Customer Reviews

Seven Steps to Mastering Business Analysis

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is easily the best organized and best written book in my Business Analysis library. A couple are more amusing and a couple are more challenging, but this is the best overall. Well worth the price.

This is not a book about softtware development. It is about the analyst role (business analyst, systems analyst, business process analyst) and the range of ways that an analyst can deliver value. This book would be ideal for a development manager to use to argue for analyst positions on a development team or to write a job description for a business analyst. Experienced analysts will find it valuable when writing a resume, practicing interview questions, or writing annual goals -- because it reminds the analyst of all the little things that business analysis contributes. New analysts will find it valuable to identify new skills to develop and hints on how to handle the enduring challenges of the role.

Being new to the business analysis industry, I found this book extremely helpful. It was informative and well-written, breaking down some of the more complicated aspects of business analysis into concepts that were easy for me to understand. Even though I used it mostly as a primer, I will keep this book around as a reference tool for the future as well because it was full of tips and techniques that I can use down the line. It was obvious that the author is very experienced and truly knew what she was talking about. I'm confident that the knowledge I gained from this book was concrete, especially how she showed the way things connected to the the BABOK. I'm glad I picked up this book because it seemed to be the only comprehensive one out there that was on business analysis as a whole, rather than specific parts like requirements or elicitation.

This is the quintessential resource/business analysis manual that everyone who is either a business analyst practitioner, manager of business analysts or software development leader must have.

Whether one is new to the BA profession or a long-term veteran, there is a lot of information here that properly frames the profession in the proper light with plenty of scenarios, examples and challenges that a business analyst encounters every day in their job.

For someone who is considering business analysis as a new career path this book serves as an excellent primer and will let one know if this is the right profession for them based on the wealth of information presented in Ms. Carkenord's straightforward and facile delivery style.

You will keep referring this to after you've read it and it is clearly aligned with all of the business analysis knowledge areas that comprise the BABOK (Business Analysis Body of Knowledge).

If you had to have a desert island business analysis book, this would be the one that you should have!

As the economy slowly emerges from the recession and starts to add jobs, the situation in the IT field is mixed. In many areas, jobs continue to be lost or outsourced to a foreign land, yet in other areas there are not enough qualified people to fill many key positions. I subscribe to several trade journals and the overwhelming consensus is that the combination of skills that are most in demand are a strong combination of technical and business knowledge skills. One of the most specific needs is the ability to perform a detailed analysis of the environments interior and exterior to the organization, what changes need to be made and how to manage them. This is the realm of the business analyst (BA).
There is no easy road to becoming a business analyst. It requires a combination of personal and group diplomacy, the ability to perform questioning that is both tactful and forceful, knowledge of individual and group psychology, political acumen as it applies to an organization, a great deal of technical knowledge and the ability to perform reasonably accurate accounting projections.
The value of business analytics and the lack of people capable of doing it well are both well known. As the title implies, this book is designed to be a tutorial in how to become an effective BA and it is a success. It opens with the logical fundamentals of what business analysis is and basic questions are asked and answered. Some of them are:

*) What is a project?
*) What is a product?
*) What is a solution?
*) What is a deliverable?

At first thought, this may be a waste of time, but upon deeper thought you realize that the definitions of these terms are not crisp. Each is defined by a relatively wide spectrum of conditions, for example what one stakeholder considers a solution another would not.
The following chapters all deal with the reader moving into a position of being "in the know." Titles of the chapters are:

*) Know Your Audience
*) Know Your Project
*) Know Your Business Environment
*) Know Your Technical Environment
*) Know Your Analysis Techniques

In other words you not only have to have the skill set listed earlier, you have to know and understand the complete context you find yourself in.
Clearly, this is not a position that one can move into very quickly; it takes a great deal of time, effort and experience in order to be an effective BA. Fortunately, Carkenord has put her experience down into a form where it can be utilized by others, at times she explains in text, other times she uses tables of key data points and she occasionally cites some of her professional experiences.
The world of IT employment is a hard one and there is no real reason to believe that the number of jobs in the area is going to dramatically improve any time soon. Therefore, if you are in IT and either under or unemployed you have two choices, either leave the business or retool your skill set. This book will be of no value if you choose the former but priceless if you decide to do the latter.

This is a must-read for anyone who must work with business analysts or must step in and perform business analysis. It is for managers who want to know what questions to ask during an interview or what types of training to recommend to existing staff. Great breadth of information and well-written. Explains all of the terminology you hear and that everyone assumes you understand. Great introduction to the profession.

I find the definitions from IIBA not very thoughtful, content is useful but focuses less on various methods of Business & Requirements Analysis.

I found Seven Steps to Mastering Business Analysis concise and easy to read. It provides a great source of information for an experienced BA as well as some who just started on the path of business analysis. What I liked the most is that the methodologies and tools described in the book can be easily employed by BAs in day-to-day work. It opened my mind to improvise with the technologies I already use and allowed me to see the approaches I dismissed long ago in a new light. I highly recommend this book to anyone in the industry.

This book provides a great basic foundation towards understanding the basics and role of the business analyst. I would recommend it to anyone considering making a switch to this field.

I'm still in the first chapter, but am already impressed with the information being provided, and the clarity of the writing. Just reading the topics covered in the table of contents was thought provoking.

I am enjoying everything about the book. It gives information and feedback on the BA profession that is very down to earth and practical advices that came from the author's experience. Sometimes little nuances that makes the job easier are all what we need to improve our skill set.