Key Terms from Chapter 1

Question 1

What is the Business Analysis Body of Knowledge?

Answer 1

The BABOK® Guide describes business analysis areas of knowledge, their associated activities and tasks, and the skills necessary to be effective in their execution.

It is a framework that describes the business analysis tasks that must be performed in order to understand how a solution will deliver value to the sponsoring organization.

Question 2

What is Business Analysis?

Answer 2

Business analysis is the set of tasks and techniques used to work as a liaison among stakeholders in order to understand the structure, policies, and operations of an organization, and to recommend solutions that enable the organization to achieve its goals.

Question 3

What is a domain?

Answer 3

A domain is the area undergoing analysis.

It may correspond to the boundaries of an organization or organizational unit, as well as key stakeholders outside those boundaries and interactions with those stakeholders.

Question 4

What is a solution?

Answer 4

A solution is a set of changes to the current state of an organization that are made in order to enable that organization to meet a business need, solve a problem, or take advantage of an opportunity.

Most solutions are a system of interacting solution components, each of which are potentially solutions in their own right. Examples of solutions and solution components include software applications, web services, business processes, the business rules that govern that process, an information technology application, a revised organizational structure, outsourcing, insourcing, redefining job roles, or any other method of creating a capability needed by an organization.

Question 5

What is a requirement?

Answer 5

1) A condition or capability needed by a stakeholder to solve a problem or achieve an objective.
2) A condition or capability that must be met or possessed by a solution or solution component to satisfy a contract, standard, specification, or other formally imposed documents.
3) A documented representation of a condition or capability as in (1) or (2).

Question 6

What is a business analyst?

Answer 6

A business analyst is any person who performs business analysis activities, no matter what their job title or organizational role may be.

Question 7

What is the classification scheme used to describe requirements?

Answer 7

Business Requirements
Stakeholder Requirements
Solution Requirements (Functional and Non-Functional)
Transition Requirements

Question 8

What are Business Requirements?

Answer 8

Business Requirements are higher-level statements of the goals, objectives, or needs of the enterprise.

They describe the reasons why a project has been initiated, the objectives that the project will achieve, and the metrics that will be used to measure its success. Business requirements describe needs of the organization as a whole, and not groups or stakeholders within it.

Question 9

What are Stakeholder Requirements?

Answer 9

Stakeholder Requirements are statements of the needs of a particular stakeholder or class of stakeholders.

They describe the needs that a given stakeholder has and how that stakeholder will interact with a solution. Stakeholder requirements serve as a bridge between business requirements and the various classes of solution requirements.

Question 10

What are Solution Requirements?

Answer 10

Solution Requirements describe the characteristics of a solution that meet business requirements and stakeholder requirements.

Question 11

What are Functional Requirements?

Answer 11

Functional Requirements describe the behavior and information that the solution will manage.

Question 12

What are Non-Functional Requirements?

Answer 12

Non-functional Requirements capture conditions that do not directly relate to the behavior or functionality of the solution, but rather describe environmental conditions under which the solution must remain effective or qualities that the systems must have.

Question 13

What are Transition Requirements?

Answer 13

Transition Requirements describe capabilities that the solution must have in order to facilitate transition from the current state of the enterprise to a desired future state, but that will not be needed once that transition is complete.

They are differentiated from other requirements types because they are always temporary in nature and because they cannot be developed until both an existing and new solution are defined.

Question 14

How are Business Requirements developed and defined?

Answer 14

They are developed and defined through enterprise analysis.

Question 15

How are Stakeholder Requirements developed and defined?

Answer 15

They are developed and defined through requirements analysis.

Question 16

How are Solution Requirements developed and defined?

Answer 16

They are developed and defined through requirements analysis.

Question 17

How are Transition Requirements developed and defined?

Answer 17

They are developed and defined through solution assessment and validation.

Question 18

What is the purpose of the BA Planning and Monitoring Knowledge Area?

Answer 18

Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring (Chapter 2) is the knowledge area that covers how business analysts determine which activities are necessary in order to complete a business analysis effort.

The tasks in this knowledge area govern the performance of all other business analysis tasks.

Question 19

What is the purpose of the Elicitation Knowledge Area?

Answer 19

Elicitation (Chapter 3) describes how business analysts work with stakeholders to identify and understand their needs and concerns, and understand the environment in which they work.

The purpose of elicitation is to ensure that a stakeholder’s actual underlying needs are understood, rather than their stated or superficial desires.

Question 20

What is the purpose of the Requirements Management and Communications Knowledge Area?

Answer 20

Requirements Management and Communication (Chapter 4) describes how business analysts manage conflicts, issues and changes in order to ensure that stakeholders and the project team remain in agreement on the solution scope, how requirements are communicated to stakeholders, and how knowledge gained by the business analyst is maintained for future use.

Question 21

What is the purpose of the Enterprise Analysis Knowledge Area?

Answer 21

Enterprise Analysis (Chapter 5) describes how business analysts identify a business need, refine and clarify the definition of that need, and define a solution scope that can feasibly be implemented by the business. This knowledge area describes problem definition and analysis, business case development, feasibility studies, and the definition of solution scope.

Question 22

What is the purpose of the Requirements Analysis Knowledge Area?

Answer 22

Requirements Analysis (Chapter 6) describes how business analysts prioritize and progressively elaborate stakeholder and solution requirements in order to enable the project team to implement a solution that will meet the needs of the sponsoring organization and stakeholders. It involves analyzing stakeholder needs to define solutions that meet those needs, assessing the current state of the business to identify and recommend improvements, and the verification and validation of the resulting requirements.

Question 23

What is the purpose of the Solution Assessment and Validation Knowledge Area?

Answer 23

Solution Assessment and Validation (Chapter 7) describes how business analysts assess proposed solutions to determine which solution best fits the business need, identify gaps and shortcomings in solutions, and determine necessary workarounds or changes to the solution. It also describes how business analysts assess deployed solutions to see how well they met the original need so that the sponsoring organization can assess the performance and effectiveness of the solution.

Question 24

What is the purpose of the Underlying Competencies?

Answer 24

Underlying Competencies (Chapter 8) describes the behaviors, knowledge, and other characteristics that support the effective performance of business analysis.

Question 25

Are the techniques listed in the BABOK prescribed for use by business analysts?

Answer 25

No. The BABOK® Guide does not prescribe a set of analysis techniques that must be used. The techniques described in this document are those that have been demonstrated to be of value and in use by a majority of the business analysis community.

Business analysts who are familiar with these techniques are therefore likely to be able to perform effectively under most circumstances that they are likely to encounter. However, these techniques are not necessarily the best possible ones to use in any given situation, nor are they necessarily able to address every situation effectively.

Question 26

Which techniques in the BABOK® Guide can be described as being in widespread useÉ

Answer 26

Acceptance and Evaluation Criteria Definition (9.1)
Brainstorming (9.3)
Business Rules Analysis (9.4)
Data Dictionary and Glossary (9.5)
Data Flow Diagrams (9.6)
Data Modeling (9.7)
Decision Analysis (9.8)
Document Analysis (9.9)
Interviews (9.14)
Metrics and Key Performance Indicators (9.16)
Non-functional Requirements Analysis (9.17)
Organization Modeling (9.19)
Problem Tracking (9.20)
Process Modeling (9.21)
Requirements Workshops (9.23)
Scenarios and Use Cases (9.26)

Question 27

Which are the Underlying Competencies described in Chapter 8?

Answer 27

Analytical Thinking and Problem Solving 
Behavioral Characteristics 
Business Knowledge 
Communication Skills 
Interaction Skills 
Software Applications

Question 28

How do Analytical Thinking and Problem Solving skills help the BA?

Answer 28

Analytical Thinking and Problem Solving supports effective identification of business problems, assessment of proposed solutions to those problems, and understanding of the needs of stakeholders. Analytical thinking and problem solving involves assessing a situation, understanding it as fully as possible, and making judgments about possible solutions to a problem.

Question 29

How do Behavioral Characteristics help the BA?

Answer 29

Behavioral Characteristics support the development of effective working relationships with stakeholders and include qualities such as ethics, trustworthiness, and personal organization.

Question 30

How does Business Knowledge help the BA?

Answer 30

Business Knowledge supports understanding of the environment in which business analysis is performed and knowledge of general business principles and available solutions.

Question 31

How do Communication Skills help the BA?

Answer 31

Communication Skills support business analysts in eliciting and communicating requirements among stakeholders. Communication skills address the need to listen to and understand the audience, understanding how an audience perceives the business analyst, understanding of the communications objective(s), the message itself, and the most appropriate media and format for communication.

Question 32

How do Interaction Skills help the BA?

Answer 32

Interaction Skills support the business analyst when working with large numbers of stakeholders, and involve both the ability to work as part of a larger team and to help that team reach decisions. While most of the work of business analysis involves identifying and describing a desired future state, the business analyst must also be able to help the organization reach agreement that the future state in question is desired through a combination of leadership and facilitation.

Question 33

How does knowledge of Software Applications help the BA?

Answer 33

Software Applications are used to facilitate the collaborative development, recording and distribution of requirements to stakeholders. Business analysts should be skilled users of the tools used in their organization and must understand the strengths and weaknesses of each.

Question 34

What is another name for a Responsibility Assignment Matrix?

Answer 34

A responsibility assignment matrix (RAM) is also known as RACI matrix or ARCI matrix or linear responsibility chart (LRC).

Question 35

What is the purpose of a RACI Matrix?

Answer 35

It describes the participation by various roles in completing tasks or deliverables for a project or business process. It is especially useful in clarifying roles and responsibilities in cross-functional / departmental projects and processes.

Question 36

What does the “R” in RACI mean?

Answer 36

Responsible. Responsible stakeholders are those who do the work to achieve the task. There is at least one role with a participation type of responsible, although others can be delegated to assist in the work required.

Question 37

What does the “A” in RACI mean?

Answer 37

Accountable. The Accountable stakeholder is the one who is ultimately answerable for the correct and thorough completion of the deliverable or task, and the one who delegates the work to those responsible. In other words, an accountable must sign off (approve) on work that responsible provides. There should be only one accountable specified for each task or deliverable.

Question 38

What does the “C” in RACI mean?

Answer 38

Consulted. Consulted stakeholders are those whose opinions are sought, typically SME (Subject Matter Experts) and with whom there is two way communication.

Question 39

What does the “I” in RACI mean?

Answer 39

Informed. Informed stakeholders are those who are kept up-to-date on progress, often only on completion of the task or deliverable; and with whom there is just one-way communication.