The Agile Perspective highlights the unique characteristics of business analysis when practiced in the context of agile environments.
Agile is about having a flexible mindset, embodied in a set of values and principles and exhibited by a variety of complementary practices. Agile initiatives involve constant change. Business analysts working on agile initiatives continually reassess, adapt, and adjust their efforts and tactics. Business analysts conduct analysis and deliver work products at the last responsible moment to continually allow flexibility for change; detailed analysis work is not done ahead of time, but just in time to be effectively utilized by the agile team.
Agile business analysis ensures that information is available to the agile team at the right level of detail at the right time. Business analysts help agile teams answer these questions:
- What need are we trying to satisfy?
- Is that need worth satisfying?
- Should we deliver something to satisfy that need?
- What is the right thing to do to deliver that need?
Business analysis work is performed continuously throughout an agile initiative and relies heavily on interpersonal skills such as communication, facilitation, coaching, and negotiation. Business analysts are active members of an agile team and often facilitate planning, analyzing, testing, and demonstrating activities. In an agile team, business analysis may be performed by a product manager/owner, business analyst, or by other defined team roles. Business analysts help the team identify modifications in assumptions and other project variations that emerge.
Refer to the Agile Extension to the BABOK® Guide for an expanded treatment of the role, mindset, and practices of business analysis in agile approaches, as well as details on the values and principles of the Agile Manifesto (www.agilemanifesto.org).
11.1.1 Change Scope
Business analysts working on agile initiatives engage with the business sponsor on a strategic level and assist with defining how the proposed product or feature aligns with the organization’s objectives. They collaborate with various stakeholders and the change team to break the product vision down into a prioritized list of desired work items to be completed. The prioritized items (or prioritized backlog list) usually focus on the capabilities needed in the resultant product, with emphasis on the highest value items first.
Business analysts may act as a stakeholder proxy, or work directly with the sponsor or product owner. In agile environments, change and rapid response to change is expected. Agile teams deliver small, incremental changes and commit to prioritized work items for only one iteration at a time. This allows the agile team to handle emerging changes for the upcoming iteration with minimal impact. An iteration is an agreed period of work time.
Requirements are developed through continual exploration and analysis of the business needs. It is important to note that though most agile approaches are iterative, not all iterative approaches are agile. There are also several agile approaches that are not iterative, such as the kanban method.
During agile initiatives, scope is constantly evolving. This is managed by the backlog list which is continually reviewed and re-prioritized. This process contributes to the refinement and redefinition of scope in order to meet the evolving and emerging business need.
If a major change emerges that significantly impacts the overall value and goals for the project, the project can be adjourned and reassessed.
.1 Breadth of Change
Agile approaches are used to address a variety of needs in an enterprise. The most common use of agile practices is in software development projects. However, many organizations have started to apply agile principles to non-software related change such as process engineering and business improvement. Initiatives using agile approaches can be undertaken within a single department or can span across multiple teams, departments, and divisions of an organization. organization to move towards culturally adopting the agile mindset. Adopting the agile mindset refers to the cultural adoption of agile principles as opposed to the organization considering agile as a methodology or practice to be implemented.
.2 Depth of Change
Initiatives using an agile approach are frequently part of a larger program of work, which can include organizational transformation and change, business process re-engineering, or business process change. The agile work stream is frequently, but not always, centered on software development. The other elements of the program can be developed using agile or another methodology that is appropriate for the need. Agile principles and practices are often successfully applied in initiatives where:
- there is a clear commitment from the customer and engagement by
empowered subject matter experts (SMEs), - the business need or proposed solution is complex or complicated, and
- business needs are changing or unknown and are still emerging.
Agile approaches can be used for initiatives that are developing a solution for the first time, or for maintaining and enhancing an existing solution. For example, if the change is mission critical then processes can be added to address regulatory requirements and to deal with the mission critical aspects of the project.
.3 Value and Solutions Delivered
The value and solutions delivered in an agile initiative are similar to any other initiative. The difference with an agile approach is the emphasis on delivering value early in a highly collaborative manner, using adaptive planning that has a focus on continuous improvement.
An agile initiative provides value by virtue of the approach taken by an agile team through ongoing review and feedback of the work performed. Stakeholders get the opportunity to frequently review the product, which allows them to identify any missed requirements early. The solution evolves over time with an expectation of rapid and flexible response to change. Clarity and visibility of all communications is of the utmost importance to ensure the agile team’s efforts align with the organization’s needs and expectations.
In a new team, the business analyst often plays a central role in building rapport and trust amongst the agile team members and external stakeholders to help enable ongoing collaborative discussions and engagement. This interaction enables the agile team to accurately deliver value that meets evolving stakeholder needs.
.4 Delivery Approach
Agile approaches focus on people interactions, transparent communications, and ongoing delivery of valuable change to stakeholders.
Each agile approach has its own unique set of characteristics that allows teams to select an approach that best suits the initiative at hand. Some agile teams have found that a hybrid or combination of approaches is necessary to work within the constraints of their environment.
Refer to the Agile Extension to the BABOK® Guide for a description of different agile delivery approaches.
.5 Major Assumptions
The assumptions in place in agile environments frequently include:
- Changing requirements are welcome, even late in development.
- The business problem can be reduced to a set of needs that can be met using some combination of technology and business process change.
- Agile initiatives have fully engaged customers and empowered SMEs with complete buy-in to the agile approach.
- Ideally, team membership is constant and members are not continually being moved to other teams.
- There is a preference for multidisciplinary and co-located teams encouraging more efficient and effective face-to-face conversation.
However, agile approaches can work well with distributed teams provided appropriate support and communication channels are in place.
- Team members may perform more than one role within the team if it is required, and provided that the team has the appropriate skills (for example, cross-functional teams).
- Team members have a mindset for continuous improvement and successful value delivery through regular inspection.
- Agile teams are empowered and self-organizing.
