Category: Business Analysis Techniques

Let us discuss and observe what are the Business Analysis Techniques used by the Business Analyst to understand the requirements.

What is an API or Application Programming Interface ?

What is an API? (Application Programming Interface)

What is an API
What is an API

API is the acronym for Application Programming Interface. In simple words we can say it is the communicator between two software applications. It allows software applications to talk each other.

Every day we are interacting with the multiple applications which are integrated with other applications. Example : Amazon, Flipkart, Phonepe etc.. It means every day we are using an API but the thing is we do not know that this is API.

Let us try to discuss and understand what an API with using some examples. I feel by using examples we can understand what is an API is.

For example some applications will allow you to login and use application with using gmail account. And for some applications which will allow you to login and access the application by using your Facebook account.

It means that applications have integration with gmail and Facebook. Here these two applications talk each other and how the request should be and in which format they are expecting request from the sender.

We will discuss in detail with another example to understand what is an API? :

What Is an API and Example?

For example I want to book train tickets, to book train tickets I need not go to IRCTC portal. If you observe by using other applications also we can book the tickets. So here we can understand these two applications are talking each other to execute your request.

Here the main concept is to understand is “Request and Response” How we need to pass the Request and how we are going to get response.

Or how we will give the response and how we are expecting request to give correct response.

If you observe our website, if you register with your email id you will get the immediate response or message. To send email messages I am using some other applications means I am using API to pass values as per their request.

Let us observe one more example which we are using on daily basis to make you understand what is an API in detail.

Here is a real-life API example. We will search for flights online to check the availability and all.  We will have a multiple options to choose from, including different cities, departure and return dates, and more.

Let us imagine that you’re booking you are flight on an airline website. You choose a departure city and date, a return city and date, cabin class, as well as other variables.

In order to book your flight, you interact with the airline’s website to access their database and see if any seats are available on those dates and what the costs might be.

However, what if you are not using the airline’s website–– and you are using some other applications to book the tickets. As all you know now days we are using multiple applications to book flight tickets or some other needs.

The travel service, in this case, interacts with the airline’s API. The API is the interface that,, can be asked by that online travel service to get information from the airline’s database to book seats, baggage options, etc.

The API then takes the airline’s response to your request and delivers it right back to the online travel service, which then shows you the most updated, relevant information.

Software developers or organizations are using below API’s

  1. SOAP Service (API)
  2. REST API (Service)

Developers will write code and use json format or .xml format to form request and response.

As a Business Analyst you need not have deep knowledge on this like how to write code and how developers frame request and response in json or .xml format.  But you should have at least knowledge to how to understand the request and response. It helps you to understand based on the response received.

For example any application or website down usually we receive message as “404 error” based on this response or message we can understand website is down.

I hope it helped you to provide a overview about what is an API?

If you want to know more about what is an API and how to develop API, you can browse on google to understand. Enough material is available in google and youtube.

For Business Analyst perspective it provides overview on what is an API ?

What is Root Cause Analysis (RCA) ?

What is Root Cause Analysis?

What is Root Cause Analysis

Root Cause Analysis is very important it helps us to understand on below. You may have the doubt that what is root cause analysis and who performs the Root cause Analysis, Let us observe below.

  1. What is the issue?
  2. How to prevent these types of issues in future?
  3. Why this issue occurred?
  4. What steps could be taken to not to occur this issue?
  5. What are the preventive actions?
  6. Getting into the roots helps in removing the main cause of the defects.
  7. The RCA helps in getting the exact reason of the problem?

What is a Problem?

An incident which impacts the smooth flow of the process is termed as Issue. And same issue is occurring again and again and impacts the smooth functioning of the application and impacts the business then it termed as problem.

Then we need to perform Root cause Analysis to identify why this issue is happening again and again. Sometimes client also expects RCA document from us.

Usually RCA document contains below.

  1. What is the issue?
  2. Why it happened?
  3. How you fixed that Issue?
  4. What preventive steps to be taken to not to repeat the same issue in future?.

When RCA or RootCause Analysis is required?

Usually RCA is needed when same incident is happening again and again and it is impacting the smooth functioning of the application.

For the smooth functioning of the processes, it is necessary to identify the Root cause of this particular issue and how to prevent the same issue in future.

RCA should be performed as soon as issue or defect identified so that it helps to avoid major problems in future.

Depends on the issue and situation it is suggested to involve the stake holders while conducting the  RCA. Because sometimes issue may occur due to misunderstanding of the application functionality.

Stake holders help in getting away from the fictionalization of the facts.

Below Techniques can be used for RCA.

  1. 5 Why Technique
  2. Tabular Method
  3. Fishbone Diagram

What is Feasibility Study and why it is important?

What is feasibility study?

What is feasibility study
Before accepting or committing any requirement, as a Business Analyst, first we need to do the feasibility study, during (feasibility study) analysis we need to concentrate on below.
  1. The requirement is feasible or not.
  2. Whether it will impact any existing functionalities.
  3. Whether this requirement may cause to any performance issues.
  4. Whether this requirement fits in the current system or not.
  5. What are the dependencies on this requirement?
  6. What are the integration points?
  7. Any impact on integration points?

You can discuss with internal and external stakeholders to understand the requirement clearly, if we not understand requirement clearly, then there is a chance to miss out some functionalities. It may lead to system issues/ bugs or client escalations.

If we delivered defect product then client will not happy and they may lose confidence on us.  So it is very important to understand the requirement clearly before committing to client.

A Analysis  is a preliminary analysis of solution alternatives or options to determine whether and how each option can provide an expected business benefit to meet the business need or requirement.

A Analysis  may address either a business problem to be resolved or a business opportunity to be exploited.

We can do the feasibilitystudy based on the resource and data available with us.  Some tools also can be used to do the feasibility study.

The feasibilitystudy is an integral part of formulating a major business transformation project.  Eg. Re-engineering a core business process and supporting  technology, establishing a new line of business, increasing market share through acquisition, or developing a new product or service.

What is GAP Analysis and why it is important?

What is GAP Analysis?

What is GAP Analysis

What is the GAP Analysis and why it is important? GAP means the difference between Current state and future state.

Who performed GAP Analysis?

This is a process performed by Business Analysts and Project Managers. The difference between the current process and future process is known as GAP. This help us to understand where we are (Current State)  and where do we want to be (Future State)?

This helps us to measure investment of time, money and human resources required to achieve a particular outcome or desired outcome.

There is no formal method to conduct (GAP) Analysis. It depends on organization to organization and process to process. A simple excel sheet can be used to for this purpose. The main objective of the (GAP)analysis is to provide difference between current state and future state or desired state.

Key Points :

  • Good understanding of the current process.
  • All the business affecting factors must be well defined.
  • GAPanalysis is an assessment tool used to find the deviation or gap between what exists versus what is needed or desired.
  • No ambiguity in the requirements and future prospects.
  • Document the gaps using graphs, charges and images.
  • Ensure to include the feedback from the stakeholders.
  • Ensure to inform to all the involved parties or stakeholders about the identified gaps.

Different stages in GAP Stages

  • Review System
  • Develop Requirements
  • Comparison
  • Implications
  • Recommendations

This is one of the best procedures followed by any organization to improve the process and recognize the processes which needs improvement.

.

What is Use Case Diagram with Example

How to draw Use Case diagram

Business Analysis – Use Case Diagram

UseCase Diagram

UseCase diagrams plays very important role, these diagrams help to understand the relationship between user to user and user to system. Like what is the relationship with the user and what are the actions done by the User and how user wants to interact with the system.

The focus of this diagram will be on “how external interfaces” (End users, Support systems, Database and internet connectivity to third party) will be interacting with the Proposed IT System.

Use Case Diagram contains below:

  1. Use Case will be as below:

Use Case

        2. Actor:

Use Case Actor

        3. Use Case System Boundary.

Use Case System Boundary

        4. Lines to match the Activity with the user:

Relationships between Actors and Use-Cases

Use-cases could be organized using following relationships −

  • Generalization
  • Association
  • Extend
  • Include

Where and Why Use Case Diagrams can be used:

  1. Describe the functionality of a System
  2. Describe the user Actions
  3. Use case diagrams represents only positive flow.
  4. Should not use for alternate flow, like if any error happens what to be done.
  5. To describe how user interacts with the system.
  6. To describe how external interfaces, interact with the proposed system.
  7. Actor and use case play important role.
  8. Lines represent the relationship between Actor and Use Case (Oval Shape).

Information which we should not use in use case diagrams.

  1. Technology Names (Java, .Net Mainframes)
  2. Brand Names ( Lenovo, Sony etc..)
  3. Data Base Names (SQL, MySQL, Oracle etc..)
  4. Networks (LAN, WAN etc.,)
  5. Architectures (2 Tier, 3 Tier etc..)
  6. Name of the systems (Laptop/ Desktop)

Actor :

  1. Actor stay away from the system boundary.
  2. Primary actor initiates the system to work.
  3. System depends on secondary actor for information.
  4. Reusable actors will be placed right side of the system boundary.

How to draw Use Case diagram

  1. Write all sequence of Actions.
  2. Differentiate information against Actions.
  3. Try to find out which actor is performing which action.
  4. Try to find out some modules with respect to functionality or usage.
  5. Try to draw the relationships between the identified Actors and use Cases

Once completes the Use case diagram then we will prepare use Case Specification Document. This is also called as Use Case description Document. This document helps to provide the clear picture of the Use Case Diagram.

UseCase Specification document contains below.

  1. Name of the Use Case
  2. Description of the Use Case
  3. Actors
  4. Primary
  5. Secondary
  6. Basic flow
  7. Pre-Conditions
  8. Post conditions
  9. Assumptions
  10. Dependencies
  11. Constraints
  12. Input and output
  13. Miscellaneous information.
  14. Alternate Flow.

We can’t tell which use case diagram is correct and which use case diagram is wrong. It depends on the project and stakeholders.

How to Derive Test cases.

  1. UseCase Diagram
  2. UseCase Description Document
  3. UseCase specification document will have, Basic flow, Alternate flow and description of the use cases.
  4. We can identify the scenarios from these flows.
  5. Try to identify 3 to 5 valid test data from each scenario.
  6. Then try to write the test cases from the gathered test data and scenarios.

To Know more about UML Diagrams.

What is JAD Session?

Business Analyst – JAD Session

JAD Session

J

JAD sessions is also one of the important elicitation technique used by the Business Analyst to gather and understand the requirements.

Let us see what is JAD session, Joint Application Development (JAD) is a process used to collect business requirements while developing new Software systems for a organization. The goal of a JAD session is to gather in subject matter experts/Business analyst or IT specialist to bring out solutions.

A Business analyst is the one who interacts with the entire group or different teams and gathers the information/ Requirements, analyses it and brings out a document. He plays a very important role in JAD session.

Why JAD Sessions required?

Meeting and collaborating with Business and Technical team, JAD sessions are very common in Business Analysis Role.  Particularly when we are working in Agile Methodology.

For example, Technical team need some more clarity on Business Requirements then JAD sessions are required, in the same way if Business team needs more clarity on technology then JAD sessions are required.

Advantages :

  • It helps to clarify the doubts: As all the required staked holders joins the session, all doubts will be clarified in this session. Based on the requirement, Business Analyst may conduct multiple sessions with all the required stake holders.
  • Understand the requirements clearly: helps to understand the requirements clearly without any ambiguity.
  • Provide solution with less time. As all the stakeholders joins in this session, will get the solutions for the problems (requirements related issues or problems) in the same session.
  • Client satisfaction: As client is involved throughout the development process he knows what is happening and how project is going on. And as he gets the updates on project client also happy.
  • Development team also happy as all the teams joined in meeting their doubts or issues get clarified by the SME’s or client without delay.
  • It helps to faster delivery.
  • JAD Session enables customers and developers to quickly come to an agreement on the basic scope.
  • If any requirement is not feasible or any challenges to deliver the requirement, then they think for alternative approach. As the entire stake holders are part of this meeting, they can take a decisions accordingly.

Prerequisites:

  • Business Analyst should have clear agenda before scheduling the JAD Session.
  • Ensure to join all the required stakeholders (SME/ Dev.Team, internal and external stakeholders)
  • Ensure to discussion is going on in right track.
  • Ensure to conduct the meeting on stakeholders convenient time. As all the required teams to be joined in this meeting, it is the responsibility of organizer to collect all the teams and convenient time ensure to join all the teams in meeting.

Who all are participate?

Executive Sponsor

They normally are from higher positions, who can take decisions and drive the project.

Subject Matter Expert

These are the business users and subject experts. The subject matter experts are the backbone of the JAD session. They help to understand the functionality and they are required to fill the functionality gaps.

Facilitator

He/ She organizes the meeting; he/she identifies issues that can be solved as part of the meeting. The facilitator does not contribute information to the meeting.

Using for an iterative approach

FAQ’s

What is the purpose of a JAD session?

JAD is used as a technique for developing business system requirements and is typically used in the early stages of a systems development project. The purpose of JAD is to bring together MIS and end users in a structured workshop setting; to extract consensus based system requirements.

How do you perform a JAD session?

Define the JAD Session Objectives. The first task for the facilitator, together with the project leader and other key individuals, is to define the session objectives. …
Prepare for the Session. The facilitator has primary responsibility for JAD preparation. …
Conduct the JAD Session. …
Produce the Documents.


What is Invest

Let us discuss what is INVEST in Agile 

What is Invest

The test for determining whether or not a story is well understood and ready for the team to start working on it is the INVEST acronym:

  • Independent — The story should be independent.
  • Negotiable — Can this story be changed or removed without impact to everything else?
  • Valuable — Does this story have value to the end user?
  • Estimable — Can you estimate the size of the story?
  • Small —Is it small enough?
  • Testable — User story should be testable.

FAQ’s

What is invest in Scrum?

Coined by Bill Wake in his book Extreme Programming Explored, INVEST is an acronym that defines a simple set of rules used in creating well-formed user stories. An effective way to ensure testability is to define user acceptance criteria for all user stories. …

What is invest in user story?

Bill Wake came up with the INVEST acronym to help us remember guidelines for writing effective user stories: Independent, Negotiable, Valuable, Estimatable, Small, and Testable.

What are 3 C's in user stories?

Whether you are a newbie or a seasoned veteran, the 3 C’s of User Stories help keep the purpose of the user story in perspective.
The first C is the user story in its raw form, the Card. …
The second C is the Conversation. …
The third C is the Confirmation.

What are the 3 pillars of Scrum?

The three pillars of Scrum that uphold every implementation of empirical process control are:
Transparency.
Inspection.
Adaptation.

Elicitation Techniques used by Business Analyst.

Requirement Elicitation Techniques

Requirements Elicitation Techniques

As a Business Analyst we need to understand the requirements clearly, to understand the requirements as a Business Analyst we need to use techniques to understand the requirements. Let us observe Business Analyst elicitation techniques.

Elicitation is the process of digging out the information from the stakeholders. Requirements Elicitation serves the foundation in documenting the requirements.

Elicitation Techniques

Let us see here below:

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FAQ’s

What are requirement elicitation techniques?

Requirements elicitation practices include interviews, questionnaires, user observation, workshops, brainstorming, use cases, role playing and prototyping. … Before requirements can be analyzed, modeled, or specified they must be gathered through an elicitation process.

What techniques do business analysts use?

S.W.O.T. stands for Strength, Weakness, Opportunities, and Threats. This is the most important technique used in business analysis. It is conducted by a group of people with different mindsets and perspectives in the company in order to access a changing environment and react accordingly.

What is elicitation in business analysis?

Requirements Elicitation. A Project’s Foundation

Requirements elicitation is the set of activities where information is given by stakeholders, users, and customers to be applied to the design of the initiative or the solution. Elicitation is a perpetual process during a project development.

What are the three main techniques of business analysis planning?

List of Best Business Analysis Techniques
SWOT Analysis. The term SWOT stands for its four elements– …
MOST Analysis. The term MOST stands for its four elements – …
Business Process Modelling (BPM) …
Use Case Modelling. …
Brainstorming. …
Non-functional Requirement Analysis. …
PESTLE Analysis. …
Requirement Analysis.

Which requirement elicitation is most popular?

Having said that, brainstorming, document analysis, interviews, prototyping and workshops are the most widely used requirement elicitation techniques.

Why is requirement elicitation a difficult task?

Why is Requirements Elicitation a difficult task ? Explanation: Users specify unnecessary technical detail that may confuse, rather than clarify overall system objectives. … Explanation: Requirements traceability provides bi-directional traceability between various associated requirements.

What is elicitation in teaching?

Elicitation is a technique by which the teacher gets the learners to give information rather than giving it to them. A teacher elicits the rules for the structure of the first conditional by asking learners to look at some examples, then writing ‘We make the first conditional in English with…?’ on the board.

What is Stakeholder Management/ Analysis

Stakeholder Management/ Analysis

Who are Stakeholders:  

Stakeholder Management

Who are involving the project directly or indirectly are called as stake holders. Ex: Development Team, Testing Team(QA), client, SME’s and Architect. Stakeholder management is very important to gather the requirements.

And as a Business Analyst we have coordinate and arrange multiple meetings and interviews with multiple teams to understand the requirements and to deliver the requirements as per planned schedule.

As a business Analyst we are responsible for certain things like,

  • Investigation of requirements
  • Elicitation of requirements
  • Analyzing the requirements
  • Communicating with internal and external stakeholders
  • Documenting the requirements

Stakeholder Management/ Analysis

Business analyst role is continuous improvement, continuously we have to concentrate on our skills and we have to upgrade as per industry to survive or to prove as a Business Analyst. Always Business Analyst needs to think how things can be better, and how we can provide better service or support to the client.

When we are analyzing the requirement we should also think about the impact on existing functionality and what are additional things are needed to meet customer expectations.

When we are communicating product delivery dates to client, we should ensure that we have to deliver on time which includes design, development and testing and all internal approvals, before committing due dates we have to understand exactly what is the requirement and how much man hours needed and what are the challenges we may face during producing the product. Because if you are unable to release the product on committed dates then client may lose confidence on you, so it is difficult to handle further. Before committing dates you should concentrate on design, development issues, Testing and issues and what are the dependencies on other teams.

To understand the situation and complexity of the problem clearly we can do interview stake holders, it helps us to understand the problem clearly and client also feel team is working on their issue, so client also may happy. Once we understand the problem clearly then we need to spend time with the internal teams to resolve the issue.

To understand the requirements clearly we have to coordinate with stake holders and subject matter experts, Subject matter expect will explain to us what the exact business requirement is and how they are expecting the functionality of the application.

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How to identify Stakeholders and How to get in touch with the Stakeholders: Stakeholder Management/ Analysis

Project Managers or Project directions can help us who are the stake holders and with whom we need to coordinately closely to understand the requirements clearly. Some of the stake holders are very important because they may impact on the project if they have any requirements.

Usually Project manager or Project director can decide who the stake holders are or in some of the cases stake holders can decide who can be the project manager. Project managers or Project directors should know who the stake holders are.

Once you start discussing with the stake holders then you can understand who can help us to understand the requirement clearly and what is the involvement of the stake holders in the project. Based on that you can identify and categorize the stakeholders.

Once you identify the stakeholders then we need to categorize them. Like..

  • How do they impact on the project.
  • What are their contribution on the project
  • What is the level of involvement and how do we need to communicate with them.

Once you get the requirements still you need clarity then you can discuss and coordinate with the Subject matter experts to understand the requirements in better way, but remember one thing, if we ask one question then subject matter experts will give multiple answers, then you need to pick the correct one which suits to your project and which is in scope. Scope like as boundary for us, if we cross the boundary then project manager may feel bad and it may impact on project delivery. Because it will impact on the budget, resources, scheduling and planning.

If you schedule any meeting with the stake holders, first you give overview of the project to the stake holders, so that we can expect the requirements within the scope. It will help us to keep them in control.  Once you get the requirements, ensure the document it and get the sign off from the client.

Identify the stakeholders, Identify of level of contribution in project, create a relationship and build a trust among the stakeholders. Because if stake holders do not have confidence or trust on you then they may refuse to discuss with you, it may impact on requirements gathering, so it is very much important to build a trust among the stake holders.

I hope it helped you to provide the overview of Stakeholder Management.

To know more about stakeholder management, you can browse on google to get more information and idea.

Stakeholder management and analysis plays very important role in Business Analyst daily tasks.

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FAQ’S

What Is Stakeholder Management?

Stakeholder management is the process of maintaining good relationships with the people who have most impact on your work. Communicating with each one in the right way can play a vital part in keeping them “on board.” This article is about how to communicate effectively with stakeholders.

What are the 7 principles of stakeholder management?

The 7 principles of Stakeholder Management!
…
Bucholtz and Carroll point out that the principles highlight action words that illustrate the spirit that should be used in engaging with stakeholders:

  • acknowledge.
  • monitor.
  • listen.
  • communicate.
  • adopt.
  • recognise.
  • work.
  • avoid.

What is an example of stakeholder management?

Examples include employees, customers, shareholders, suppliers, communities, and governments. Upstream stakeholders contribute to or approve the activities required to design, build and bring a product to market.

What are the 4 steps of stakeholder management process?

Four Steps to Stakeholder Relations

  1. Identify Stakeholders. The first stage in stakeholder relations involves researching individuals and third-party organizations that may be relevant. …
  2. Study Stakeholders. Once potential stakeholders have been identified, do your homework. …
  3. Prioritize Stakeholders. …
  4. Contact Stakeholders

What are stakeholder management techniques?

Five strategies for effective stakeholder management

  • Stakeholder mapping. Early in the project, conduct a thorough stakeholder analysis to identify your stakeholders. …
  • Influence is key. …
  • Identify the triggers. …
  • Look for opportunities. …
  • Proactive mitigation.

What are the 10 key principles of stakeholder management?

Key principles of stakeholder engagement

  • #1 Understand. …
  • #3 Consult, early and often. …
  • #4 They are human too. …
  • #5 Plan it! …
  • #6 Relationships are key. …
  • #7 Just part of managing risk. …
  • #8 Compromise. …
  • #9 Understand what success is.

What makes good stakeholder management?

Good communication keeps crucial stakeholders on board. Stakeholder management is the process of maintaining good relationships with the people who have most impact on your work. Communicating with each one in the right way can play a vital part in keeping them “on board.”

What is stakeholder management and why is it important?

Stakeholder management is an important activity that is used to gain mutual understanding of the objectives and expectations of all parties. It aids in developing a concept that will gain support from all the interested and affected parties enhancing the likelihood of a successful outcome

What is the objective of stakeholder management?

At its core, stakeholder management is the ability to create and maintain positive relationships through the appropriate management of individual needs, wants and expectations. Stakeholder management is a process that works best when planned and guided by underlying principles.

Why is stakeholder management skills important?

Stakeholder management is important since it is the lifeline of effective project relationships. This needs to involve establishing a sound relationship and understanding how their work is contributing to project success. You need to establish trust and maintain relevance

What is stakeholders management plan?

The stakeholder management plan defines and documents the approach and actions that will increase support and minimize the negative impacts of stakeholders throughout the life of the project. It should identify the key stakeholders along with the level of power and influence they have on the project

What is the first step for stakeholder management?

Stakeholder Analysis is the first step in Stakeholder Management, an important process that successful people use to win support from others. Managing stakeholders can help you, too, to ensure that your projects succeed where others might fail.

How do you build stakeholder management?

Six principles for building trusting stakeholder relationships

  1. Seek first to understand before being understood. …
  2. Have empathy and think in win/win solutions. …
  3. Set a good example as a project manager and leader. …
  4. Be honest and open about project progress. …
  5. Be proactive and take responsibility for your actions.

What are the four types of stakeholders?

The easy way to remember these four categories of stakeholders is by the acronym UPIG: users, providers, influencers, governance

What are the five steps to stakeholder engagement?

5 Essential Steps to a Stakeholder Engagement Plan

  1. Reduce project risks.
  2. Manage your resources more effectively.
  3. Facilitate team collaboration.
  4. Gain buy-in.
  5. Meet timelines.
  6. Build trust and better relationships with stakeholders and communities.

What are the Tools used by Business Analyst

Tools used by Business Analyst

Let us discuss about Tools used by Business Analyst

Tools used by Business Analyst

Tools Used by Business Analyst:

Business Analyst needs to use some tools during the project to make stake holders to understand the requirements clearly.  Let us see some of the commonly and important Tools Used by Business Analyst:

A complicated BA role, Business Analyst  needs to gather the requirements from the client and he needs to ensure that no requirement should be missed. He should prepare the specifications very carefully, because development team will understand the requirements based on the artifacts shared by the Business Analyst, if they understand in different way then development team will deliver what they understand as per the artifact, so it may not be as per client requirement, it leads to project failure.

Every organization is using different tools as per company’s requirement, here we will observe the commonly used to tools.

As a practicing business analyst, I have come across many business analysis tools.

 I read so many articles and blogs in internet to understand what are the tools used by the Business Analyst to prove as a good Business Analyst. I found so many tools in internet, but practically it is very difficult to learn all the tools which I found in internet by the business analyst. Because A business analyst is one who deals with the requirements gathering, elicitation, analysis, and modeling on a day-to-day basis.

Hence, in this article, I focused on commonly  Tools Used by Business Analyst which are used by almost all organizations.

Fundamentally, BusinessAnalyst need following types of business analysis tools:

  • To track requirements
  • To manage the requirements
  • Design the requirements
  • Describe requirements in certain detail
  • Model requirements wherever feasible
  • To collaborate with internal and external stake holders.

Here I am going to mention which are the tools I am using to meet my requirements, am not intended you to learn only these tools and am not promoting any tools.

MS Excel:

Mostly I use Excel to create flow charts and as per the client requirement, can use Excel to track the requirements and for requirement traceability matrix. We can create multiple things with using Excel like Wireframes, Flow charts and to manage the requirements. Excel contains several built-in mathematical and financial functions which will be useful in data analysis

  • Pivot tables
  • Examining the trends in data
  • Sort and filter data
  • Creating charts or graphs

MS Word:

Will use Ms_Word to prepare the multiple documents like FSD , BRD, Release Notes and User Manuals. Most of the stake holders are using the Ms-word to prepare multiple documents.

MS PowerPoint:

Will use power point for presentations. With using powerpoint we can easily explain to stake holders.

Google Search:

If you stuck somewhere and not able to understand what to do and how to do, then Google search will help us to get basic idea. If we need any templates related to documentation also we can get the same with using Google Search.

Skype

We can use skype to schedule meetings and we can explain easily via screen sharing to the stake holders. We can easily coordinate with internal and external stake holders with using skype.

Ms _ Visio:

Ms_Visio can be used to draw UML diagrams. We can easily identify with UML diagrams that which actor is doing which task. It will help developers to understand the requirement clearly.

  • UML diagrams creation such as use case, sequence diagrams, and activity diagrams.
  • To prepare process flow charts
  • To create data models
  • To generate architecture diagrams

Ms_Project:

Ms_Project can be used to track the requirements.

JIRA :

Jira can be used to track the requirements, issues, Change requests. Most of the organizations are using JIRA tool.

Balsamiq, axure and Pencil :

Balsamiq and axure can be used to create mockups to understand the requirement clearly. And easily we can explain to stake holders. Balsamiq Mockups helps business to work faster and smarter. Moreover, it allows projects to host online. In addition to that, it works as a collaboration tool between team and clients.

I hope this provided you the overview of Tools Used by Business Analyst.

Here I mentioned common tools used by Business Analyst, if you want to know more tools used by Business Analyst then you can browse on google.

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Tools Used By Business Analyst : FAQ

What are the tools for business analysis?

Microsoft Office Suite. The following applications of Microsoft office suite come under the best business analysis tools list – …
Google Docs. …
Rational Requisite Pro. …
Balsamiq. …
SWOT. …
Pencil. …
Trello. …
SmartDraw.

What are analytics tools?

What are business analytics tools? Business analytics tools are types of application software that retrieve data from one or more business systems and combine it in a repository, such as a data warehouse, to be reviewed and analyzed

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