The Role of the Business Analyst in Benefits

© British Gas Trading Limited 2011

The Business Analyst Role in Project Benefits

Thames Valley IIBA EventJayesh Patel

Date : 24 July 2012


Agenda

Slide 2

• Introduction into Benefits• The Project• BA Role during Project Lifecycle• Project Challenge• BA Approach & Tools• BA in Release Planning• Q&A• Take Aways


Introduction into Benefits

Definition of a Benefit:

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... The measurable improvement resulting for an outcome that is perceived as an advantage by one of more stakeholders and which contributes towards one or more organisational objective(s) (PRINCE2).


Benefits – The Challenge

• Some statistics…..• Studies show that over 70% of business improvement projects fail to

deliver their expected benefits, and even when they are achieved in part, often they are far from fully realised (InfoWorld report)

• Fewer than 12% of companies can accurately measure the business impact of their IT investments (InformationWeek summary of survey and interview research)

• 41% of projects failed to deliver the expected business value and ROI (Tata Consultancy Study)

• When the true costs are added up, as many as 80% of technology projects actually cost more than they return. It is not done intentionally but the costs are always underestimated and the benefits are always overestimated (Mercer study)

• 50% of CEOs and CFOs agreed with the statement “I do not feel my organisation is getting the most for its information systems investment” (Computerworld survey quoted in The Information Paradox)

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Type of Benefits

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Tangible Intangible


Why do we do projects?

“The role of IS is to deliver a capability to the business – the solution MUST enable the benefits to be delivered”

(British Gas Head of IS Change Finance)

Slide 6


Typical Benefits Categories in Business Cases

• Cost Reduction in Operating Costs

• COGS (Cost of Goods Sold)

• Revenue Growth

• Margin Enhancement

• Cost Avoidance in Operating Costs

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Benefits and the Project Life Cycle

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How BAs can add value in relation to Benefits

• The level of sophistication across the business in relation to benefits varies greatly

• There needs to be increased emphasis to ensure that it is possible to measure what has changed between As Is and To Be >translate this into quantifiable financial benefit

• Project costs are visible – benefits are more difficult to isolate and measure – this is a challenge for everyone

• MI should not always be an afterthought – it is often required to be able to measure benefits

• Business Analysts can play a key role in relation to business stakeholders and other IS stakeholders such as project managers

Slide 9


The Project

Quote captured by engineer in field and

sent via email to customer and British

Gas Office

•Business Case Benefits: £6m over 4 years for British Gas Services businesses

Replacing current paper + manual entry quoting process with automated solution

Paper based Quoting

From… To…

Field

An increase in quotes generated by engineers More consistency in quoting (increase in Revenue) Real time Pricing update (ability to run campaigns) Paperless quoting

Back Office

System stability Ease of telesales Facilitating new markets e.g. Solar, Electric Vehicles Improved controls on margins

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The Project (2)

• Agile (SCRUM) software development

• 42 Functional Requirements in High Level Requirements Specification at end of Shaping phase

• Produced 5 Epics and 105 user stories– Create Quote

– Progress Quote

– Manage Packs

– Housekeeping

– Performance Tracking

• End of Mobilisation phase ~166 user stories

• During Build phase ~maximum 196 user stories

Slide 11


Agile (Scrum) Overview


Allocating User Stories to Sprints

1

2

3

4

5

6

Product Backlog Sprint Backlog

User Stories are selected from the Product Backlog by the Product Owner at the Sprint Planning meeting

User Stories further refined and prioritised during the current Sprint to be ready for the next Sprint(s)


Prioritising Refinement of the Product Backlog

Product BacklogNext Sprint

Last Sprint

Pro

du

ct B

ackl

og

Sch

edu

le

Fine grained and detailed User Stories, ready to be used in a Sprint (Estimated at lessthan the Sprint duration)

Medium sized requirements,typically large UserStories. (Could be a Release)

Course grained requirements,Epics. (Could be future releases)

There is limited value expending effort on stories scheduled for

Sprint 9 when in Sprint 2


Agile - Iterative Process

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Project User Stories

Categorised User Stories into 8 Minimum Marketable Feature (MMF) sets to aid Release Planning:

1. Fast Quote

2. Complicated Quote

3. Create Quote in Office

4. Progress Accepted Quote

5. Progress Deferred Quote

6. Product Management

7. MI Reporting

8. System Configuration

Slide 16


BA Role during Project Lifecycle

Idea

• Define Options• Define business

needs & objectives

• Identify benefits

Shaping

• Gather requirements

• Analyse requirements

• Prioritise Requirements

• Define Measures• Mapping/tracing

benefits to requirements and objectives

• Communicate requirements

Mobilise

• Communicate requirements

• Elaborate requirements

• Create Product Backlog

• Ensure & manage the quality of Stories

• Identification & tracking of gaps, synergies & dependencies

Build• Clarify requirements• Prioritisation of the Product Backlog• Manage Product Backlog• Assessment of business value & impact on project• Requirements Specification &Solution Design & Product Backlog Traceability• Support Change Requests• Support Testing

Implement

• Support Training• Support

Implementation of measures

• Support Business Readiness

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Key

Red Text = activities directly linked to benefits


Project Challenge

Cost

QualityTime

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BA Approach & Tools

• Utilised Product Owners to proportion benefits from Business Case into Minimum Marketable Feature (MMF) Set

• Extracted Product Backlog from Mingle into MS Excel spreadsheet• Filtered User Stories by status, priority, business value and story points• Joint working with Solution Architect and Scrum Master to assess which

MMF could be delivered in a Release taking into account technical constraints

• Selected high business value User Stories that should be implemented for an MMF

• Prioritisation of MMF into a Release and graphical representation (see subsequent slides)

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Benefit Driven Requirements

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Minimum Marketable Feature Set Field (nn% of business case)

Office (nn% of business case)

£n.nn Million £n.nn Million

Fast Quote 80% 0%

Complicated Quote 20% 0%

Create Quote in Office 0% 30%

Progress Quote & Print Partner 0% 35%

Product Management 0% 20%

Operational Reporting 0% 10%

Performance Tracking (MI) 0% 2%

Housekeeping 0% 3%

100% 100%

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Release 1 Release 2 Release 3-£1,500,000

-£1,000,000

-£500,000

£0

£500,000

£1,000,000

£1,500,000

£2,000,000

£2,500,000

£3,000,000

£3,500,000

Multiple Releases

Benefit

Cost

Net Benefit

Time

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Release 1 Release 2 Release 3

-£2,000,000

-£1,000,000

£0

£1,000,000

£2,000,000

£3,000,000

£4,000,000

£5,000,000

£6,000,000

Single Release

Benefit

Cost

Net Benefit

Time

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Benefit delivered by Releases


BA in Release Planning

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ChallengeEarlier

BenefitsRealisation

Prioritisation

BA Enabler to help make decisions

ReleaseManagement


Questions

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Summary

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BA Role during Project Lifecycle

The Project

Project Challenge

BA in Release Planning

BA Approach & Tools

Introduction into Benefits


Take Aways – As a BA you can do this!

Business Analysts can become involved and add value at every stage of the life cycle by using their skills in

• Identifying, defining and shaping benefits

• Prioritising benefits

• Mapping/tracing benefits to requirements and objectives

• Prioritising and challenging of requirements

• Defining measures and the information to support them

• Gathering information

• Championing benefit realisation

• Influencing implementation

• Documenting and reporting benefits realisation

• Challenging and facilitating

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Thank you

Jayesh PatelBusiness AnalystBritish [email protected]