PMcrunch

The business analysis function is one that needs to be managed with care and the wisdom of experience.  Business analysts handle requirements management, systems analysis, business analysis, requirements analysis, or consulting. The various activities around these functions take place throughout the project and require continuous monitoring, starting at a high level near the beginning of the project.  This post explores key business analysis activities throughout the project life cycle.

Here are the key project life cycle business analysis activities:

1. Enterprise Analysis and Making a Business Case – Business analysis starts with the business case, which must align with the strategic objectives of the organization.
2. Requirements Planning - Requirements planning describes a phased approach that forecasts and schedules how the requirements will unfold in a process called progressive elaboration. 
3. Requirements Management - Managing requirements amounts to some level of Configuration Management, which is designed based on the expected complexity and level of change over the course of the project, and the risks to project success of changing requirements.
4. Eliciting Requirements – This is part science in that a solid proven framework is helpful, and part art in that developing rapport with varying stakeholders helps to uncover the core, and sometimes hidden, needs.
5. Requirements Analysis and Models - Often requirements are so complex that they require sophisticated architectures, drawings, mathematical models, and prototypes to reflect back to stakeholders the proposed solution, providing further subject matter for conversations around the continuously unfolding requirements.
6. Communicating and Implementing Requirements - Due to the detailed and often technical nature of the work, work packages at the implementation level are well removed from the stakeholder, so the business analyst bridges that gap between the two.

The Project Manager is concerned with ensuring progress against schedule, risk management and mitigation, and delivering of the product of the project on time, within budget, and to specified quality standards.  The Business Analyst, on the other hand, is most concerned with ensuring that the product of the project is well-defined throughout the project and meets the targeted business needs through expert requirements management, systems analysis, business analysis, and requirements analysis.  Both jobs are a project life cycle function and do not end until the stakeholders verify that the product meets their requirements. 
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John Reiling, PMP
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