Contents

Purpose of this guide 3

Role of a business analyst 4
Misconceptions about BA 5
Questions to ask 8
Skills framework 10
Roadmap to become a BA
12
Learning path for a BA
19
Further Reading resources
26

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 Chapter 1

Purpose of this guide

This guide is conceptualized and written for professionals, who wish to
become a business analyst in the IT industry. It’s a step by step guide
and will help you plan your move to this exciting career of BA.

To begin with, I will help you in determining if you have the right
aptitude for this career? Getting into the right career ensures that you
will do well and will have a successful life.

Last but not the least, this guide also includes a section titled
Learning path for a business analyst, which will provide you useful
resources to get you started.

What are we going to discuss in this guide?

• Role of a Business Analyst
• Misconceptions about Business Analyst profile
• Questions to ask before you start
• Skills of a Business Analyst
• Roadmap to become a BA
• Certifications for a business analyst

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 Chapter 2

Role of a Business Analyst

It's pertinent to start this guide by

understanding the role of a business analyst.
Everything about
What does a business analyst do? The
Business Analyst
diagram above is a simple depiction of the role
– Role, Career
of a business analyst.
and growth path
As shown above, Business analyst plays
the role of an intermediary between the
customer and the technology team with the
primary responsibility of understanding the
requirements and converting it into technical
requirements so that the tech team can
develop the software. Business Analysts also
test the software before it is delivered to
customer for UAT.

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 Chapter 3

Misconceptions about BA
I come across these misconceptions often during my
discussions with business analyst aspirants. Lack of awareness or
misplaced information are the primary reasons for these misconceptions.

O n ly I T P ro f e ssionals ca n b e co me B u siness A n a lyst s

This is nowhere close to the reality. In fact, professionals

from other industries have no disadvantage as far as BA role is
concerned. This role, in fact requires a thought process, which is more
business oriented than IT oriented. Why? That's because you are going
to be entrusted with understanding the business requirements from the
customer. Obviously, this does not need you to be an IT professional as
you are not dealing with technical requirements but business
requirements as stated by non-IT professionals (mostly).
However, you do need to understand software development
processes and analysis techniques in order to convert the business
requirements into technical requirements. Anybody can learn these
techniques and with systematic practice, can master them as well. Later
in this guide, I will discuss a breakdown of specific topics which needs to
be learnt.

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 Chapter 3

Misconceptions about BA
Y o u n e e d t o le a rn p ro g ramming

This is completely untrue, you need not learn programming

(in the truest sense) at all. As far as you are concerned, you don't need
to learn programming at all to become a business analyst.

However, SQL (Structured Query Language), the language to query the

database, needs to be learnt partly so that you can use it to validate the
data from the data base. We have created a 3-part SQL tutorial for the
beginners and you will see that it's not very difficult to learn that.

B u sin ess A n a lyst = B u sin ess A n a lyt ics, re a lly?

This is again far from reality. Business Analyst, in our

context, deals with customer requirements and functional testing. On the
other hand, Analytics deals with data and more specifically - it is the
science of making sense of the data.

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 Chapter 3

Misconceptions about BA
Let's take some examples. Retail chains use analytics to
determine - how to stack products based on customers buying pattern.
Analytics is also used to offer co-branded credit cards for consumers.
That's because consumers in a particular category use
certain services regularly. So you can see banks issuing credit cards co-
branded with Jet Airways or Amazon. These products are based on
recommendations done by analytics engines using various statistical
analysis. So, analytics is very promising field, yet very different from
business analyst profile, we are talking about specially at the entry level.

My real concern is that we are pushing aspirants,

who are looking to get into requirements analysis and
modelling into data analysis and modelling.

However, I must mention that If you are good with data and
like to get involved with data crunching, analytics is the right field for
you. Be sure about your aptitude before jumping on to the bandwagon.

7
 Chapter 4

Questions to Ask

Having clarified common misconceptions about Business

analysts, it's time to ask some hard questions. These questions will help
you in ascertaining if you have the aptitude for this role. Answer these
questions on the scale of 1-4. The meaning of scale is shown on the next
page.
Please note that if you don’t score well, it does not mean that
you can’t move to this role. Anything is possible with the right attitude and
hard work.

Rate your answers based on the scale given on the next

page. If you score 11+, you have a good aptitude as well as natural flair
for this role. If your score is between 8-10, you are in the borderline
category. Score below 8 means that you need to work towards it.

8
 Chapter 4

Questions to Ask

4-Very Much 3-Somewhat 2 - i n d i f f e r e nt

1-No

Here are the questions:

Q1. Do you like to interact with people?

Q2. You are not afraid of asking questions- even though they

might sound stupid?

Q3. You don't avoid discussions on important topics for the fear

of annoying people?

Q4. You don't mind even if you have to work alone to achieve

certain goals?

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 Chapter 5

Key Skills for BAs

Talking of skills, business analysts need certain specific
skills to start their career as a business analyst. These skills are
important not only from the day-to-day responsibilities are concerned,
but also from the interview perspective. The table below shows specific
skills, I have identified as entry level business analyst skill.

Software Development Structured Query Language (SQL)

methodology

Understanding BABOK guide Verification and Validation

Requirement elicitation techniques

UML Modelling
Prototyping
Data flow diagrams (Legacy)

Logical data modelling

I have not mentioned domain knowledge here. Even though

I feel that it’s an important skill, you can start your career as a business
analyst even without domain knowledge. Domain knowledge can be
acquired later in your career as well.

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 Chapter 5

Key Skills for BAs

As shown on the previous page, the CRAFT framework

points to the following specific skills:

 Requirement elicitation and Stakeholder analysis

 Requirements modelling with UML
 Requirements modelling with DFD
 Data Modelling
 Agile and SCRUM
 Managing requirements in Agile projects
 SQL

11
 Chapter 6

Roadmap to become a BA
In the previous sections, we looked at the role & skills of a
business analyst. Having explained the required skills for an entry level
business analyst, let’s discuss the steps required to achieve your target.
The roadmap has 5-steps as shown below.

In the next section, we will have a detailed look at the steps

shown above.

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Chapter 6

Roadmap to become a BA
Step I: Skills gap Analysis

As the first step, you need to evaluate your skills against

the detailed business analyst skills map. We have created a BA skills
map as shown below. Mark a 'Y' or 'N' against each row to evaluate
yourself.

Certifications
An important step in skills gap analysis is to know the right
certification for you. I am going to provide you details of BA
certifications on the next page.
In the subsequent sections, we are going to provide more
information on how to go about acquiring these skills.
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 Chapter 6

Roadmap to become a BA
Certifications

Another consideration is to get a certification. There are several entry

level certifications available, some of them are as follows:

 ECBA from IIBA

 BCS Foundation Level

 QAI Certification

 Certified Agile Business Analyst (CABA) from iSQI

Certifications are one of the ways in which an employer

can get assurance about the minimum skills level. Below is the link
for an article written by me on Which is the right BA certification
for me?

http: //businessan al yst. tech can vass.com/w hich -

business-an al yst -certif icati on -i s-ri gh t- for-m e/

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 Chapter 6

Roadmap to become a BA
Step II: Skills Acquisition Plan

Once you have completed skills gap evaluation, you would

know the skills, you need to acquire or upgrade. Now it’s time to
determine the approach, you would like to take to acquire these. You
have the following options available

 Self-learning

 Formal Training

 Hybrid learning

In the next chapter, I will provide the approach to acquire

each of the mentioned skills. I am also going to list down the resources,
if you would like to use them to learn the basics of business analysis.

Once you complete those tutorials, you can decide whether

you can continue with self-learning or you would like to go for a formal
training. But whichever approach you decide upon, you must provision
for at least couple of months to acquire the skills needed.

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 Chapter 6

Roadmap to become a BA
Step III: Skills Acquisition

This is the longest step and should take at least couple of

months. As discussed earlier, you can get started by using the step by
step resource guide discussed in chapter 7.

One of the important skills for the business analysts is the

communication skills. Communication skills refers to the ability to
communicate with the customer as well as the technology team, in a
clear and effective manner.

Communication skills is not about speaking a language

fluently but more about the ability to convey ‘what needs to be
conveyed’ without any loss of information. In broader sense, this is
about effective presentation skills. If you feel you need to work upon it,
go ahead and work on it simultaneously. There are plenty of resources
available on Youtube or you can join a course from any communication
skills academy.

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 Chapter

Roadmap to become a BA
Step IV: Practice, Practice & Practice

Why did I choose to keep this as an independent step?

That's because this step has the potential of making the real difference.
Every aspirant can learn the theoretical concepts using one of the
suggested approaches, but the ability to apply these techniques in real-
life scenarios is what makes the real difference. This e-book does
provide you a few resources, which you can use to learn it practically.

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 Chapter 6

Roadmap to become a BA
Step V: Re-shape your resume

Work on your resume so that it starts reflecting your newly

acquired skills. Re-shaping will require you to list down and show case
the skills as shown in the detailed skills map. Once you are done with
your resume, start applying for the job openings through a job portal
and get ready for facing the interview.

18
 Chapter 7

Learning path for a BA

In this chapter, I am going to provide a detailed step-by-
step resource guide to help you get started with business analysis
skills.

Step I: IT Awareness

Being aware of the basic IT concepts and terminologies

is important from multiple perspectives. This is specially true for
professionals, who don't have an IT background. You would not like
to give the impression of being DUMB in front of your manager and
team members. As the first step, get yourself familiarized with the
concepts and terminologies. Here are four video, selected to help you
get familiarized with the IT industry terminologies and concepts:

Lesson 1: What is information System?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qujsd4vkqFI

Lesson 2: Types of information System

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3zoHFdzQbs

Lesson 3: Internet basics for beginners

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3yttwGE-C0

Lesson 4: Types of application software

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7FqOKjgrLo

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 Chapter 7

Learning path for a BA

Step II: Understand Software Development process

Business Analysts play a major role in

SDLC
Software industry has evolved
the success of the IT projects by
over the last few decades. understanding and analysing the
Starting with Waterfall
customer requirements effectively.
methodology of software
development, the industry has This skill is one of the primary skills of
tried to keep pace with the
a business analyst. However, before
changing times. Several SDLC
methods have been tried. Agile you get to that, you need to learn
methodologies have shown to be about the software development
promising.
processes.

Software development process

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hjgOSyMuNA
Software development process part 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zsF1PhgUKI

Basics of Agile SDLC methodology

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icYMx2MmSTg
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Chapter

Learning Path
Step III: Learn Requirements development
Requirements (more precisely customer requirements) hold the key
to what a business analyst does? Quite naturally, you need to be
familiar with every aspect of requirements development and
management.

What do I mean by requirements development?

Requirements development refers to the entire process of
understanding the requirements from the customer to converting
the requirements into technical requirements, so that technical team
can develop the software on that basis.

I have shortlisted two videos for you, recorded by me

only. These are part of my business analysis training sessions.

Concept of Requirements
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3MnELjNFJU

Challenges of requirements gathering

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zsF1PhgUKI

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 Chapter 7

Learning Path for a BA

Step IV: Process Modelling

We touched upon the process modelling in the previous video. Process

modelling is key to understanding the business requirements. There
are multiple techniques to perform process modelling, one of them
being UML Modelling. Next video explains the requirements analysis
and modelling methodology in details.

Requirements modelling using UML

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QA-YekAB5Y

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 Chapter 7

Learning path for a BA

Step V: Writing requirement specifications

Once the requirements have been understood, they need to be

documented so that technology team can take it forward. Different
formats of writing specifications are employed. For example, in
Waterfall SDLC, we prepare System Requirement Specifications
document (SRS) or Functional Specifications (FS) document. Use
case specifications are prepared in OOAD methodology, while user
stories are maintained in Agile methodologies.

Writing SRS
http://www.jaysonjc.com/programming/
how-to-write-a-software-requirements-specification-srs-document.html
Crafting Agile Requirements
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmX6OO0CxfM
23
Black Box Testing Step VI: Functional Testing
You will come across this term
quite often as far as testing is Once the software application is ready,
concerned. This essentially a Business Analyst is expected to verify if
refers to the testing of
the software is developed as per the
functionality without looking at
the code. You will provide an customer expectations. Since you have
input and will verify the output, if
been responsible for understanding
it is as expected. Generally
testing is conducted by writing customer requirements, you will also be
test cases and preparing test responsible for verifying it.
data

Basics of Manual Testing Part – I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hjgOSyMuNA
Basics of Manual Testing Part – II
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zsF1PhgUKI
Basics of Manual Testing Part – III
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icYMx2MmSTg
24
 Step VII: Learn SQL
Database
Database systems are used
Structured Query Language (SQL) is
to store the data entered by
the users of the software. one of the skills which is expected to be part
Databases only understand a of a Business Analyst’s repertoire. SQL is
language known as
primarily used for extracting data from the
Structured Query Language
software application data base.
(SQL). Some of the popular
databases are Oracle, SQL Knowledge of SQL is required to
Server, MySQL etc. verify the entry of correct data as well as
SQL is a simple to learn.
data analysis. Here is the tutorial:

SQL Tutorial for beginners

businessanalyst.techcanvass.com\sql-tutorial-for-beginners-part-i

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 Chapter 8

Further reading
In chapter 7, I provided you a step by step resource guide to
help you get started with the business analysis skills. In this chapter, I
am providing you links to more resources for learning.

Agile Methodology Essentials

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3G7IJVb7-o

SCRUM Basics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icYMx2MmSTg

IIBA Certification BABOK guide version 3 Intro

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjwU73haQrM

BABOK Core Concepts Model (BACCM)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gO03J3weI_4

SQL Tutorial for beginners

businessanalyst.techcanvass.com\sql-tutorial-for-beginners-part-i

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