The Role of Business Analyst in Agile World

First let’s look at what is Agile?

Agile is a set of principles for software development. At the core is customer value and iterative development : release frequently, focus on the customer and collaborate through a cross-functional team, always prioritising test-and-learn methods over detailed planning. Align on the outcome, the end-state and its impact. Learn quickly, fail quickly. Key is speed delivery, so work to reduce the level of control and approval.

Agile goes with speed, so agile teams are generally small, 5-7 engineers. They can deal well with complexities and get creative. When faced with a big complex problem, they will break it into smaller components and work for solutions to each of them. The strength of Agile is Innovation. Basically all the agile principles aim to nurture innovation. 

So, what is the BA’s role?

In an agile team BAs responsibility is to explain clearly what the team wants to achieve but not how they should do it. The team should be autonomous to figure that out. They are empowered to work closely with internal and external stakeholders to get the information they need. 

As a BA, keep lightweight documenting and modelling. In Agile the purpose of docs is mainly to start a conversation, not to outline each detail. Rely on simplicity. It is less important to document and much more important to communicate. 

In an Agile world the role of the BA is to facilitate dialogue about customer value with the team, to bring clarity and shared understanding of what the team is building and how it brings value for the user. 

Few key points here are:

  1. Make sure that what is built is valuable. 
  2. Your focus is on producing dialogue, not documents. 
  3. Plan driven by outcomes, not tasks .
  4. Work through incremental development – deliver a small piece of value in a small amount of time. 

BAs facilitate the dialogue that helps the product manager prioritise what to build next.

BAs understand customer needs and what will delight users.

BAs facilitate continuous delivery by breaking down work into smaller pieces of value.

BAs ensure shared understanding of what the team is building.