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In this introductory course, you'll delve into the role and responsibilities of the business analyst-the communication link between all business areas and a critical player in project success. Learn techniques for ensuring project success every step of the way-from identifying and analyzing potential projects to making sure that the final project product meets the requirements you identified. Through hands-on exercises, you'll learn to define the scope of work and master requirements-gathering techniques that will work for a variety of projects and audiences. You'll consider the unique needs of customers, stakeholders, and the IT department as you work toward building, documenting, communicating, and managing requirements.

Students pursuing college credit recommendation or continuing education units must attend at least 90% of class time, participate in class exercises and section-knowledge checks, and score at least 70% on an end of-class, multiple-choice assessment.

Highlights

• Role of the business analyst
• Build and evaluate a business case
• Plan, manage, analyze, document, and communicate requirements
• Conduct effective interviews, group workshops, and questionnaires
• Data mining
• Effectively capture and document business rules
• Get agreement
• Ensure requirements are met

Hands-On Exercises

• Identify Business Analysis (BA) Concepts and Activities in Your Organization
• Propose Project Scope Based on Your Analysis of a Business Architecture, Feasibility Study, and Risk Assessment
• Define Team Roles and Work Division Strategy
• Plan Requirements Activities for a Project
• Plan Scope and Requirements Change Management
• Choose Elicitation Techniques
• Choose Techniques to Structure, Model, and Analyze Requirements
• Identify Project Assumptions and Constraints
• Determine Requirements Verification and Validation Activities
• Draft a Requirements Communication Plan
• Prepare for Requirements Presentation and Sign-off
• Determine Solution Assessment and Validation Activities
• Compile an Individual Professional Skills Inventory
• Produce an Individual Professional Growth Plan

Course Outline

1. Overview of Business Analysis

• The solutions lifecycle
• What is business analysis?
• Business analysis terminology
• International Institute of Business Analysis
• CBAP certification

2. Enterprise Analysis

• Introduction
• Definitions
• The business architecture
• Feasibility studies
• Project scope
• Business case
• Risk assessment
• Decision package
• Selecting and prioritizing projects

3. Requirements Planning and Management

• Introduction
• Definitions
• Team roles for the project
• Work division strategy
• Requirements risk approach
• Planning considerations
• Requirements activities
  • Selection
  • Estimation
• Requirements scope
• Requirements activity
  • Measurement
  • Reporting
• Requirements change management

4. Requirements Elicitation

• Introduction
• Definitions
• Elicit requirements
• Techniques
  • Brainstorming
  • Document analysis
  • Focus groups
  • Interface analysis
  • Interviews
  • Observation
  • Prototyping
  • Workshop
  • Reverse engineering
  • Survey/questionnaire

5. Requirements Analysis and Documentation

• Introduction
• Definitions
• Requirements package
• Business domain model
• Analyze user requirements
• Analyze functional requirements
• Analyze quality of service requirements
• Assumptions and constraints
• Requirements
  • Attributes
  • Document
  • Validate
  • Verify
• Modeling techniques
  • Data and behavior models
  • Process/flow models
  • Usage models

6. Requirements Communication

• Introduction
• Definitions
• Communication plan
• Manage conflicts
• Determine format
• Requirements package
• Requirements presentation
• Requirements review
• Requirements sign-off

7. Solution Assessment and Validation

• Introduction
• Definitions
• Solution alternatives
• Technology options
• Solution selection
• Solution usability
• Quality assurance
• Solution implementation
• Solution impacts
• Post implementation review

8. BA Fundamentals

• Communication skills
• Leadership skills
• Problem-solving skills
• Business knowledge
• IT knowledge

9. Case studies

10. Exercises

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