the learning events I lead.  It is my job to understand students’ needs and then figure out how to best meet them.  In addition, it’s my responsibility to do that in a way that maximizes the student experience, that is, make it fun, engaging, and pertinent to their real world.

What, if anything, do the students own?  Students often see training as a break from the proverbial grind.  They want to have fun, relax, and even be entertained.  And that’s fine.  Learning should be fun.  But how is the success in the classroom dependent on what they bring to the experience?

I remember some questions that a colleague used to ask her students at the beginning of each class to open their minds to the idea that the success of any learning experience is, in part, their responsibility.  She asked them to note somewhere privately the answers to the questions below:

     One a scale of 1 to 7 (low-high), rate yourself on the following:

          How participative do you plan on being in class today?

          How much “risk” are you willing to take, that is, try new ideas?

          To what extent are you interested in the success of everyone in the room?   

          How important are you to the success of this class?

Learning and development are often cited as key ingredients to fixing our national economic malaise.  Perhaps many of us are or will be increasingly finding ourselves in training as our organizations embrace the idea that learning and skills development are the cornerstones of being competitive, and maybe just surviving, in the knowledge-based, global economy of the 21^st century. Are these questions that we all could be asking ourselves more?

I’m signed up to take a class in a few weeks and I’m pretty excited about it.  It will be a change of venue for me.  I get to relax and let someone else figure out how to meet my needs.  I’m even holding out hope that I might be entertained a bit.  I’m looking forward to a great instructor leading me through a great class.

But I also had better be willing to own my piece of the learning experience. I will need to participate and take some risk to get outside of my comfort zone because that is the only way to truly learn. I hope I’m  interested in the success of everyone in the room because their success is my success.  And how important am I to the success of the class? I think critically.

Learning Success was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

And what did 2011 bring us in the world we live in?  In no particular order:

• The deaths of Kim Jong Il, Moammar Gadhafi and Osama Bin Laden.

• The marriage of a Prince and his Princess in Kate and William.

• Another singer added to the “27 club” RIP Amy Winehouse.

• The courtroom drama of the year with Casey Anthony.

• Katy Perry ties Michael Jackson’s record for most number 1’s on one album.

• The record 9.0 magnitude earthquake and subsequent tsunami and tragedy in Japan.

• Two new American Idol judges who ended up more popular than Simon Cowell’s big brag the X Factor

• The “Arab Spring” with uprisings for freedom in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Syria and Libya.

• New tech gadgets changing how we live including an iPhone that talks to you.

• Occupy Wall Street.

• The end of an era including the space shuttle program, Oprah Winfrey, Borders Books, Harry Potter, Steve Jobs and the Iraq withdrawal.

• Grave predictions from the Mayan calendar for 2012.

But what of Business Analysis and the world we work in for 2011 you say?  Again, in no particular order:

• More and more companies get on the Agile bandwagon and we will explore this quite a bit in 2012.

• A very successful Building Business Capabilities conference in Ft. Lauderdale, FL (I was there – where were you?) Oh, and the theme in 2012 is Creating the Agile Enterprise.

• I saw companies changing the way they think about requirements, adapting to the changes that mobile devices (smart phones and tablets) are making in our companies and everyday lives.

• Several successful IIBA Business Analysis Development Day conferences in Minneapolis, Des Moines, Cincy, Omaha (I was there speaking at all of them – where were you? Lol).

• I saw a disturbing trend of people pushing the BA out of the Agile process (a trend we will reverse in 2012 with some good education!).

• Watermark Learning won the PMI Product of the Year Award for their new Project R.E.A.L. class (developed by someone you might know as BobtheBA. Lol, I just had to add that last part you know…). Real experience, applied learning. A new way of looking at training.

• I saw another disturbing trend of companies using workshops as their only method of eliciting requirements (another trend to reverse).

• More companies recognizing the value of the BA and investing in training (which will help reverse those previously mentioned disturbing trends).

• I saw the development of Business Architecture Forums and Enterprise Analysis rising up with a focus on good business cases (a trend that will continue).

• I worked with and saw so many people really take control of their careers this year – people that wanted to become BAs or just improve their careers and did despite the odds because they had passion, drive and understood that they needed to be leaders in their domain. Congrats people, congrats. You know who you are so now go inspire others to greatness as well!

Well, that is just a few of the things that 2011 brought us. Certainly I could go on and on and on. What did you see that we should not forget about 2011? Please feel free to share with everyone! Do you know what you are going to do in 2012? In my next blog I will chat about what 2012 has in store for us and talk a bit about how to sustain that promise of change in the New Year.

2011 BobtheBA and A Quick Look Back was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

The close of one year tends to make one reflect on what has occurred in the past year and ponder the future. Here we ponder some trends in the Project Management and Business Analysis fields for 2012. Here are our top seven predictions for business analysts (BAs) and project managers (PMs) in 2012.

1. Divergence of the PM and BA Role. In 2009 we predicted that as the economy tightened, organizations would decrease their project budgets and combine the role of PM and BA. For 2012 we believe that organizations will see the need for both roles, particularly on strategic projects, and move away from a combined role. There are several factors for this trend:

• Business analysis is maturing as a profession. As the IIBA has gained traction, more organizations have become aware of the BA role and its importance. From 2010 to 2011 the number of IIBA members increased about 50%.
• Organizations have found that even with successful project management, many projects fail because of dissatisfaction with the end product. Having business analysts helps ensure that the product is a solution that works and is one the organization needs.
• PMI has recognized the importance of the business analyst role. In 2010 they undertook a study to determine areas of overlap, handoffs, and how the two roles could collaborate.

2. Combined Agile methods. We predict that Agile methods will continue to change and merge as organizations take advantage of the benefits of Agile. In our 2009 Trends blog we stated that “Integrating Agile methods into project management and business analysis is a trend that will continue in 2009. Currently, the industry has a wide, varied, and inconsistent use of Agile techniques. This trend is likely to continue.”

 In the two years since we wrote that article, Agile methods have continued to evolve. Although organizations have widely adopted Scrum as the predominant Agile method, they still struggle with its implementation. We think that organizations will continue to adopt Agile methods, but that these methods will continue to evolve. Combined techniques, such as Scrum-ban (which combines Scrum with the Lean technique Kanban) or Scrumerfall (a combination of Scrum and Waterfall) will be adopted for different kinds of projects.

 3. PM and BA on Agile projects. We predict that the role of the BA and PM on Agile projects will solidify. When Agile started to be adopted, some organizations thought that the roles of PM and BA were obsolete. However, more and more organizations have recognized that the need for both roles, even if the titles are new. The Scrum Master role is best filled by someone with the expertise to coordinate the initiating, planning, executing, monitoring, & controlling, and closing each iteration and release. In other words, the work typically done by a PM. The designations of Certified Scrum Master (CSM) from the Scrum Alliance and Agile Certified Professional (ACP) from PMI have solidified this role.

 The role of the BA on an Agile project has not solidified. BAs are used in a variety of ways or not at all on Agile projects. There have been heated discussions on LinkedIn discussion groups and at conferences about this role. While many organizations use BAs in the product owner role, the fundamental issue of the product owner having to make business decisions makes this problematic. Going against most of the current thinking, we predict that organizations will realize in the next few years that business analysis is essential to Agile projects. Agile projects still have requirements, and there is a need to go from high-level user stories to the detail needed to develop the needed functionality. Organizations will realize that this in-depth analysis cannot be completed during an iteration, that it has to happen just prior to development. This is called grooming the product backlog and is the perfect role for the business analyst.

 4. The BA as management consultant. We predict that in 2012 BAs will actually function as described in the BABOK® Guide, version 2.0. That is, more BAs will “recommend solutions that help the organization achieve its goals.” They will do that in a variety of ways:

• Business cases. More organizations will recognize that the BA is in the best position to develop business cases. Although often performed by PMs, this function happens prior to the initiation of a project and is input to project initiation (PMBOK® Guide – Fourth Edition). The PMBOK recognizes that the performing organization (business owner) is accountable for the business case, but it is the BA who is in the best position of developing it.
• Ability to Influence without Authority. We are seeing more organizations tell us that they want their BAs to move away from taking customer orders and start using their expertise to recommend solutions. This need correlates to the enthusiasm we have seen around the need to influence without authority.
• In her keynote at the BBC conference in Ft. Lauderdale last year, Kathleen Barrett, CEO of IIBA mentioned that one of the key competencies of the enterprise BA is management consulting.

5. BAs as change agents.We think that BAs will be more involved in change management. At the BBC conference in Ft. Lauderdale last year Kathleen Barret announced a new tag line for IIBA—that business analysis was about changing how organizations change. In other words, BAs will be more involved in change management. Changes might include changes in business processes, job descriptions, reporting structures, software, and more. Here are some of the ways we see this happening:

• Enterprise analysis. Before projects are initiated, BAs determine the business need across the enterprise and recommend solutions, which need to include the ways in which organizations will need to change when these solutions are implemented.
• Project work. While the identified at the enterprise level are by necessity high-level, the changes resulting from each project will be specific in nature. We predict that BAs will develop better tools for assessing whether or not the organization is ready for the change. We think that they will act as management consultants once the project has been defined to ease the pain associated with implementing the changes associated as with implementing the solution.
• Post-project follow-up.We believe that BAs will be called on to monitor the post-implementation changes and continue to consult with the organization on the best way to make the solution work, even when there is some organizational resistance to it.

 6. The virtual environment.Now that it is here, the virtual environment will continue to flourish, even if the economy improves. There are a variety of reasons why organizations will continue to rely on the virtual environment for completing projects, for training, and for webinars to replace live conferences.

• Travel budgets.Spurred by a sluggish world economy, many organizations have reduced travel budgets for team meetings, training, and international conferences, relying instead on the virtual environment. Although colocation of teams is ideal and preferred, it is not always possible. More teams communicate and collaborate virtually, more virtual training will occur, and more webinars will take the place of live conferences.
• Globalization has made travel impractical. Although face-to-face time, particularly during project initiation, is helpful in building trust, respect, and relationships, it is not possible to be together for all project meetings and/or requirements elicitation interviews and workshops when the team is located across the county or world.
• Collaboration toolshave made the virtual environment not only possible, but practical. Net meetings, as well as more robust training and webinar tools have supported virtual teams, so that real work can be accomplished. In addition, teams have learned how to build relationships and trust in the virtual environment. Building relationships and trust in a virtual environment is easier and quicker once people accept and feel comfortable with the virtual tools available.

 7.  “The economy, stupid,” a past political slogan said. During a slumping economy, organizations look of ways to maximize efficiencies. Focus turns to business processes and how to improve and manage them. During more prosperous times, interest in business process management tends to wane. We predict that business process management, with an emphasis on eliminating waste in organizations, will continue throughout 2012, even as the economy (hopefully) shows signs of improvement. We also predict that there will be no dominant tools for managing processes and recommend that project professionals doing business process work focus on core concepts and skills and be flexible when it comes to using BPM tools.

7 Trends in Business Analysis and Project Management to Watch for in 2012 was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

To celebrate this milestone in our business, we’ll be bringing you some interesting, fun, and historical facts from 1992 throughout the year. Watch for these stories, find out how they relate to our business, and look for a special feature in March marking Watermark Learning’s inception on March 2, 1992. Watch for special announcements of training discounts and other news, too. The first special is at the end of this post.

Headlines from January 1992:

 AT&T VIDEO PHONE PREMIERS

NEW YORK — January 7 — American Telephone & Telegraph Co. brought the 115-year-old telephone into the video age Monday with a new phone that lets callers see each other as they speak.

The first true videophone network was a precursor to today’s webinar technology that makes our online and virtual course offerings possible.

APPLE LAUNCHES NEWTON, THE FIRST PDA

The term PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) was first used on January 7, 1992 by Apple Computer CEO John Sculley at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, referring to the Apple Newton.

The Newton and its successors paved the way for today’s smart phones, opening up new avenues of communication via social networks to provide instantaneous information and advice for business technology practitioners.

Other significant events from January 1992 include:

• January 1 – The Russian Federation was officially formed
• January 11 – Singer Paul Simon is the first major artist to tour South Africa after the end of the cultural boycott.
• January 22 – STS-42: Dr. Roberta Bondar becomes the first Canadian woman in space, aboard Space Shuttle Discovery.

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SPECIAL OFFER FOR JANUARY: Mention discount code X92J40 and receive 20% off the price of a public class in honor of our 20 years. Offer ends February 10, 2012. Cannot be combined with any other offer or discount.

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1992 – It Was a Very Good Year was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

Fortunately, we have a little meeting protocol where I work.  In our organization, you can’t schedule a meeting without identifying the objective of the meeting and the desired outcome.   At first, I didn’t think it would be difficult to get my thoughts around those things and document them.  (Did I mention I had a lot to talk about?)

But when it came to actually  spelling out the objective in the invitation, my fingers froze. I hadn’t really gotten much past “To talk about all the stuff I need to talk about.”  That, of course, left me with nothing to describe in the way of desired outcome. 

So I took my hands off the keyboard, put them on my forehead and started to think:  What is the purpose of this meeting?  Why should he take his time, that is, the organization’s most valuable resource, to meet with me?  What do I have to say that is worth his time to discuss?

The truth is, I did have a lot on my mind.  I was feeling overwhelmed and unfocused with more to deal with than I had bandwidth for.  I had ideas and thoughts about some things I was excited about and wanted to be able to address all of it, but I couldn’t.

The truth is also that I did not have a lot to discuss.  I just needed to know the current priorities of things on my plate.  My objective was to clarify my priorities, and the desired outcome that I needed at the end of our meeting was a list. 

Once this became clear, the meeting got a lot shorter.

How long ago was it that you attended a meeting with 3, 5, or 10 people without a clear understanding of the purpose and deliverable expected out of the meeting?  When was the last meeting you attended that got off track in the absence of a meeting objective?  How many meeting agendas have you seen that included extraneous items that wouldn’t have been necessary had a purpose been identified?  Most importantly, when was the last time you were sitting in a meeting that you might not have needed to attend if a clear meeting objective had been defined?  

The time it takes to be thoughtful about a meeting objective and desired outcome is not free, but it will always be cheaper than the time squandered in meetings without clear objectives defined.

So the next time you are inviting people to a meeting, consider identifying the objective of the meeting.  If someone were to ask you why your meeting is worth their time and organizational money, could you answer?  Maybe your objective is to get a decision about something.  Or identify options.  Or prioritize choices.  Whatever it is, define it first – before developing an agenda, deciding how long it will be, or whom to invite.

And then write down what it is you need to walk out of your meeting with, your desired outcome.  Maybe it’s a decision.  Or signatures of approval.  Or a list of options.  Whatever it is, write it down.  You’ll find your meetings are more likely to end on time because you know when they’re over – you’ve named it!

Try it.  But don’t expect to like it.  It’s a lot easier to just send an invitation to a bunch of people for a meeting about…you know…that thing we need to talk about.  

But once you have defined an objective, the rest of the meeting will become a lot more clear.  Your desired outcome will probably reveal itself.  Who really needs to be there will become evident – and will probably result in a shorter list of invitees than a meeting with no defined objectives.  Your agenda will begin to take shape and, again, probably be shorter than with an undefined meeting.

I ended up scheduling our meeting for 40 minutes, which is longer than we usually meet, but shorter than I initially intended to request.  I’m pretty confident it’s going to be a good use of organizational time and resources.  I think my manager is, too.

Is Your Meeting Worth the Time? was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

We can help! Join us monthly for a free, live CBAP®/CCBA™ Q&A session. Each month a CBAP®-certified expert from Watermark Learning will be available online to answer your questions. We have seven CBAP instructors on our staff to give you the most complete information possible on the CBAP®/CCBA™ process, application tricks, and preparation tips. In our jobs and relationship to the IIBA®, we encounter a great deal of information. Let us share that with you live and direct! We are dedicated to helping you apply for and pass the CBAP® or CCBA™ exam.

You can join by phone and/or computer. We may show screen shots as needed or it could be just good verbal exchange. It’s up to you! Attend one or all of the sessions.

The first session is December 16 from 12-12:30pm ET. Then, we’ll meet the first Friday of the month at 12-12:30pm ET. Richard Larson, CBAP, PMP, will be your first expert. You’ll also hear from other notables including Elizabeth Larson, CBAP, PMP, CSM, and Bob Prentiss, CBAP. Other certification experts will be on tap throughout the year.
• To register for the webinar and to see screens, please visit:  https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/948147986
• To join just by phone, please pre-register and then call: 1 (914) 339-0032, enter access code: 555-919-312.

We hope to hear from you and we look forward to your questions!

P.S. Look for future announcements through the ProjectBrief or visit our CBAP Resources page.

Ask the CBAP/CCBA Experts was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog

“Bah humbug!”  Well at least that is what it sounded like to me (BobtheBA) at the time, a few Christmases ago.  And all I could think of was “What a Scrooge!”  So what’s the story that brought out the worst in two people during the holiday season?  Well before I tell you this true story just know that this person and I are close friends and I do have permission to tell the story (we laugh about it a lot now).

I was working on a small project to make some minor enhancements to a website.  The requirements were simple so I did not do much other than write up some bullet points in a MS Word document in 20 point font, double sided.  So 2 pages of bullet point requirements in large print, easy to read, they were clear, concise, correct, necessary, testable, traceable and all of the other characteristics of well-written requirements.  I was feeling pretty good, they had been discussed, signed off on and I sent the requirements to the developer so they could crank them out and we would be on to the next phase.

Time goes by and I do not hear from the developer.  This was supposed to happen quickly so I was surprised.  I sent an email and received no response.  I went to talk to the developer and as I approached, the developer took the double-sided, well-written, large font requirements and pushed it toward me and said, “I don’t value reading” and they went back to looking at their computer screen.  What???  Really?  Bah humbug you say?  I did a double take and looked behind me thinking the comment could not really have been made to me not to mention the absurdity of not valuing reading.  Yet it was and this started a multi-hour argument (yes, argument and not debate or discussion) about the requirements.  This was not about the quality, lack of understanding or how they fit into the vision, but instead the argument was about the packaging of the requirements.  It was not what they wanted.  It was two pages!  What could they possibly want?

So in the heat of the moment I went there… again, how hard is it to read two pages in large font?  I accommodated their need of not wearing their glasses (hello… 20 point font).  Was I supposed to put them on CD so they could listen?  Did they want them in user story format?  Use cases?  What?  They wanted a matrix.  Let the argument continue.  “You can’t read two pages and you are angry because it was not in a matrix?  How hard is it to read two pages in large font?”  Scrooge!  “Bah humbug, do them again.”  Sigh, what a Scroogy McScroogerton.  This was certainly feeling like I was seeing nightmares with the Ghost of Christmas Future and not drinking the Milk of Human Kindness with the Ghost of Christmas Present.

So whose fault is it?  One side can argue that it is not hard to read two pages in large font.  For the good of the project just plough through quickly and get over it.  The other side can argue that it is the BAs responsibility to ensure the right format for the right audience regardless of project size and complexity.  Well, in this case it was my lack of vision.  In every case as a Business Analyst you need to consider your audience.  I did consider them but only from a historical perspective (past projects and behaviors).  Where I missed my opportunity was that I should have also asked them directly and confirmed my approach.  If they were in agreement with the approach then the two pages would have been fine.  However, if they had been asked they would have said they needed a “matrix” and that would have given me the boundaries for what I needed to do.

I have relayed this story many times and people end up on both sides of the fence.  Some say BobtheBA you should have asked.  Others say tell Scrooge to get over it.  What do you think?  Whatever you think and in whatever you do, I hope this Holiday season you will not have reason to be called Scrooge, call someone else Scrooge or just feel Scroogy in general.  Let’s all take the approach of the Ghost of Christmas Present and have a great Holiday season!

Scrooged! was posted at ProjectBrief Blog. | http://www.watermarklearning.com/blog