Business Analyst: Are you designing for a disaster...

What intentional and unintentional errors in business analysis can lead to...and what impact it can have. This blog provides a guide to help the business analyst understand the consequences of errors in requirements and designs.

Unintentional:

One of the most unlikely incidents occurred due to a software bug in the Therac - 25 medical radiation therapy device in 1985-87. This machine was used to administer radiation doses on patients, and in several cases the faulty device administered excess quantities of radiation. In some cases, it exceeded 100 times more than the intended dose, and resulted in several injuries and three deaths.

(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25)

Technology is like a 'Gift of Fire,' as correctly mentioned by Sara Baas in her book where she gave many examples of such disasters.


Correlating to her thought, it would be appropriate to ask a business analyst, “are you designing for a disaster?”


Many business analysts working on a project, especially a large project, fail to see the complete picture. This alone can lead their company or their client to the disaster.

Along with software design, development and testing, requirement analysis and design is key part of developing software solutions.


It is the business analyst who elicits a particular requirement or functionality document, confirms, and sign it off before communicating the requirements to the technical team. The requirement states precisely how it works under normal conditions, in an alternate process and possible error it may have.

What are the rules applied to the requirement? What is acceptable and not acceptable in terms of data, rules, format and so on?If the error lies in the requirement/functionality, intentionally and unintentionally goes undetected, could it lead to major disaster depending on the project/product it is used?For example, a decimal place mentioned incorrectly in a requirement document in banking software that deals with millions of transactions could potentially make a serious impact with loss of few millions dollars.

A particular requirement or function used in laser arm robotic surgery could be seriously impaired.

Defective transportation software could potentially cause loss worth millions and delay.

A space ship or flight software could cause an accident if any fault occurs in the system.

These are just a few examples of the thousands of potentially damaging situations that could arise if the software requirements are not documented and implemented correctly.


Intentional:


Of course, there could be intentional error in the requirements for designing the software solution to mislead authority. The most notorious example is how Volkswagen managed to manipulate the car emission system for two decades. Of course, when they are caught, they have to cough up close to 18 billion dollars in penalties, not considering the loss of face and brand value.

Oops...How brilliantly one can misuse the use of software... The team of business analyst/stakeholders/project manager who designed software never thought it would ultimately cost billions...

(Source: http://time.com/4046994/volkswagen-emissions-golf-crisis/)


Undetected hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica: This is another serious issue that impacts the whole world. The software that was used by NASA to map ozone layers had been designed to ignore certain values that deviated greatly from expected measurements.

Therefore, the hole in the ozone layer went undetected until 1985, even though the project was launched in 1978. It was only found after the scientists at NASA reviewed the data for abnormal results and found the error and the big hole.

(Source: http://royal.pingdom.com/2009/03/19/10-historical-software-bugs-with-extreme-consequences/)

The business Analyst's role goes far beyond the requirement lifecycle, as their role and responsibilities are not limited to just requirements or the solutions...but the total solution and its overall impact on the organization and beyond. Their contribution could possible make or break the organization.

Please read my book for more details: Business Analysis: The Question and Answer Book available on Amazon and other places in Kindle and paperback.

#BusinessAnalysis #Design #Disaster #SoftwareDevelopment #RequirementManagement #ProjectManagement

Automated model-driven BPMN approach for Business Analyst

This is my review to research paper “Resource-based Modeling and Simulation of Business Processes” written by Andrea D’Ambrogio. It is an interesting research paper that explores the simulation-based analysis of business processes that covers all the phases in BP lifecycle, starting from design to execution and improvement to post implementation enhancement phases.

The goal of the paper is to introduce a reliability in analysis that considers unexpected failures of resources to execute the process task due to unavailability of a resource allocated to a task.

The paper exploits both model-driven principles and Discrete Event System Specification, also known as DEVS.

This process requires first interpreting the BPMN model with the allocation of task resources described in terms of performance and reliability properties of the task resources and then transforming the annotated BPMN model into a DEVS-based model that in turn analyzes and produces the better outcome. This DEVS-based model can be used effectively by business analysts due to their unfamiliarity with or lack deep knowledge of the formalism. In addition, the author of the paper has proposed the automated model-driven approach, which would overcome the issues related to the manual building DEVS model, which are effort and time consuming, as well as error free. The mapping of BPMN elements to DEVS atomic models are later linked to the process control flow logic to get the final DEVS-coupled model. Work is currently in process to complete the specification of mapping rules for basic BPMN elements.

If this research is applied to advanced BPMN and becomes successful, it will have more scope in writing business requirements, business rules, and designing the systems.

How to conduct Stakeholder Analysis?

The basics of requirement management is planning for stakeholder analysis. If you miss this, you will face many hurdles. Stakeholder analysis is key to succeed in your project as missing any stakeholder in the stakeholder analysis means that stakeholders requirements will add to the project as either an additional requirements or a change. Both would have an impact on project timeline and budget. Moreover, the stakeholder may be disappointed for not counting him/her in the first place.

Let us understand how to work on stakeholder analysis...following are few tips of analyzing the stakeholders and creating the list in most effective way.

- By studying the business need (problem or an opportunity) and solution scope document to understand stakeholders and their involvement.

- Outlining the stakeholders’ details by studying the organizational structure or modelling the organization (enterprise architecture) and their relationships, and communication.

- Getting additional details through existing documents related to stakeholder analysis.

- Communicating and collaborating with identified stakeholders to confirm details thus obtained (except for details on their attitude and persona).

Process: First identify the impact of the business need (problem or an opportunity). Once you know the details, that will become your basis to build stakeholders. You also obtain organizational structure to understand the people and their role. You discuss with the main stakeholders to identify the stakeholders or you can obtain the official stakeholders list as some of organizations have formal designated person for every dept who act as stakeholder(s) for them.

You can compile the data in excel and verify the data with the relevant stakeholders.

The data can be compiled using following parameters.

1. # / Stakeholder Number
2. Name
3. Contact Number
4. Email
5. Location
6. Role
7. Responsibiltiies
8. Authority Level
9. Profile or
10. Technical skills / proficiency
11. Preferred environment
12. Special Needs
13. RACI (R - Responsible, A - accountable, C - consulted and I Informed. Some may add S for support, but that is an optional)
14. Additional Description
15. Group / category
16. Influence *
17. Attitude *

Please remember that all the information can be send to stakeholders to validate the data, except last two (influence and attitude) unless you want get fired. This list must be modified by authorized person to avoid complication of loss of data or changes made to the documents.

You can add more parameters to this and create a matrix that can be easily used.

Business Analysis vs Business Intelligence

There is huge difference between Business Analysis (BA) and Business Intelligence(BI) because BA has larger scope as it is application to all types of projects (including BI) where as BI covers only software applications used to analyze an organization's raw data (data mining, analysis and reporting related project) to make effective decisions.

Business Analysis:
"A set of task and techniques to understand products, services, operations, organization structure, policies, and culture to recommend a solution to the stakeholders to achieve their business goals."

The business goals could be generate additional revenue, reduce operational cost, to implement new regulations, to reduce operational roadblocks,  faster and effective decision making process, improve customer services, improve brand value, to increase customer base...

These goals can be achieved either by enhancing existing solution by adding feature or functionality, fixing issues or problems in exiting solutions or implementing new regulations or improving the process, building a new solution for introducing new products or services or developing new decision support system to make effective decisions.

It covers strategy analysis, requirement engineering and IT analysis to define and recommend a solution to the problem or an opportunity within the organization.

Business Analyst primarily identify and define the problem using various BA techniques and recommend solutions for that so that organization can achieve its goals and objectives.

• Bottom up approach: There is problem identified by users/customer in existing system and it is reported to managers. After detailed investigation, there is a need to enhance the existing solution partly or fully
• Top-Down approach: There is new opportunity idenfited by management to expand the exiting product line or implement new products/services. After detailed investigations, the appropriate solution is defined and implemented.
• Peer-to-peer: There is productivity issue identified by mid-level managers and needed decision support systems. After detailed investigations, the appropriate business intelligence solution is need to make effective decisions. This is where BI will play a role.

The scope of Business Analysis is larger than Business Intelligence as it can be applied to any kinds of problems or opportunity including BI.

Knowledge and Skills: Business Analysis, Domain Knowledge (to collaborate with stakeholders and domain subject matter experts, and technical know-how (SDLC, Testing, Data modeling, data management and others…to collaborate with IT team)

Business Analysis vs Business Intelligence
Source: ANISAN Technologies (www.anisans.com)

Business Intelligence: "a set of techniques and tools for the acquisition and transformation of raw data into meaningful and useful information for business analysis purposes"

Whereas Business Intelligence job is more technical role that involves several related activities, including data mining, online analytical processing, querying and reporting to analyze an organization's raw data using a variety of software applications. The BI specialist will work towards putting up effective system to extract, load, transform (ETL) and generate reports from heterogeneous data source such as SAP, PREST, ETU, RH, ORACLE...

Knowledge and Skills: technical skills like coding and knowledge of data analysis tools/ languages like R, SaS, Python etc.

The role of Business Analyst in designing UI/UX prototypes

''What is the role of business analyst in designing UI (User Interface) /UX (user experience) prototypes?' This was an interesting question asked of me to answer by a student. After responding, I thought of writing a detailed blog on this topic to cover many aspects of UI/UX design, as it is one of the most interesting but least visited topics. 

Most of the time, UI and UX are used interchangeably, however, they represent different areas. Let’s take a few minutes to understand and differentiate between them. 

User Interface (UI): User interface design focuses on better interaction with solutions and the design may focus on the placement of menu, look, and feel of the page. 

The goal of user interface design is to make the user's interaction as simple and efficient as possible, in terms of accomplishing user goals (user-centered design). Good user interface design facilitates finishing the task at hand without drawing unnecessary attention to itself. 

User Experience (UX): UX focuses on optimization of a software solution in terms of users' experiences and their feelings associated while interacting with the solution or product. It is human-computer interaction in a useful and meaningful way. For example, effortless identifying of the menus, flexible font size, usage of white space to declutter the website (and readers' minds), or using a familiar color (logo color) to enhance the product ownership. 

UI/UX Design Life Cycle.

User Need: This is an initial activity when need is identified. Business Analyst will understand the user problem or an opportunity. For that, business analyst will refer current state and other relevant documents to understand the current design and related issues and the focus area for proposed solutions.

Elicitation: There are no specific standards available for preparing the UI / UX designs. However, the business analyst can use standards that are specific to the project, their comfort level, and consideration of the internal and external usability standards that may be applicable. The requirements are split into requirements (descriptive text) and model/design (descriptive pictures/models). These are mentioned in IIBA's BABOK Guide version 3 You can use the same standards or customize as needed. 

Business analysts can elicit these requirements through design or models in collaboration with stakeholders and users. The business analyst can provide the details in the form of: 

Requirements: Functionality, features, and data needed in designing UI/UX Design. In addition, the user inputs these and validations needed for the same are also elicited. 

Organization policies and standards (internal and external): Internal policies will include the organization’s standards or policies for creating the UI and usability standards; for example, using colors, fonts, placement of items such as logos and menus, and so on. It will also include menu style, pagination, and navigation across sub-pages. While the external standards will include the standards specified by web browser (Safari 9.1.3 or Internet Explorer 10.0 etc...) operating system (Windows, Mac etc...), external agencies to whom you are sending or receiving feeds, and other requirements... These details need to be part of the requirement and provided to the designer for preparing the prototypes/wireframes. The design style will include menu style, pagination, and navigation across sub-pages. You can use a template/excel sheet to describe the details (for example: first name, input box, size, position) and provide them the basic design in MS Visio.

UI/UX Approach

Design/Prototype Approvals: Once the designs are prepared, the business analyst can use these designs/prototypes and the supporting materials (such as the excel sheet that was provided to technical person to create the prototypes) as a requirement to complete a mock-up and communicate them to the stakeholders. The stakeholders will review both the design and the supporting documents, and provide their feedback to improve, if needed. Once the changes are made and the designs are presented, they are required to verify and validate before starting the approval process. These designs and supporting documents become your verified and validated requirements for UI/UX.

At the end, the stakeholder preference will overrule all other standards in defining the UI/UX design. For example, do stakeholders prefer to follow industry standards such number of clicks for a functionality or detailed functionality, standard placement of menu over customized menu, and more.

User Acceptance (Validation): Ensure that all the windows are prepared and connected; i.e., the flow of the requirement screen by screen using all the flows mentioned in the FRD (basic flow, alternate flow, and exceptions). Some business analysts are creating this type of wireframe. But it is an option, as they can get these completed by the technical person.

Deliver: These approved designs are delivered along with supporting requirements to the technical team to develop. Once the development is completed, they are tested and deployed.

Enrich and Enhance: Once the solution settles in user community (production environment, website, or product delivery/acceptance) with no new bugs or issues reported, the enrichment and enhancement will begin as needed. UI/UX is most dynamic interface in comparison  to other part in solution architecture.  

Principles of UI/UX Design:

UI/UX design principle

Consumer apps can be trendy and catchy to appeal to the customers and business analyst can expect fewer formalities or standards used in these types of apps.

Summary: The UI/UX designs depend on the types of app or solution and stakeholders or user preference.

The designs are presented, reviewed, and confirmed before they enter into the development phase.

What is the difference between incident and problem?

Based on ITIL standards,

Incident - An incident is an unplanned disruption or degradation of service.

Problem - A problem is a cause of one or more incidents.

Incident Management
It’s considered as incident only it extends and impact on regular business process. They are flagged as emergency if they impact on critical services.
It needs to be resolved immediately.
It can be resolved using either permeant or temporary fix
Incidents can turn into a problem when it reoccurs or likely to reoccur.

Problem Management
Unresolved and repeated incidents become a problem that needs long terms fix.
A problem need policies and/process to resolve it to prevent it from reoccurring it.
Problem may be known or unknown
It can be remained unsolved or used an alternate option if the cost of resolving the solution is higher than the benefits it would bring in. (cost vs benefit analysis)

Incident vs problem.

Incident: If your 3 years phone breaks down, you need to fix it as you haven’t taken a backup. The technician fix it for you for USD 40.

Problem: There is battery and other hardware component issue, so the technician ask you to replace battery and the other component that combined would cost you USD 180. While the current value of your phone is USD 150 that you originally bought it for USD 500 as a newly launched model at that time)

You may take a backup immediately and make a decision if you want to fix your phone or buy the same model that now would cost you USD 350 (because, currently there is a new model in market).

If you read the example carefully, you understand that the incident needs immediate fix and problem can be prolonged till next incident occurs or you are ready to resolve it using other options (buying new battery and component or new phone, either the same model or new model). However, you will keep a close watch (i.e. taking backup regular or preparing yourself the new phone ) since you are aware of the problem due to the past incident.

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Certified Business Analyst: The best option to launch your Business Analysis career

I had a long association with ANISAN so recommending them for their quality, dedication, and delivery.

ANISAN Technologies, one of the pioneers in providing the Business Analysis Training offers and created several success stories since 2006 in USA, Hong Kong, China, Australia, UK and India with proud alumni base in leading companies across the globe.

ANISAN offer comprehensive 6 days (48 hours) training in Business Analysis.

Who should attend?: Suitable for aspiring Business Analyst with or without IT knowledge and fresher or experienced professional.

Brief Syllabus:

Part I : Introduction to Business Analysis, Introduction to SDLC approaches

Part II : Business Analysis Knowledge areas (as per international standards, BABOK Guide and BCS standards)

Part III : Practical - Part I Strategic Business Analysis (Business Need, Gap Analysis, Solution Scope & Business Case)

Part IV : Practical - Part II Business Analysis Deliverables (Elicitation, Requirement Management, BRD, FRD, UML (Use Cases, Activity Diagrams and Sequence Diagram), UAT, other documentations

Part V : BA Techniques & BA Essentials


Part VI : Tools Training - UML with MS Visio

ANISAN USP:

1. ANISAN is one of pioneer in the field of Business Analysis and providing BA related training and placement since Mar 2006.

2. Our entire training program is based on International Standards (IIBA, BCS & IREB)

3. Successful Completion of ANISAN's Certified Business Analysis certification our participants join renowned corporates like ORACLE, TCS, L&T InfoTech, Accenture, NSE, HDFC, Morgan Stanley, Well Point, Credit Suisse', Novartis, Cox and Kings....

4. Courses offer comprehensive syllabus that have practical and real world approach. All content is reinforced through group exercises, discussions, and sharing of real-world experiences by our subject matter experts.

5. Well experienced faculty with average 15 years Industry experience.

6. Faster Career growth for professionals who would like to work efficiently in IT and non-IT field by improving their productivity and expertise.

7.Produced large and successfully alumni base across the globe.

8. Placement Assistance.

ANISAN Technologies already a well-known name in Business Analysis courses is official partner with IREB, Germany and IIBA, Canada in delivering the BA training.

Exam Preparation Training for IREBs both CPRE(R) Foundation and Advanced Level exams

Exam Preparation Training for IIBA's both CCBA (R) and CBAP (R) certification

Fees: Please write to us.

Please create a login online at www.anisans.com and use PayPal payment option for enrollment and other fees for making payment. You can use any option to complete the payment)

Fees covers: Training + Certification + Study Material book + case Studies + 40 PDU towards CCBA/CBAP exam at IIBA, Canada

Business Analysis Training and Certification - Course Book

* ANISAN is most cost effective training in the industry.

** ANISAN is official training partner with IIBA, Canada and IREB, Germany

*Part Payment option is also available for course fees.

Location: Both classroom (in selective cities, pls refer our schedule) and online (Online training using training tool to share desktop, create notes and share application for practicals.)

Please contact me if you have any queries.

Contact us at:

email - info@anisans.com or priti.verma@anisans.com

Or
what's up message at - +1 (201) 448 4386

For more details, read 'Business Analysis - The Question And Answer Book' . It is way you can understand all... over 200 questions and elaborated answers.

In India Order link https://www.amazon.in/dp/B074PRQQ5V or Global Order link https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074PRQQ5V

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Business Analysts' knowledge-bank - Information Systems by Efrem G Mallach

The reason why I added this book to Business Analysis blog- Many Business Analysts come from domain or business background and they are required to know the basics of Information Systems. They need to know where to obtain the required knowledge. Read my detailed review about the book before you think of purchasing it.

The book provides comprehensive knowledge about most aspects of Information System, which is required by every business student. This comprehensive knowledge is quite valuable as there is no business or profession today that is untouched by Information system. Therefore, one can't remain aloof from the basic understanding of Information Systems and how it works. 

If they know how it works, they will know how best they can make it work for them effectively. It simply means, if they can understand what is needed, they can guide and monitor the entire development of business solution successfully.

Business technology management is big part of business today and is a key to its success. Professionals, who know what are the ‘Business Needs’, what is the suitable Information System required for that, and how to get that, will be able to optimize the business environment that decides the success or failure of any business.

Information Systems by Efrem G Mallach

In the first section, the book covers why Information System matters and the role of Information System within business environment. It also covers general concept of Information Systems.

In the second section, it covers technology part of Information System including hardware, software, database management, and network. This is basically explains what any business student needs to know about building a business solution or application or project.

In the third section, it covers the various Information Systems that is needed in the organization for different departments by different people depending on their role and responsibilities. It also covers the system and it’s usage of connecting with external stakeholders for their interaction with the organization as a customer or a supplier or a regulator…

In the fourth section, the book covers how to select these Information Systems from the various options available i.e. off-the-shelf product, customized product or developing the solution and so on... This is an important factor as it involves an analysis based on many criteria to take a correct decision.

In the last section, it covers the effective managing of the Information Systems after the transition phase.

All the topics are well elaborated with appropriate examples and illustrations. However, It doesn't cover the Strategy Analysis topic of Information System where most business students will be involved either as a stakeholder or a subject matter expert (SME) or as a sponsor in future. This part is extremely significant as it talks about how Information System solution are defined in detail and their role during requirement management to spell out the correct requirements. Otherwise, the business student may not develop the correct thinking process to visualize the Information System to contribute appropriately.

Another part is – author missed out on ‘Change Management’ that can be implemented through pre-defined or ad-hoc process depending on the project size, the complexity and the formality. So, projects don't get cancelled due to changes in requirements at the last moment as they can always be accommodated during next release or sprint.

Finally, requirement engineering has changed significantly and now, it is far more sophisticated compare to what it was a decade ago.

The book could have added a few UML diagrams along with process diagrams mentioned in the book to elaborate the requirements as they are current industry standards and business students (future stakeholders) are expected to know them.

On the flip side, the outdated information such as magnetic disk storage etc. could have avoided or explained in a line or two. Instead, there could have been greater emphasis on the process management or reengineering or others areas of business technology management that were more suitable to the business student.

Overall, the book is very useful as it provides all the required details in one place systematically using business language.

#IIBA, #BCS, #IREB, #requirementmanagement, 

#BusinessAnalysis, #BusinessAnalysiscourse, #businessanalyst, #businesstechnologymanagement, #InformationSystems, #Whatbusinessstudentneedtoknow, #EfremGMallach, #ANISAN, #ANISANtechnologies, #SandhyaJane, #CBAP

Business Analysis: Basics of Investment Banking Domain - part 1

Business Analysis is relatively matured professional field having adequate research done in last decade and having clear industry standards defined by few institutes for business analysis and also brought more clarity to business analyst role. Obviously, the next level for a business analysts would be creating a niche for themselves in the field.

This blog provides guidance on what business analyst need to know to build a successful career in investment baking domain. This blog provides high-level information about investment banking domain for a business analyst who is new to the domain.

Although Investment Banking domain is vast, but his article helps you in selecting and understanding the major area(sub-domain) you wish to focus on in future.

Please note that this blog throws only high-lights over the domain information for your understanding and further reading highly recommended to understand and master the topic.

History: 
The investment banking has not started with some act 1933 or with one of the old banks...The New York Stock Exchange originated in May 1792 under a buttonwood tree at 68, wall street.

Investment Banks have changed drastically since last century that offered services mainly focused on raising capital and straggles in merger and acquisitions. Currently they wide range of products and services to issuing and investing clients. This including strategic advice, buying and selling investments products, raising capital, offering public and private investment market place, Trading securities, advising corporates on merger and acquisition, launching IPO and much more...to broad client base, from high net worth individuals to big business houses.

Let us understand the financial products and services...

Products:
Financing(Capital Raising):

• Capital Financing(Individuals/Financial Institutions), 
• Capital (Corporates)
• Bond underwriting  (Governments)
• Principal Advisor (Proprietary)

Markets (Capital Market services):

• Market Maker Broker (Individual/Financial Institutions)
• Risk Management  (Corporates)
• Government Dealer (Governments)
• Proprietary Trading (Proprietary) 

Advisory Services(investments and Merger & Acquisition):

• Sales and Research (Individual/ Financial Institutions)
• Merger and Acquisition: (Corporates)
• Privatisation Investment Partnership (proprietary)

Capital are raised through debt market (including high-yield bond market) or equity market (including new markets like the private equity markets)

Relationship Management and strategy:

There are various roles such as Super Banker, Coordinator of Product Specialists, Tandem RM (a generalist and an M & A banker), Functional RM (product specialists work as RMs for middle market clients) and so on...depending on the internal structure of the bank the role and responsibilities could change.

Trust generated through long term, transparent, fruitful association is only factor to strengthen the relationship.

Trading and Capital Market Activity:

Three different trading models:

1. Over-The-Counter (OTC) market against organised exchanges
2. Quote Driven market against order-driven markets
3. Floor-based exchanges against electronic markets

Products: 

Over-the-counter

• Equity-based products and activities include cash equities, equity options, warrants and swaps
• Interest-rate products include fixed-income securities, government agencies, money markets and repos, swaps, futures, forwards-rate agreement (FRAs), options, caps and floors.
• Currency related activities: customer-driven and discretionary foreign-exchange trading, cross-currency transactions, currency derivatives (currency options, forwards, futures and swaps)
• Credit-based products include investment-grade, junk bonds and credit derivatives 
• Mortgages include liquid products, asset-backed products, and structured products.
• Commodity-based products and activities include commodity futures, options and forwards typified by underlying assets such as power assets, metals, oil products and so on...

Quote Driven Market: is based on quotation determined by market makers or dealers and investment bank plays vital role in quote driven system.

Order Driven Trades: are auction markets in which prices of the trade is determined by the publication of ordered shares. The stock exchanges such as NYSE, Bombay Stock Exchange or London Stock Exchange provide the platform for buyer and seller and the facility of electronic transmission of the trade and its execution.

Floor based Exchanges: The exchange house highly regulated market that lists registered instruments like stocks, bonds and derivatives and allows face-to-face broker meetings for conducting trading business.

Strategies in Trading: The trading strategies largely based on following few factors:

• New players: New exchange houses or expansion of existing exchange houses: 
• Supplier choice: Supplier has a choice to list their shares on any exchange place - one or more
• Buyer choice: Buyer has a choice to buy from various market place, not restricted to one. They has option to trade cross-border.
• Multiple options: Some of the investment banks are providing exclusive alternate services to trade and report transactions. 
• Increased competitiveness: Empowering the exchanges to create competitiveness.  

Equity Research: This is extended services provided by financial organisations and investment banks who are suppose to educate clients on buy/sell recommendation. However, with advanced research facilities, the banks are offering advice to clients or institutional investors on various financial matters that may not be ethical sometimes...

Does research data needed on trading the equity that is publicly traded? why it is needed when all the information stated in public is correct(?) catch 22. In any way, the financial analyst are expected to provide information about investment and potential appreciation of the same using various financial models including complex system that helps the analyst to calculate the information using market data and provide the potential value that may not be absolute. Some time the calculation method or formula could be wrong that could have serious impact on forecasting the portfolio value.

The analyst and investor may use various data such as S & P calculation and credit rating to present P/E (Price/Earning) data is used to calculate P/E(Price/Estimated) value.

In addition, there are other methods to estimate the prices such as Discounted-Cash-flow or automated system using Monte-Carlo prediction tool...

Equity Offering:
Following are the various equity offering mechanisms.

• IPO
• Auction Mechanism 
• Fixed Priced Offering
• Book building Details
• The Pre-filling Period 
• Cooling Period

 Managing IPO is one big and challenging project for the investment banks...The IPO of Google or Alibaba were complex and highly challenging.

Fixed Income Business:The government and large corporates issues bond to raise funds. These bond are traded on global financial stocks. They are one of the key part of asset class in investment portfolio.
Bank typically help the government or large corporations to formulate the strategy of issuing, pricing, and distributing the securities. The bank also provide services to the buyer to arrange finance to buy these securities.

Types of Bond
Bond
The Domestic Bond Market
The foreign Bond Market
The Euro Bond Market
The Euro Dominated Bond Markets
Public and Private Issuers
Government Bonds(Treasury bill or Treasury notes)
Corporate Bonds

Issuing of Bonds: 
Following are the different way bonds can be issued.

New products:

• Zero Coupon convertibles
• Perpetual Debt
• Subordinated Debt
• Mezzanine Finance
• High-yield Bonds
• Structured-Financed Products
• Collaterlized debt obligations
• Credit Derivatives
• Project Finance

Zero Coupon convertibles: The are convertible at the holder's option and do not pay a coupon. They are highly discounted and are known as zero coupon instruments. They are convertible bond, liquid yield option notes or LYONs.

Perpetual Debt: The perpetual debt issued by financial institutions has no maturity date, but pay regular interest. The issuer can buy them back.

Subordinated Debt: These are unsecured debt or preferences shares offering interest rates 2 to 5 percentage points.The junior bond are low on the priority of payment. interest is paid in the form of cash flow after the interest on senior bonds are paid, if money is left. They are used to finance pools of assets in a securitisation.

Mezzanine Finance:
High-yield Bonds
Structured-Financed Products
Collaterlized debt obligations
Credit Derivatives
Project Finance
Strategies in Fixed Income

The next blog will have more details on following topics:

Merger and Acquisition Business

Strategies of M & A

Hedge Fund and lather native Investments

You can any of the following path to again the domain knowledge.

- Part time MBA in Finance or CFA (when I was working in Investment Bank in Manhattan, many of my colleagues were doing it). I would prefer CFA over MBA as it is intense and highly focused. 

- Short term courses in Investment Banking Operations provided by universities or reputed institutes. for example - Executive Diploma/Certificate in Investment Banking - HKU or Investment Banking Operations Certificates (website: IOC) and many more in USA and UK. Many courses are provided online and classroom mode. 

- Self-study through books written by well-known authors, reputed websites such as wikipedia (check the reference sections), Investopedia - Educating the world about finance and more sources.


Please do not attend certification courses that are provided by private institues having no affiliation as they have no value later stage in your career i.e. mid-level and above.

#businessanalysis #businessanalyst #investmentbanking #investmentbankingdomain #domain #finance #career #certification #training #analyst #sandhyajane #anisantechnologies 

Business Analysis Communication and Collaboration

The Business Analyst's role is pivotal and he is required to maintain a high level of coordination with the business and technical teams on a continuous basis during the solution life cycle.

Communicate and Collaborate:
Yes, the key aspect of the communication goal must be to forge collaborative relationships as the active participation of stakeholders is a must in order to create a successful solution. Based on this primary goal, the Business Analyst can set-up the agenda for communication. Here are a few guidelines to achieve the same:

Code of Conduct: 

Establish a code of conduct at the very outset. This will provide guidelines and create a set of expectations for everyone. This also helps avoid unnecessary confusion.

The code of conduct must be communicated to key stakeholders and, if required, their agreement must be obtained after incorporating any feedback.

Create an Environment of Trust and Respect: 

An environment of trust is created through consistent, clear and focused communication that is timely and updated at regular intervals.

Creating an environment of trust and respect is the key to the success of a project. For that, the Business Analyst must take the lead in communicating information correctly and consistently about the plan, outcome of proposed goals and their foreseeable benefits to stakeholders and organization.

Setting the correct tone, fulfilling promises, obtaining feedback and incorporating them while building the solution, providing regular feedback on stakeholder contribution and creating an atmosphere of transparency, all go a long way in ensuring success of the proposed solution.

Reduced email communication and encouraging more interaction over the phone or interpersonal meetings not only help improve understanding but also aid in avoiding unnecessary work.

Time Zones: 

Be sensitive to the time zones while setting-up meetings or even sending out emails to recipients.

Understand Stakeholders: 

Organize meetings for the entire team to understand everyone's needs, concerns and skills. This data will also help to build the base to design the best possible solution.

Understanding the stakeholder background such as his educational and professional experience, and cultural background, help minimizes confusion and conflict. If a stakeholder is new to the organization’s culture, either explain the same to him in detail or provide him with the communication policy to bring him on the same page.

Addressing concerns helps in bringing out the stakeholder’s attitude towards the proposed solution and in what way he can contribute to the proposed solution. This information will support the Business Analyst in planning his strategy throughout the business analysis life cycle.

Focus on Goals and Managing Expectations: 

Communication should always be focused on the goal while discussing issues, risks, plans or anything else during meetings. These goals must be part of the opening discussion of the meeting/workshop to remind everyone about their respective areas of focus.

Face Conflict: 

Conflict may arise due to various factors and the Business Analyst must plan his strategy to both confront and defuse the situation. Regular discussions and feedback from individual and team meetings effectively help to deal with conflicts.

Manage Technology: 

Technological interventions are required to manage in-person or virtual meetings. They may include audio-visual set-ups, telephones, projectors, and other connectivity. These need to be planned well in advance.

More about Business Analysis, The way you can understand all... over 200 questions and elaborated answers.

In India Order link https://www.amazon.in/dp/B074PRQQ5V or Global Order link https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074PRQQ5V

Business Analysis: The Question And Answer Book

References:


http://www.forbes.com/sites/mikemyatt/2012/04/04/10-communication-secrets-of-great-leaders/


http://www.forbes.com/sites/theyec/2013/06/07/five-ways-to-build-an-effective-team/


Communication Strategies for Virtual Teams by Debbie DuFrene & Carol M Lehman, (pp.31-35) Business Expert Press LLC, 2011, ISBN: 13-978-160649-260-4


http://www.forbes.com/sites/iese/2013/06/20/managing-virtual-teams-ten-tips/


Effective Communication in the Organization by Michael Fielding, Juta & Co. (Pty Ltd), 2005, ISBN 0 7021 6650 2


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