Why aren’t more business analysis professionals using fun and exciting techniques with their stakeholders to drive creative thinking? Is our reliance on a limited range of tools reducing the number and quality of ideas? Are we, to put it bluntly, a bit boring?
A few years ago, I stumbled on an image of a workshop where someone was wearing a cardboard box on their head to play the role of a cash machine. That struck me as a brilliant way of eliciting requirements. To date I haven’t found an opportunity to apply it in my work in the legal sector – but the principle of using creative roleplay to explore how users could interact with a system sounds like genius to me, and I’m determined to use it eventually!
At September’s BA Conference Europe, I attended a workshop led by the brilliant Michelle Shakesheff and Catherine Plumridge on expanding the range of techniques we use. We began that session by conducting an audit of what we had in our BA toolboxes, and the results were, frankly, a little sad! Most attendees only had a handful of techniques they really felt confident in using, and admitted to reaching for these in almost every project. This is despite there being at least (according to BCS) 123 techniques available to us in our work.
I’ve been lucky enough to facilitate some fantastic events with IIBA UK this year where attendees tried out new techniques, with a particular focus on creative thinking. These were fun, imaginative, and hands-on sessions that produced tons of ideas. I came away energised and enthused, and keen to put these techniques into practice in my own work at the earliest opportunity. But it is notable that most attendees admitted to not deploying fun and creative techniques in their work.
A few reasons have been hinted at:
- Embarrassment. Some of us are shy, retiring types, and facilitating a regular meeting can feel stressful enough, without being responsible for making it fun!
- The “cringe” factor. Nobody likes “forced fun”. The announcement of an ice-breaker activity can send shivers down the spine. We worry that everyone is going to feel uncomfortable.
- Frowning on frivolity. Some organisations have a very “serious” culture, where reserve and gravitas are treated as analogues for competence and effectiveness. Nobody wants to be seen as the person who doesn’t understand the seriousness of the situation!
- It’s too late for big-picture thinking. A common complaint among business analysis professionals is that we’re only invited to the party after the big decisions have been made. Often, solutions have been determined by a senior stakeholder, and the focus of our work becomes about how to implement the chosen option.
- We don’t have power on projects. If we’ve only been brought into the project late, it’s likely that our authority and autonomy will be limited. If we’re not careful, we’ll find ourselves directed by others in what activities we undertake, leaving us no room for creative thinking.
- Lack of exposure to what’s out there. The techniques we reach for are often those we’ve learned on a training course. We got an opportunity to try them out, and felt comfortable enough to put them into practice. But we haven’t gone exploring to see what else we might use.
- The value isn’t obvious. Explaining to stakeholders how imagining they’re on a ship is going to help can feel daunting. We don’t know what ideas might be generated, so it can be hard to explain confidently that the exercise is going to be useful.
- It’s more work. We’re busy; many BAs work on multiple projects concurrently, and adorning our stakeholder engagement activities with “bells and whistles” can seem like a nice-to-have.
- We prefer the bits of our job we can control. Whether it’s drawing a process model, poring over a massive spreadsheet, or drafting requirements wording, many BAs love the tasks that require quiet and focussed thinking. Activities like this rely on our own analysis skills, and we don’t have to worry about the “uncontrollable” surprises that come with stakeholder interactions. If we’re not careful, we can end up minimising the time we spend with stakeholders in favour of doing more self-contained tasks.
There’s a real risk of selling ourselves short by staying within our comfort zone of bland-but-functional techniques. Other roles are growing in prominence – user researchers, UX designers, product owners, innovation leads, and Design Thinking gurus are all looking for recognition, and a BA can find themselves seen as “just the requirements lady” or “that guy that does process models”.
In my experience, using creative techniques with stakeholders brings a number of wins.
Using a range of techniques to encourage divergent and creative thinking will generate more (and better) ideas, leading to better business outcomes. The organisation is less likely to blindly follow the lead of whoever is shouting loudest about their chosen solution.
Fostering interaction and collaboration to explore issues and generate ideas means that your participants’ understand each other better, and their own perspectives will evolve as new insights are revealed. You don’t have the same uphill struggle to win hearts and minds.
Your stakeholders will enjoy working with you because they have fun and see the value your methods offer. They’ll come to you more readily (and earlier!) in the future.
Your business analysis work will simply be more fun. In addition to feeling proud of the great business analysis work you’ll be known for, you’ll have plenty of opportunities to interact with your stakeholders in an informal, enjoyable way.
If you’re looking to inject some creativity and fun into your business analysis work, the following suggestions might be helpful:
- Think about what might play to your strengths. You might feel more comfortable applying visual techniques rather than tools that rely on lively verbal interaction. There are countless useful resources on the web, so do some research to identify a technique that grabs you.
- Try out new techniques in a “safe” environment first – with members of your team, or with your peers in the wider business analysis community. IIBA UK’s events are a great route to trying new things!
- Buddy-up. Work with another BA when trying a new technique so you can support each other (and without all the pressure being on you!). You can also give each other feedback and insights into what was working and how stakeholders were reacting.
- Think about how you might nudge people along if they don’t dive right in. Are there good questions or prompts you can drop in? Will people need to see a worked example first? Can you bring in someone that’s done it before to help?
- Talk to people that have used the technique. Find out what worked well for them – and what pitfalls to avoid.
- Start small in scope, perhaps exploring ideas around a specific system feature or process. This lowers the risk, and can help form a successful base to build upon.
- Think about how can you inject more fun or inspiration into a technique you already use. Simple things like gamification or playful imagery can be a good starting point. You can also look at ways of spicing up the activities around you techniques, such as how you invite people to a session, or how you put people into groups (for the latter, check out my handy tokens here).
I’d love to hear about your experiences (good and bad!) in using creative thinking and fun techniques when engaging with stakeholders, and any advice you might have for other business analysis professionals looking to broaden their range of tools.