Users explicit and implicit needs and your official and unofficial project list

Users explicit and implicit needs, your official and unofficial projects list

I am sure you have all heard of the phrase “Read between the lines “, “Don’t just listen to what I say, try to understand what I don’t say. “, In my marketing MBA course I have learned that a disgruntled customer whose feedback falls on deaf ears will eventually stop complaining and take his business elsewhere, also customers have stated explicit needs and un stated implicit needs. No one thought / asked for walkman, but the latent need existed, Sony’s foresight created the product Walkman and the changing lifestyle fuelled the demand for it, a market was born. Remember the only way to keep up with Future is to create it. The same applies to the conduct and role of the business analyst in any organisation

Companies go through phases, they are born , grow , mature , stabilize and decline ( unless they re-invent themselves )

In each phase the company faces new challenges and business analyst will need to prioritise these challenges for execution. Once prioritised he needs to prepare a business case and implement these projects. Some projects are high priority and the organisation has resources for them and they get implemented, some projects inspite of being useful, don’t get implemented because the company is still small in scale and investment in technology does not justify returns. Life goes on, company continues to grow , and the need which was not considered important due to small scale, now begins to grow important. The business analyst who were present at the time of original need moves on and is replaced with a new team , the new team is told a folk story on why the project was not implemented , they take it as given without questioning and don’t consider its implementation. Old users move on, new users come in , they continue to spend time doing a task that could have been automated and when they ask why it is not being automated they are given the same legendary reason. The reasons become Chinese whispers and no one is clear on why it has not been implemented and all continue to suffer

This is where a business analyst’s special skills comes in.

1. When you join a new company maintain a log of issues you find with users.


2. The best way to look for it is in calls that are logged with the help desk.


3. Speak with the users and try to understand what thley spend most of their on.


4. Record your observations , this will become your unofficial project list.


5. Do not jump and try to implement all unofficial project in the beginning.


6. Go with the flow and implement your official projects.


7. As you get more confident and knowledgeable about the company culture , its processes, refine your unofficial list.


8. Gain confidence of your users , find a user who is suffering the most.


9. Speak with the users for a possibility of the solution and discusses the requirements and refine them. finalise them with the users.
   


10. Check with all involved in implementation tha feasibility of implementation.


11. Once you are sure users need it desperately (i.e. there is business case) and there are resources able and available for implementation, speak with the management and add it to project list and implement it.
    


12. Trust me this will be one project that you will find eager users to help you out , there will be no reluctant users. It will be a WOW project.
    

A well implemented project will increase users confidence in IT and create a positive energy among users.

Dealing with Reluctant Business Users

Dealing with Reluctant Business users

Business Analysis is not about working in your cubicle (if you are lucky you can get way with a seat and a soft board on one side in the name of cubicle)

Business analysis is about working with business on business. By nature of the job it calls for working with business users. Anyone having worked with users will be clenching his fist at this point, well I am gritting my teeth

Talk about taking horse to the pond, what do you do when the horse if not thirsty? Can you still make him drink water?

This is the situation I regularly face, Imagine a situation where the CEO has asked business to work with a new supplier for new product range. The merchandiser who is responsible for that range is not convinced that the product is right for business, but the CEO is!!

In this situation the business analyst is caught between the devil and the deep sea, we have to work with CEO who sits on the clouds, also deal with the reluctant merchandise who believes and half hopes the initiative fails so he is proven correct

A business analyst is called upon to work out the process as per the business requirements, deal with business partner (who is surprised why no one in business is speaking with him regarding the new initiative’s success) and also make the reluctant merchandiser follow the process

Has any found himself in this situation? I have outlined brief steps on how to approach the situation

• First Step is to remember that actions are not important but intentions are and it’s not personal

• The first stage is to put an organisation structure in place, ( structure after strategy)

• The project will need to have a business sponsor who will be responsible for all decisions , the buck stops with him

• Under the business sponsor there needs to be an IT team lead and one business Team lead

• The next step is to get all stake holders in a room and make sure every one shares the understanding of the strategy in the same way and business objectives are defined and roles established

• There will be situations where all may not agree on the desired outcome , it is important to bring these to the table and document them

• This will lend more reason to follow the trials through so that the issues can be proved to be real or hypothetical

• Once the objective and issues are documented the next step is get the cross functional team and map the business process required to support the initiatives

• Define measures of success and put the system in place. The process may need automation of tasks, this will lead to parcels of development work that can be done in house or outsourced

• Share the process with business partner and with all involved in working with it , refine the process using their concerns

• The final process is then blessed by all and can be easy to implement

The result of the process will then prove the financial benefits of the project, the result will not be affected by lack of process or attitude in implementation but on pure business climate and judgement of decision. The results will be a fair basis for GO or NO go on the Pilot















    

Quest for Merchandise Planning Software Information

I have been trying to get some free information off the net on Merchandise Planning process and an evaluation of related software

It is amazing that even in this internet driven world where free information is a plenty , it was quite a challenge to find any decent information on this topic or subject at all , in fact i did not find any at all. There are a few sites that talk about the process briefly but none in enough detail

I could find more information on Sinuses then on Merchandise Planning. I guess there are more people who have suffered from Sinuses then from the headache of worrying about Merchandise Planning

Anyway i found an interesting blog http://merchandiseplanning.blogspot.com/ and a news group on merchandise planning - > > > > > merchandise_planning@yahoogroups.com

I guess I have to re-invent the wheel of learning all about Merchandise Planning through my own experience, any one wanting to know more about this subject can contact me after 6 months of this post by then I would hopefully have learned from Merchandise Planning software implementation

Welcome Poem

Hi

Let me start this Blog with a poem, I started my career's first WOW project as a business analyst with a presentation that started with this poem...{From a poem by Walter Foss}

Once upon a time there was a calf.
One evening he walked home through a thick jungle.
The distance to his home was only one kilometre but he walked three kilometres since, like all calves, he wandered here and there, left and right, up and down.
The next morning a shepherd’s dog passed that way and saw the calf’s hoof marks, and followed the path of this calf through the woods.
Shortly after, the first sheep of a flock followed the path and behind him all the other sheep. Thus a path was made through the woods
Men began to use that path, cursing its twists and turns as they did, but doing nothing about it.
The path gradually became a lane, the lane became a road and horses and bullock carts followed it - followed the steps of the wandering calf.
A century later the road became a street, and then a city’s crowded thoroughfare, with thousands following in the footsteps of the wobbly calf.
Three centuries later the road became the main street of a very large city. Buses, lorries, trams and cars followed the zigzag path of the calf.

“A hundred thousand men were led
By one calf near three centuries dead
They followed still his crooked way
And lost one hundred years a day...
For men are prone to go it blind
Along the calf-path of the mind
And work away from sun to sun
They follow in the beaten track,
And out and in and forth and back,
And still their twisting course pursue
To keep the path that others do,
They keep the path a sacred groove,
Along which all their lives they move.”

The above poem captures the essence of what I have been doing as a Retail Business Analyst

The purpose of this blog is to discuss retail specific issues that may be of interest to a Retail Business Analyst

Ajay Bohra
Retail Business Analyst