BA Role

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A Business Analyst is a person who helps businesses to analyze their processes, products, services, and systems to improve current processes and make profitable decisions through insights and data analysis. A Business analyst also helps organizations to document business processes by assessing the business model and its integration with technology.

A primary job responsibility of Business Analyst is to communicate with all stakeholders & to elicit, analyze and validate the requirements for changes to business processes, information systems, and policies.

A professional business analyst plays a big role in moving an organization toward efficiency, productivity, and profitability.

Before we jump into the tutorial, we will see some basic perspective of a Business Analyst to help the organization succeed. The foremost priority for any business analyst will be to try understanding following things

Understand what business does and how it does
Determine how to improve existing business processes
Identify the steps or tasks to support the implementation of new features
Design the new features to implement
Analyze the impact of implementing new features
Implement the new features
Next in this Business Analyst basics tutorial, we will learn about Business Analyst roles and responsibilities.

Business Analyst Roles and Responsibilities
Business Analyst can be from any sector, and the role differs based on the sector. Business Analyst are classified into various categories like

Business Analyst
Business Process Analyst
IT Business Analyst
Business System Analyst
System Analyst
Data Analyst
Functional Architect
Usability or UX Analyst

Skills of a Good Business Analyst
Basically, Business Analyst skills are judged on these four attributes:

Analytical skills- An outstanding analytical skills will separate out a good business analyst. A good part of BA role includes basics of business analysis, analyzing data, workflow, user or stakeholders inputs, documents, etc.
Leadership skills- One of the Business Analyst responsibilities is directing team members, forecasting budget, helping team members with the problem, etc.
Business process and planning- Planning the project scope, understanding and implementing requirement of project, identifying resources required for the project and so on
Technical skill- If a business analyst is in the IT sector, few technical aspect are expected to know like operating systems, hardware capabilities, database concepts, networking, SDLC methodology, etc.
Certifications
As per the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA), CBAP (Certified Business Analysis Professional) certification is a recognized certificate for a professional Business Analyst.

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UAT (User Acceptance Testing) is unique among the activities we undertake on our projects, because its focus is on people who are outside the team, and its primary purpose is not finding defects.

User ? The people who will actually use the solution are not generally active in the project that creates it.  This is true even in Agile projects, where the Product Owner (who is quite involved) is only one person, and the other users remain more distant.  UAT gives users the opportunity to see what has been built and provide feedback to the development team before it is deployed.

Acceptance ? No system is perfect, so we must ensure that our system is acceptable before it is deployed.  It is precisely the Customer for whom the system is being built and the ultimate end users (those people who are not very involved in the project most of the time) who must accept what we deploy.  UAT is their opportunity to determine if they can indeed accept what has been built.

Testing ? Written requirements, drawings, mock-ups and the like are not the system, they are merely attempts to clarify what the system will be and do ahead of time.  When it comes to acceptance, those things, and even demonstrations of the system there are no substitute for the Customer and the Users actually putting their hands on the system and trying it out (testing it).

User Acceptance Testing is when the people who will ultimately use the system to do real work run it through its paces in a test environment to be sure that it meets the business need well enough to be accepted.

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Business Analyst perform following activities during the UAT
1. Identifying UAT Testers - Users can of be of two types-Active users or Passive users. Active users are the ones who actually interact with the system and their hands are on the keyboard whereas Passive users are the ones who don't interact with the system directly but are impacted by the system in one way or another(eg, they may receive reports or emails or notifications from the system)

2. Planning UAT Tests - Planning for UAT is significantly different from planning the other types of testing because the whole purpose of UAT is different. All of the other testings that are done is focused on finding defects, so by the time we get to UAT, there should be fewer defects remaining to be found. On the other hand, the major focus of UAT should be on how the system will actually be used in practice.

3. Determining When To Do UAT - Usually people think that UATs must be performed at the end of the project, but doing this crucial evaluation so late might land up in significant risks because any issues found in UAT will either cause delays(time involved in the correction) or will have to be accepted as it is.

4. Delivering Business Value Through UAT - Actively participating in UAT planning and execution is an important way for the BA to ensure that value is indeed delivered.

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A Business Analyst is a person who helps businesses to analyze their processes, products, services, and systems to improve current processes and make profitable decisions through insights and data analysis.

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Roles of Business Analysts in User acceptance test :

1. Delivering Business Value Through UAT-Actively participating in UAT planning and execution is an important way for the BA to ensure that value is indeed delivered.
2. Determining When To Do UAT-Usually people think that UATs must be performed at the end of the project, but doing this crucial evaluation so late might land up in significant risks because any issues found in UAT will either cause delays(time involved in the correction) or will have to be accepted as it is.
3. Identifying UAT Testers-Users can of be of two types-Active users or Passive users. Active users are the ones who actually interact with the system and their hands are on the keyboard whereas Passive users are the ones who don't interact with the system directly but are impacted by the system in one way or another(eg, they may receive reports or emails or notifications from the system)
4. Planning UAT Tests-Planning for UAT is significantly different from planning the other types of testing because the whole purpose of UAT is different. All of the other testing's that are done is focused on finding defects, so by the time we get to UAT, there should be fewer defects remaining to be found. On the other hand, the major focus of UAT should be on how the system will actually be used in practice.

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UAT (User Acceptance Testing) is unique among the activities we undertake on our projects, because its focus is on people who are outside the team, and its primary purpose is not finding defects.

The Business Analyst (BA) is in the perfect position to identify the people who should be the UAT testers.  By virtue of the Requirements Elicitation and Analysis activities, the BA has already identified and made contact with a wide variety of end users; both Active and Passive users.

The Active Users are those who actually interact with the system itself.  These are the people whose hands are on the keyboard or mouse or touchscreen and would have been key sources not only of functional requirements but also of performance, usability and other non-functional requirements as well.  Much of what is built into the system is intended to meet these people?s needs, so some (or many) of them should definitely be UAT testers.

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?   After completing all the stages in SDLC process we have to contact client for testing of final product. As BA we have to put up a online meeting or a walk through meeting with client.
?   Business analyst should validate if the project meets its requirements. We can receive direct feedback from the end users and then analyze the feedback to make right correction.
?   After analyzing feedback from the end users we should make User Acceptance test plan, UAT test cases and defect log.
?   As business analyst we have to create separate test plan for each type of user who will participate in UAT. Each test plan must include business scenario that will be used by the system.
?   While the UAT testing is going on business analyst must ensure that all the requirements are tested by the user for best result. We can add individual roles in the test plans to achieve complete UAT of each requirements.
?   As a business analyst record the results of user acceptance test and confirm the business objectives are met by application.
?   If the requirements are not fulfilled then the application will be sent for further modification and development.

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BA has different role :
Creating a detailed business analysis, outlining problems, opportunities and solutions for a business
Budgeting and forecasting
Planning and monitoring
Variance analysis
Pricing
Reporting
Defining business requirements and reporting them back to stakeholders

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The BA role is all about ensuring that each project delivers the value the business needs and expects. Actively participating in planning for and running User Acceptance Testing is an important way for the BA to ensure that value is indeed delivered.

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BA Roles are
1. understand and identifying the business Requirements
2. Managing and preparing project documents
3. Conducting meetings with developing team and stake holders
4. Decision making and problem solving
5. Monitoring project progress and handling change request
6. UAT planning and execution and deliveries

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What is the role of BA in UAT?

1. Requirement Gathering using Elicitation technique
    Stakeholder analysis
         Identify Stakeholders
         List down all important stakeholders
         Create RACI matrix ? make a matrix or table contains all stakeholder list who will impact the proposed IT solution. And check for each activity in
         SDLC who are responsible, accountable, consulted and informed stakeholders.
     Elicitation technique
         brainstorming, document analysis, reverse engineering, interviews, workshop, focus group, observation, questionnaires and prototyping through
         which BA gather requirements

2. Document the requirements using industry standard
         Business requirement documents (BRD)-
         BRD is maintained once all the requirements are gathered, sorted and validated .It also contains scope of project
         Solution Requirement (SRS) ? It has two types
            1)Functional Requirements (FR)- contains technical functionalities or features of a proposed solution
            2)Non functional requirements (SSD) ? related to quality, reliability, system environment, regulatory, standards etc

3. Model the requirement using UML? Using  use case diagrams or activity diagram, BA will prepare test cases  and communicates with client on the design and solution documents and from that solution architect recommends the architecture of the IT solution and then DB architect and GUI designer work on database and design with all possible screens respectively

4. Communicate the requirements to the technical team ? BA arranges JAD sessions with technical team and communicates all requirements. Development team will start preparing code to get the desired solution and testing team start testing scenarios and test cases prepared by BA using use cases

5. Track the requirement ? BA tracks the requirement by maintaining RTM (Requirement traceability matrix) .Each resource must maintain the RTM during software life cycle it helps to do impact analysis if any defect occurs in between. It will also help client to understand the progress of project

6. Handle the change request- If any change request comes from client BA performs feasibility study to accept the request and then perform impact analysis of change on project and requirements and then prepare budget estimation to implement the change. After that BA takes approval from project manager to implement the change request

7. Facilitate User Acceptance Testing ? At every stage of product development BA takes sign off from client either on email or on document that work done in every stage is accepted by client. After completing the system integration testing done by testing team BA prepare client to drive UAT and then take sign off on client project acceptance form. And then BA forwards the RTM to client and take sign off from client on project closure document.

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Business analysts (BAs) are responsible for bridging the gap between IT and the business using data analytics to assess processes, determine requirements and deliver data-driven recommendations and reports to executives and stakeholders.BAs are responsible for creating new models that support business decisions by working closely with financial reporting and IT teams to establish initiatives and strategies to improve importing and to optimize costs. You?ll need a ?strong understanding of regulatory and reporting requirements as well as plenty of experience in forecasting, budgeting and financial analysis combined with understanding of key performance indicators,? according to Robert Half Technology.

According to Robert Half a business analyst job description typically includes:

Creating a detailed business analysis, outlining problems, opportunities and solutions for a business
Budgeting and forecasting
Planning and monitoring

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UAT (User Acceptance Testing) is unique among the activities we undertake on our projects, because its focus is on people who are outside the team, and its primary purpose is not finding defects.

User ? The people who will actually use the solution are not generally active in the project that creates it.  This is true even in Agile projects, where the Product Owner (who is quite involved) is only one person, and the other users remain more distant.  UAT gives users the opportunity to see what has been built and provide feedback to the development team before it is deployed.

Acceptance ? No system is perfect, so we must ensure that our system is acceptable before it is deployed.  It is precisely the Customer for whom the system is being built and the ultimate end users (those people who are not very involved in the project most of the time) who must accept what we deploy.  UAT is their opportunity to determine if they can indeed accept what has been built.

Testing ? Written requirements, drawings, mock-ups and the like are not the system, they are merely attempts to clarify what the system will be and do ahead of time.  When it comes to acceptance, those things, and even demonstrations of the system there are no substitute for the Customer and the Users actually putting their hands on the system and trying it out (testing it).

User Acceptance Testing is when the people who will ultimately use the system to do real work run it through its paces in a test environment to be sure that it meets the business need well enough to be accepted.

#Identifying UAT Testers
The Business Analyst (BA) is in the perfect position to identify the people who should be the UAT testers.  By virtue of the Requirements Elicitation and Analysis activities, the BA has already identified and made contact with a wide variety of end users; both Active and Passive users.
While identifying UAT testers, we need to think not only about the end users we identified during Requirements Elicitation and Analysis, but also about the requirements themselves.  User Acceptance Test should include checking all of the functionality of the system for acceptability, so it is useful to go thru the requirements and ensure that there is a user who will check each one during UAT.

#Planning UAT Tests
Test Planning for UAT is different from planning the other types of testing on our projects because its purpose is different.  All of the other testing we do is focused on finding defects, so by the time we get to UAT there should be few defects remaining to be found.  The focus of UAT should be on how the system will actually be used in practice.
#Determining When To Do UAT
We usually think of UAT as being the final step of the project immediately before deployment.  But doing this important evaluation so late in the project represents significant risk ? any issues found in UAT will either cause delays (as they are corrected), or will have to be accepted (and possibly scheduled for correction at some future date).

For this reason, the BA should work with the developers and testers to identify ways that UAT can be done earlier so the users? feedback on the system can be incorporated into the software without endangering the project timeline or costs.  Here are some examples of ways to do this:

#Delivering Business Value thru UAT
The BA role is all about ensuring that each project delivers the value the business needs and expects.  Actively participating in planning for and running User Acceptance Testing is an important way for the BA to ensure that value is indeed delivered.

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Design the test with testing team according to all the scenarios which can occur in product

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The UAT business analyst will be involved in UAT to a degree, depending on the project.

At a minimum, he/she will provide guidance to system behavior and identify scenarios which would be suitable to test. They may be requested to review the test scripts and objectives and, in some cases, may actually coordinate and manage the execution of the user acceptance testing.

The business analyst role in UAT, should do no more than co-ordination as it is critical that the business has ownership of the tests and, hence, believe that passing business acceptance testing genuinely means the product is fit for purpose.

This will depend on the company culture, the specific project and whether there are any resourcing issues.

As a service value proposition the business analyst should seek to collaborate with stakeholders to support business acceptance of the solution.

The service activities for business acceptance testing and hence the role of the business analyst role in UAT should include:

Agreeing scope for the testing activity.
Defining test scenarios and test cases.
Provide support to stakeholders when testing for business acceptance.
The business analyst can help facilitate UAT including arranging the schedule, environment and who will be involved in UAT.