MEDIDAS TOMADAS CON LA PERSONA SENTADA

Part of the work performed within needs assessment is to identify the problem being solved or the opportunity that needs to be addressed. To avoid focusing on the solution too soon, emphasis is placed on understanding the current environment and analyzing the information uncovered. The business analyst needs to ask “what problem are we solving?” or “what problems do our customers have that this opportunity will address?” The business analyst begins to elicit information to uncover the data necessary to fully identify the problem or opportunity.

2.3.1 Identify Stakeholders

Stakeholder identification is conducted as part of the needs assessment to assess which stakeholders are impacted by the area under analysis. A stakeholder is an individual, group, or organization that may affect, be affected by, or perceive itself to be affected by a decision, activity, or outcome of a program or project.

For example, when an organization wants to take advantage of a new technology or plans to automate current manual processes, stakeholder identification is performed to identify who will be impacted by the changes. There are various ways to locate stakeholders. Some possible methods are described in Section 3 on Business Analysis Planning, where this topic is presented in more depth.

During needs analysis, it is helpful to identify the following stakeholders: • Sponsor who is initiating and responsible for the project,

• Stakeholders who will benefit from an improved program or project,

• Stakeholders who will articulate and support the financial or other benefits of a solution, • Stakeholders who will use the solution,

• Stakeholders whose role and/or activities performed may change as a result of the solution, • Stakeholders who may regulate or otherwise constrain part or all of a potential solution, • Stakeholders who will implement the solution, and

• Stakeholders who will support the solution.

The affected stakeholders for a needs assessment can be categorized into one of four categories using a responsibility assignment matrix such as a RACI model:

2

• R—Responsible. Person performing the needs assessment,

• A—Accountable. Person(s) who approves the needs assessment, including the business case, when warranted,

• C—Consult. Person or group to be consulted for input to understand the current problem or opportunity, and

• I—Inform. Person or group who will receive the results of the needs assessment.

Example—Consider an insurance company that is interested in reducing the processing times and costs for automobile and homeowner claims. Initially, the organization understands the solution may impact a number of stakeholders across the company. To better understand who to involve in the needs assessment phase, the business analyst develops a RACI matrix to determine the roles and levels of responsibility.

Table 2-1 shows an example of a partial stakeholder list for the insurance company. Other possible stakeholders might be the claims operations manager, claims examiners, partners, and suppliers.

Table 2-1. Example RACI for Assessing Business Need

Sponsor Product Manager Business Analyst Product Development Team Mobile Technical Team Project Manager

Identify problem or opportunity A C R C C

Assess current state of the

organization A I R C C

Recommend action I A R C C C

Prepare business case I A R C I I

Collaboration Point—Both project managers and business analysts have an interest in stakeholder identification and RACI analysis. While the project manager is concerned about analyzing the roles across the project, business analysts may perform their analysis to a lower level of detail or may focus on one specific area, such as a needs assessment or requirements elicitation. Each may lend support to the other and work together to perform this work. It is important to ensure efforts are not duplicated.

2.3.2 Investigate the Problem or Opportunity

The business analyst focuses on learning enough about the problem or opportunity to adequately understand the situation, but avoids conducting a complete requirements analysis at this stage. As used here, situation is a neutral word to describe the context about the problem or the opportunity being investigated.

Initially, the business analyst may conduct interviews with stakeholders to investigate the situation and learn about the current environment. The business analyst may also review any existing documentation about current processes, methods, or systems that support the business unit. Process modeling is one technique used to document current “as is” processes of the business. The business analyst may monitor or observe the business performing their work in order to discover elements of the current “as-is” process. This technique is referred to as observation. For more information on observation, refer to Section 4 on Requirements Elicitation and Analysis.

2.3.3 Gather Relevant Data to Evaluate the Situation

Once a broad understanding of the situation is obtained, it is necessary to gather relevant data to understand the magnitude of the problem or opportunity (also known as “sizing up” the situation). The lack of data can result in proposing solutions that are either too small or too large compared to the problem at hand. In other words, the business analyst should attempt to measure the size of the problem or opportunity to help determine an appropriately sized solution.

When no internal data exists or when it cannot be feasibly collected, benchmarking may be performed. Benchmarking is a comparison of the metrics or processes from one organization against a similar organization in the industry that is reporting or finding similar industry averages. Data may not be readily available since competitors will guard nonpublic data closely. Benchmarking may also involve comparing internal organization units or processes against each other. Examples of data suitable for benchmarking include, but are not limited to the following:

• Cycle times for a business process to complete transaction volumes, occurrences of exceptions or problems, and delays caused by the exceptions or problems;

• Amount of money lost per transaction, per sale, by losing a customer, from costs to acquire a new customer, through waste, and from calls to a help desk;

• Website visitors, website conversions, sales inquiries, new accounts, and new policies; • Potential increases in sales, market share, customer base, and new contracts;

• Market size, potential new market share, current competition, and pricing structures in place; and • Competitive analysis of products offered, feature and benefit comparisons, pricing, and policies regarding

the foregoing.

Once the desired data is assembled, techniques such as Pareto analysis and trend analysis can be used to analyze and structure the data.

2.3.4 Draft the Situation Statement

Once the problem is understood, the business analyst should draft a situation statement by documenting the current problem that needs to be solved or the opportunity to be explored. Drafting a situation statement is not time-consuming, but it is a very important step to ensure a solid understanding of the problem or opportunity the organization plans to address. If the situation statement is unknown, or wrong, or if the stakeholders have a different idea of the situation, there is a risk that the wrong solution will be identified.

The format of a situation statement is as follows: • Problem (or opportunity) of “a”

• Has the effect of “b” • With the impact of “c”

2

Example—Consider the insurance company example that was presented previously. Like many companies, this insurance carrier took advantage of new technologies across its business and has an extensive Internet presence. The organization now wants to exploit mobile technology to improve its claims processing.

Before the development of a project charter, the business analyst drafts a situation statement for inclusion in a formal business case. Using the knowledge gained through the initial needs assessment work, the business analyst considers the identified business need and any initial assessment of the impact that the problem is having on the business. With this background information, the business analyst can then draft the situation statement, such as:

“The cost for processing claims has been rising steadily, increasing at an average rate of 7% per year, over the last 3 years. The existing method for submitting claims either by phone or the Internet involves significant processing delays and has resulted in the need to increase staffing to process the calls and personally investigate the claims.”

The problem, as assessed, was one of increased costs to process claims, including additional labor costs.

Note: The financial impacts identified in the situation statement will later be referenced during the completion of the cost-benefit analysis.

2.3.5 Obtain Stakeholder Approval for the Situation Statement

Once the situation statement is drafted, agreement is obtained from the affected stakeholders that were previously identified. This is a key step because the situation statement guides subsequent work for assessing the business need. When a formal situation statement and its approval are skipped, it is difficult to determine whether the essence of the current situation has been captured. Business stakeholders play an important role to ensure that the situation statement correctly defines the situation. Failing to refine the situation statement with the business may result in a solution that addresses only part of the business need or fails to meet the business need at all.

The business analyst initiates and facilitates the approval process, which may be formal or informal, depending on the preferences of the organization. Approval may not occur upon the first review of the situation statement, and there may be a need to revise or reword the statement so that the stakeholders are in agreement with it. The business analyst leverages skills such as facilitation, negotiation, and decision making to lead stakeholders through this process.