Hi, I’m Ryan Thomas Hewitt. I’m the Lead Business Analyst in the DWP Stockport hub.
I’m delighted to write the 1st post on the DWP BA blog. It’s a great area to share our experiences building a BA community in the DWP.
In this post I want to share the insights + learning material from our BA Community day (presentations, exercises, facilitator notes). The aim is for other BA communities to use the materials and run similar sessions in their BA community.
OVERVIEW
Over 30 BAs attended our DWP Business Analyst community day. We ran 6 sessions about BA techniques & experiences e.g.Impact Mapping, Use Cases, User Stories.
I’ll share the experiences & materials of each session. People appreciated an opportunity to participate in the day & learn new techniques.
MARSHMALLOW CHALLENGE
The Marshmallow Challenge is a group activity that conveys key aspects of iterative product development & team dynamics. It’s a fun and interactive activity we used to kickoff the day.
To run the challenge we split the attendees into smaller groups, introduced the goal of the challenge (goal = to create the tallest tower with the marshmallow at the top), and outlined the rules of the challenge. We provided the materials and let the groups create their towers.
At the end of 18 minutes – all towers were standing with a marshmallow ontop. The winning team built a structure of almost 20 inches.
We played the TED talk, which covers the key insights generated by the challenge. We discussed the team observations and how the exercise demonstrates:
- The importance of iterating vs incrementing
- The stages that teams go through (orienting etc)
- The importance of cross-functional teams
- The importance of facilitation skills
- The need to identify the “project marshmallow” upfront!
- That high stakes can have a strong impact on performance
The materials we used to run the session are below. We took about 45 minutes to run the entire exercise.
Presentation: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1SzR68FF9OE4C9yG9DDemcs-TpMxWSeA47R1CH2mNWLk/edit?usp=sharing
Facilitator/follow-up questions: http://www.leadershipchallenge.com/resource/challenging-the-process-with-the-marshmallow-challenge.aspx
USER STORY SMELLS
Based on Mike Cohn’s book about applying user stories – we created an exercise called “user story smells”. We split into groups and provided each group with a pack of 10 user story smells. The “user story smells” are bad practices or anti-patterns that have been observed when creating user stories. For example one smell is writing user stories from the perspective of a Product Owner rather than end user.
The smells were printed off as cards. We asked each team to write down their observations about the smells. Which smells did they agree with? Which had they observed? What would they do if they encountered a smell? Which are the most common story smells?
User story smells was a good way to get the group thinking about how to create better user stories & the challenges we face. Finally, we asked each team to match the smells to 10 example stories. The idea was this would reinforce the learning – and get people to think about their own experiences.
Matching the 10 smells to 10 example stories was really well received. Teams successfully matched most cards. We reflected on their thoughts about the smells & their performance on matching the cards.
Below is a link to the presentation I created. It has 10 user story smells, 10 example bad user stories and the answers sheet. Plus more information about the activity:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1MXP3IMv0s56_FemJ8f_srWdZXphKiUIFpfVT0bLG_aY/edit?usp=sharing
IMPACT MAPPING
Impact mapping is a technique that several BAs asked to learn about. It’s a great technique to ensure that deliverables are traced back to the overarching goal.
During this session the presenter ran through the core elements of Impact Mapping based on Adzic‘s book. We discussed an Impact Map I created on a previous project & how this was used.
To reinforce the concepts of the technique & make the session interactive we asked the teams to create an Impact Map for Stockport County. The challenge was to create an Impact Map for this goal: get Stockport County to the top of the Premier League by 2025. We found having a non-work example was useful & the activity kept people engaged and helped them learn about the technique.
The presentation & activity we ran is here:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1phjR-zB7x4inDp63dFPKJlEEOjyYQ6fSksQhLOLJoOU/edit?usp=sharing
STRATEGY RUN AROUND
Strategy is an area that can sometimes be overlooked by BAs working on individual projects. However it’s important that BAs understand the wider picture of organizational strategy and how it impacts our projects. This session is probably the only activity we have run that incorporates aspects of a 1970s gameshow (Mike Reid’s Runaround).
The purpose of the talk was to:
- Introduce key concepts of strategy (e.g. the types of strategy models, strategy vs tactics)
- Help understand the DWP BA Community’s level of strategy understanding
For the talk the presenter asked a strategy question, and then had the group run a relevant corner of the room. Each corner represented a potential answer to the question (answer A, B, C or D). The presenter would then provide the answer and offer more content/insights about the answer. We had 10 questions and 4 corners – hence the runaround!!
The format was a good method of generating interaction and discussion. It helped us baseline the level of knowledge people had for strategy. It made a potentially tough subject engaging & fun. The material can be found below:
BIG FAT QUIZ OF THE YEAR
This could be an annual quiz in the making. We closed the day with a pub quiz session – the winner received a prize and kudos points!! We had 25 questions about Business Analysis, DWP and Stockport.
We asked questions about the INVEST criteria, 3Cs, jobs-to-be done format, user story mapping etc. The questions and answer sheet are below. I’ve taken the liberty of removing the Stockport and DWP specific questions – you’re welcome ;-) Feel free to use this material:
Question & answers = https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qqaeFqeIQi2iGmXfiopzzzFYuBvXusLxNhq23YNY7hs/edit?usp=sharing
Answers sheet = https://app.box.com/s/ss8g6py3lyvdjat18axvqvyql44num4k
USE CASE DIAGRAMS
The session introduced the essential elements of use case diagrams. We find that use case diagrams are overlooked in agile projects. The speaker reflected on the benefits of use case diagrams on agile projects – namely that they provide an overview of how the actors interact with the system. The speaker also provided a number of examples about how use case diagrams have been used in the DWP on agile projects.
A link to a video summary of the presentation is below (it provides an overview of the elements of use case diagrams):
SUMMARY
Community days are a brilliant opportunity to reflect on best practices & share experiences with colleagues. They allow members of a community to learn new techniques & practice them. Community days are an opportunity to step back from the day-to-day project work and reflect on our experiences & professional development.
We’d love to hear your feedback about running community days & these materials.
