Delivering Business Analysis

The BA Service handbook

By (author) Debra Paul, Christina Lovelock

Publication date:

16 September 2019

Length of book:

405 pages

Publisher

BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT

Dimensions:

244x170mm
7x10"

ISBN-13: 9781780174686

Business analysis is a vital business change function with the potential to offer an efficient and valuable business service. Effective business analysis enables greater project success, informed investment choices and the delivery of beneficial business outcomes. A BA service is essential to modern businesses.

Delivering Business Analysis explores the creation and management of a BA service, including strategy definition, recruitment and continuous service improvement. The book explains how to move beyond the BA Community of Practice and embrace a service mindset, as well as how to deliver a BA service offering and move on to co-create business value.

This is the first publication to support senior BAs and BA team leaders within their organisations, helping them to engage with their customers and ensure they lead a team with the skills and tools to deliver an exceptional BA service. It is a key text for anyone driving or enabling successful change outcomes who wish to understand the benefits that accrue from adopting a service approach.

  • A comprehensive manual, covering all aspects of establishing and maintaining a BA service
  • Offers BA Leaders a timely road map for moving from a standard community of practice to a customer-focused BA service
  • A variety of practical and informative case studies is included, each of which focuses on a particular aspect of BA service delivery and leadership
  • This guide will enable BA leaders to attract, recruit and retain high-performing business analysts to their organisations
  • Fully aligned with the syllabus for the BCS Professional Certificate in Business Analysis Service Delivery
'This book contains a wealth of information and models to help BA leaders understand what their organisation needs from the BA function. The use of models and frameworks works particularly well; using an abstract concept to make sense of a concrete situation is, after all, the core of business analysis. This book also recognises the need to understand leadership as a distinct skillset, which is often overlooked within BA functions as many managers are promoted on the basis of technical excellence and may have little help developing their management competence. Whilst there are lots of ideas included in the book, I was particularly heartened that the importance of organisational context runs strongly throughout; this is not a “one size fits all” instruction manual, but rather a rich source of views and concepts to help BA leaders make the right choices for their own organisations. This book is recommended reading for anyone who has, or aspires to, a BA leadership role.'