Key factor in determining the optimum business strategy and model
Business analysis can be one of the most important activities one performs when it comes to his/her business and one that is demanding itself, regardless of the business core activity. Each business which wants to evolve and stay on track has to learn dealing with change and transformation.
The agent of change or the business analyst (according to IIBA – International Institute of Business Analysis) will own the role of identifying what has to change and why, when is the optimum time to address the specific change and who are those impacted by the change. The agent of change will facilitate the change process, recommending the best approach for the organisation to succeed. She/he will maximise the value delivered by the organisation to its customers and collaborators. From strategy to leadership initiatives, all taking into account the organisational mission, vision, set of values and goals. She/he will support the attempt to become successful by implementing new working strategies, technologies and processes.
As business analysts, we take the ownership of guiding, supporting and helping the creative agencies we work with, delivering their planned strategies and generating the expected results. We engage in finding the best solutions for their business to thrive, following the optimum strategies to optimise cost, identify new business opportunities and help the organisation grow further. Our ultimate goal is to enhance their capabilities of doing business effectively. Business Analysis Helps Businesses Do Business Better.
The core concepts and their relationships by BACCM™ BABOK® Guide
Nice to have versus must-have
It’s fair to say that we can try almost anything we want to, and until all these business concepts have been understood and shaped, we have all tried our best in making a business work. But sometimes, the sole purpose of a business isn’t only to work. A business is more than just an idea or a set of products or services. It’s made out of its founders, the people who work for it every day, of those who shape it and fight for its success. It’s definitely influenced by its customers and the people who request the business value and make it prosper. There are so many resources involved in making a business exist that it becomes obvious that we need good processes in place to make it develop and grow. Moreover, we want to influence its success by achieving the business objectives and major goals.
Part of a business long term development process includes taking a closer look at processes and tools that speed up our growing process or those who delay it or even stop it. Moreover, we need to pay attention to those mechanisms which have no impact on our business development – we call these: nice to have. For example, we want a project management tool and we purchase one of the most expensive because it’s widely recommended or it has multiple functionality features. However, we end up only using 20% of it. This means we pay for the other 80% and we don’t even need it. When the 20% supports our daily tasks and business growth and the other 80% is just a random cost, we are wasting financial resources instead of investing them properly in other areas.
While some business owners might consider a business analysis process just a nice to have one because it’s not necessarily needed, we find it as a must-to-have process for any business regardless of its level of development. For example, a proper business analysis could help reduce the 80% of unnecessary resources and tools and redundant costs. Furthermore, it can optimise processes, improve procedures and operations and also find the optimum solutions to challenges and major problems.
A business is based on needs. The needs of its customers and stakeholders and the needs of its employees. When those needs meet the business requirements, then the way to success it’s a simple and clear path. However, in most cases, this intersection of the two conditions is not so often realised, due to the fact that business owners focus mostly on delivering and achieving and not always on building the appropriate structure to achieve and deliver.
Bridging the gap
Business analysts are responsible for bridging the gap between different departments and the business using data analytics to assess processes, determine requirements and deliver data-driven recommendations and reports to executives and stakeholders. Her/his major role is to interpret all business requirements and translate them into understandable tasks. This action has a crucial impact on delivering the expected business outcomes.
The more we understand the role of a business analyst, the more we realise how much an organisation and its employees need her/his support. This understanding will lead to creating the necessary requirements for any organisation to continuously improve and achieve its goals. Furthermore, it will improve the communication between all departments and stakeholders as this is another key task of a business analyst. She/he deals with several layers of a company and his role can vary from tackling project management or business processes to IT, Marketing or so on. We could almost say that a business analyst is the person who does it all and although this might seem too much – she/he is the person who has to know a bit of everything to positively influence the business and its results.
We, optimized it provide a wide range of business consulting services and have been helping lots of creative agencies re-engineer their internal and external processes over the years. We help you analyse your tools and processes, document each step and identify areas for improvement. We integrate that process with the technical one then assist you with the implementation and ongoing monitoring of these improvements. Amongst our business consulting services, you can benefit from: complete business analysis, technical consultancy, account/project management and support operations.
