Business analysis is emerging as the IT job of the decade. The reason, explained Steve Erlank, managing director of Cape-based Faculty Training Institute (FTI), is that many despairing businesses, facing repeated IT project failures and systems which did not meet organisational needs, were turning to the business analyst as the person who could help unlock and realise value from IT investment.
"We are continually astonished at how many companies experience project failures running into millions of rands simply because the basic project processes were ignored, requirements were poorly understood, or under-skilled people were used.
"The problem is the wide knowledge divide between business-oriented and IT-oriented people. Business people don`t have to be experts on IT. But, to extract real value and a return on investment made in IT, business managers need not only to understand how technology can be used to support or drive business processes, but also need to understand the complicated process involved in getting ideas converted into technology-based business solutions.
"Since this may involve project management, software design, testing, programming and other technical skills, most business people are clearly not equipped to take on this task. And, it may be argued, nor need they be."
He said that historically, business people had relied on the technical IT function to carry out these activities, and to identify, specify and build these solutions. But IT, for the most part, was as ill-equipped to understand the business domain, as business was to operate in the technical domain.
Analysis had progressed a lot from the days of data processing, where systems analysts designed solutions that were written in COBOL, resided on mainframes and were accessed by 'users`.
Modern solutions now incorporated the gamut of information and communications technology (ICT), and needed to integrate complex distributed architectures of applications, databases, networks, hardware and people.
Solutions were spread over back-office, front-office and outside the company as it offered e-business applications to an increasingly dispersed and mobile user community that included business partners, customers, government and industry bodies. ICT solutions were now solidly rooted in business; technology was becoming ubiquitous. And to make it work, business needed to control its deployment.
Erlank said: "The solution lies in a special, multi-skilled person called the business analyst, who can act as an intermediary or representative of business in its interaction with IT specialists, both inside and outside of the business. A business analyst identifies and establishes business requirements, and translates them into clear-cut well-written specifications that are understood and used by technical specialists to develop and implement IT solutions."
The business analysis role emerged about five years ago in SA and was maturing quickly as organisations realised the value that these multi-skilled individuals could add in ensuring that IT projects were aligned to business strategy.
"The skills set for business analysis have been well defined and are out there. But the number of skilled business analysts remains in short supply. Professional business analysts require a range of skills, such as strong communications ability, excellent knowledge of business, and strong instincts for where technology can be applied to solve business problems.
"In addition, they require mastery of a number of methodologies and modelling techniques, and must feel equally comfortable operating in business or technical domains, at all levels of the organisation.
"Such individuals are hard to find, so businesses are turning to training to develop their own internal business analysis capability," Erlank said.
FTI speaks with the authority of nearly 15 years` training experience during which it had assisted more than 150 organisations, many of them national household names, in the Western Cape to build their analysis and project management capabilities.
Following the successful launch of its definitive six-month part-time Diploma in Business Analysis (Dip.BA) in Johannesburg, FTI now was experiencing a mini-boom in demand for this training.
During 2003 more than 20 large corporate organisations in Gauteng elected to send delegates on the public courses, or commissioned FTI to create diplomas customised for their needs to run in-house.
Advance bookings are being taken for courses well into 2004, with the January 2004 public course already waitlisted.
Erlank said: "We do very little formal marketing, and prefer to rely on referrals and word of mouth. We build very close relationships with our diploma graduates, and keep in contact for years after the end of courses. Our growth in Gauteng has been amazing, and is almost entirely due to the enthusiastic recommendations of our delegates, their managers and their companies.
"In Cape Town, where we have been running diplomas for business analysts, project managers, managers and other senior professionals for many years, we find that managers, who themselves are graduates of one more of our diplomas, then ensure that their own staff go through the same training as they did.
"We call it the 'Marine Corps syndrome`, managers who themselves worked so hard to qualify now expect their subordinates to follow the same rite of passage. This is part of the natural progression of careers in IT, and means that companies are able to build, over time, a workforce whose skills, experience and work practices are aligned.
The Dip.BA, which has evolved from a qualification for systems analysts first offered nearly 15 years ago, now features in the skills development programmes of many major organisations.
Delegates on Gauteng-based courses in 2003 were drawn, for example, from the South African Reserve Bank, Absa Bank, Investec Bank, Mutual & Federal, Harmony Gold Mining Company, MTN, and Liberty Life.
Academically, the diploma is based on a curriculum that is accepted and taught worldwide at universities, and it conforms to standards for business analysis defined in professional bodies such as the British, Australian and New Zealand Computer Societies. Ultimately, similar standards will be included in the National Qualifications Framework in SA.
"But the course is much more than theory, which is a limitation of most university-type courses," said Erlank, who spent more than 10 years as a senior lecturer at the University of Cape Town.
"To pass, delegates have to demonstrate mastery of the techniques by applying them in a variety of challenging situations. More than half of the course assessment is based on successful completion of real-world projects selected by the delegates and done in their own companies.
"The small classes, and the proven track records of the lecturers, ensure an intensive, motivating and powerful learning experience. The six month part-time, after-hours format means that the diploma is ideally suited to the schedules of busy people who hold down critical jobs, and who really can`t be spared by their companies for the amount of time required to train full time as a business analyst."
Erlank said: "We are passionate about the quality of our training, and take great pains to ensure that the training adds value both to the delegates and their companies. We have pitched our diploma courses directly at those people whom we feel can extract the most value from IT projects, namely the business analyst, the project manager, and the IT-empowered user or manager."
"Responses we have had from graduates show that the right kind of training really can produce value, right from day one. In too many companies training is seen as a cost which must be controlled. We would like to see organisations seeing the cost of training as an investment, with tangible returns.
"Delegates passing through the diploma courses become multi-skilled and can accept a multi-dimensional business role in the interests of efficiency and cost control. They become much more project-oriented. They gain enormous confidence from the tools they acquire in bringing together a range of applications and people skills, allocating resources, and nominating and sticking to 'start` and 'end` project dates, which is absolutely crucial.
"One of the most exciting and motivating aspects of our training for us is how empowering delegates have found our courses. For us, truly empowering someone involves providing them with more than just skills. After all, almost any training can transfer skills. The learning process on our diplomas goes much farther. It develops people who are confident in applying their new skills in the workplace. Without that, training cannot add value," Erlank said.
Web site: www.fti.co.za
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