We're pleased to announce that the IIBA UK team have responded to a government consultation, and we have provided a series of recommendations on how an increased focus on business analysis will be crucial in the coming years.

 

A sub-committee of four volunteers carried out a range of stakeholder interviews and research. This research was distilled into a ten page report.  We'd like to extend our thanks to those practitioners who made themselves available to be interviewed--we could not have put our response together without you.

 

We are also extremely pleased to report that BCS L&D (part of BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT) and the BA Manager Forum (BAMF) endorsed our response.  This collaboration allows us to illustrate that we speak with one unified voice, and will add weight to our recommendations.

 

Our report was broad and included the following specific recommendations:

• Holistic: Encourage holistic thinking prior to implementing process, people, organisational or IT change. It is necessary to take a view on the impact that changes will make, not just locally, but overall to services , stakeholders and patients.
• Benefits: Increase the focus on outcomes and benefits - ensure that 'value for money' is value focussed and not purely cost focussed; and that relevant measurement takes place to ensure that this value is actually achieved.
• Culture:  Develop a collaborative culture that drives, and is receptive to, change; which is also reflective and learning.
• Business Cases: Build outcome defined Business Cases for change and actively measure and assess the benefits of change initiatives.

 

Business Analysis is an important enabler for these and therefore, the report concluded it would be beneficial to:

• Accord greater recognition to the Business Analyst (BA) role
• Provide a clear career and development path for business analysis and provide adequate training
• Provide ongoing professional development for business analysis practitioners
• Encourage the use of internal business analysis resources first before looking to external consultants
• Equip all health workforce staff engaged in business change initiatives with a minimum of foundation skills in business analysis to enable them to contribute effectively throughout the business change lifecycle.

We are extremely keen to raise the profile of business analysis, so please do contact us if you see any other relevant opportunities for doing so.