Enterprise Analysis

Enterprise Analysis often creates a confusion that, is it same as Business Analysis or is it something different. As per BABOK Enterprise Analysis is described as “the BA activities necessary to identify a business need, problem, or opportunity, define the nature of a solution that satisfies the identified need, and justify the investment necessary to deliver the solution. Enterprise analysis outputs create a context to requirements analysis.”

Let us try to understand this from an activity perspective. This particular activity describes the knowledge area of business analysis to identify a business need, problem or opportunity, define the nature of the problem and justify the investment.

Enterprise Analysis is often the starting point of the project and through Enterprise Analysis activities, the business requirements are identified and documented.

It is the Enterprise Analysis, which helps to meet the strategic goals of the organization. Enterprise Analysis focuses on or is broken down into 5 sequential areas

1. Define Business Needs
2. Assess Capability Gaps
3. Define Solution Approach
4. Define Solution Scope
5. Define Business Case

Define Business Needs:

• Few approaches:
  • From top down
  • From bottom up
  • From middle management
  • From external drivers
• Main Considerations:
  • Business Goals & Objectives
  • Business Problems/Opportunities
  • Desired Outcome
• Techniques:
  • Benchmarking
  • Brainstorming
  • Business Rules Analysis
  • Focus Groups
  • Root Cause Analysis

Assess Capability Gaps:

• Main Considerations:
  • AS-IS Capability Analysis
  • TO-BE Capability Requirements
  • Assumptions
• Examples:
  • Business Process
  • End User Task
  • S/W Features
  • Services that an organization delivers
  • Products that an organization delivers
• Techniques:
  • Document Analysis
  • SWOT

Define Solution Approach:

• Main Considerations:
  • Alternative ways of reaching the goal
  • Assumptions
  • Constraints
  • Prioritizing the approach
• Techniques:
  • Benchmarking
  • Brainstorming
  • Decisions Analysis/Matrix
  • Estimations and Yields
  • SWOT per approach
  • Feasibility Analysis

Define Solution Scope: Scoping is a very vital factor in this process. Solution scope should include

• The scope of analysis
• The capability supported by solution components
• Capability support at each release
• How to enable the required capability
• Main Considerations:
  • Solution scope definition
  • Implementation Approach
  • Dependencies
• Techniques:
  • Scope Modelling – Identifying scope boundaries
  • User Stories/Use Cases
  • Interface Analysis – What needs to be integrated
  • Functional Decomposition
  • Problem or vision statement

Define Business Case: It mainly covers cost vs yield, ROI. It is a framework of how to achieve the business goal

• Main Considerations:
• Cost
• Yield
• Potential Risk
• Measurement Criteria – KPI and Metrics
• Techniques:
  • RPF/PFI
  • Estimation Modelling
  • Metrics and KPI
  • SWOT Chart
  • RACI Chart