How to Become Agile in Business Analysis

1. Agile Development in a Changing Business Environment

• Requirements Definition
• What is Agile?
• The IT Project Landscape
• Will the Real Problem Please Stand Up!
• The True Cause of Errors
• Communications Channels
• What to Expect from This Class

2. Agile Philosophy, Principles, Practices and Processes

• The Agile Manifesto – Then and Now
• Core Agile Principles
• What Can You Do To Be More Agile?
• An Agile System Development Approach
• A Smorgasbord of Agile Methodologies
• The Basis of eXtreme Programming (XP)
• “Scrumbling” for Success
• Adaptive Software Development
• Lean Software Development
• Feature Driven Development
• Dynamic System Development Method
• To Be or Not To Be Agile (pros, cons, and a checklist)
• The Agile Team – Roles and Responsibilities

3. Adopting Agile Methods in Existing Methodologies

• Methodologies – Agility or Rigidity?
• Can Waterfall Be Agile?
• Incremental Iterative Methodologies
• The Unified Process
• Adding Flavor to the Unified Process
• OpenUP – Open Source Unified Process
• EUP – Enterprise Unified Process
• RUP – Rational Unified Process
• An Agile Requirements Taxonomy
• Growing Agile for Large Projects
• Significant Challenges to Organizations Adopting Agile Methods

4. Modeling for Agility

• Agile Impact on Diagramming Methods
• Process Models
• Data Models / Class Diagrams
• Swimlane Diagrams
• Use Case Models
• System Flow Diagrams
• Agile Go-With-The-Flow Modeling

5. Agile Business Analysis Methods

• Business Analysis and Conventional Wisdom
• Agile Business Systems Analysis
• The Need for Ongoing Analysis
• A “Just in Time/Just In Case” Approach
• Business Analysts in an Agile Team
• A Business Analysis Skills Survey
• Analysis of the Existing Situation
• How Much Is Needed?
• How Detailed Do You Go?
• When Do You Do What?
• Common Business Analysis Techniques
• “Agilitizing” Business Analysis Techniques
• Requirements Gathering Meetings
• Problem Analysis
• Timing Analysis
• Exception Identification
• Information Usage Analys
• Agile Use Cases
• The Role of User Stories
• Creating a Feature List from Business Requirements

6. The Role of User Stories

• What is a User Story?
• When are User Stories written?
• Who writes User stories?
• How do you obtain User Stories?
• What is a good User Story?
• How do User Stories support requirements?
• How do User Stories support Use Cases?

7. 

• Summary

2 days

Business Process Owners and Managers
Experienced Business/Systems Analysts
Experienced Requirements Engineers
Information Technology Managers
Anyone responsible for managing or practicing business analysis

NONE

Our instructors have extensive experience in applying these techniques on projects with business experts from a wide variety of fields.