Role of a BA with Scrum
My company transitioned to a full Scrum environment last year as part of an overall SAFe implementation. Therefore, each team has a traditional Scrum Product Owner, and those POs work with the SAFe Product Managers (PM) to define and prioritize the overall Program Backlog, and the Product Backlogs for each team. We are now planning to hire several Business Analysts, to work with the POs and PMs. I’m concerned that we already have some confusion at the team level about who really manages the product backlog for the team – is it the Product Owner or the Product Manager? Now we’re going to throw Business Analysts into the mix, and neither Scrum nor SAFe have a clearly defined role for a BA.
I’ve heard two possible approaches for utilizing the BAs. One is as a sort of “assistant” to the POs, doing most of the in-depth research and User Story writing at the team level. Another approach is for the BA to focus on large, significant initiatives in advance of giving it to the teams, those that require a lot UI design and/or input and approval from our C-level management (which can take a long time). In effect, they would write traditional requirements docs, that, when completed, would be given to the PMs/POs to break into features and user stories, ultimately ending up in team backlogs.
Has anyone seen a successful implementation of using BAs in conjunction with Product Owners, and perhaps even Product Managers? If so, what was the actual role of the BA? How well were you able to keep the team-level focus on the Product Owner as the “single voice” for their backlog?
A Scrum Team should have all the skills required to create a "Done", potentially releasable increment. Maybe that means that BA skills are needed within the Dev Team. Maybe it is not per se a skills needed to create a "Done" increment, but still the P.O. gets information to make a well-balanced order in the Product Backlog based on people that have roles like BA.
Regarding the separation of Scrum and SAFe, the is one rule when scaling; 1 product, 1 product backlog, 1 Product Owner. Looking at SAFe, the Product Manager role is ultimately the Product Owner, where the Product Owner of the "Agile Teams" are proxies and are semi-intermediaries to the Dev Teams and PM. Not per se pragmatic but there you go.
Depends on which configuration of SAFe your company is implementing. In SAFe the Product Owner is not the decision maker on the product. In a Full SAFe configuration, at the Portfolio level, the Epic Owner is the CEO of the Product. Whatever you have stated for the role of the BA is what I have seen so you are accurate in your assumptions on their role in SAFe.
We are now planning to hire several Business Analysts, to work with the POs and PMs.
Who is planning to do this, and why? Is it the plan of a self-organizing Scrum Team, whose members recognize they lack appropriate business analysis skills? What problem is being solved?
Who is planning to do this, and why? Is it the plan of a self-organizing Scrum Team, whose members recognize they lack appropriate business analysis skills? What problem is being solved?
The management structure that some of the Product Managers and all of the Product Owners report to are doing this. There was no request from the teams that I am aware of, nor was there really input into if it was needed or not. As for the problem being solved, I think it's related to the Product Owners not having sufficient time to work with the business and research requirements/user stories.
As for the problem being solved, I think it's related to the Product Owners not having sufficient time to work with the business and research requirements/user stories.
That is a problem which I understand that needs to be resolved, but it is not a problem found or solved at team level, right? If the POs / PMs are being helped by hiring BA, perfect, but non of your concern, right?
I’m concerned that we already have some confusion at the team level about who really manages the product backlog for the team
There can be no such confusion for the team, it is the PO. (period) You say there is a "full Scrum environment", so this can only be a no-brainer.
One is as a sort of “assistant” to the POs, doing most of the in-depth research and User Story writing at the team level.
This is what happens at my current assignment as well. They are present at the refinement meetings (PO as well) and help with writing the PBIs indeed
I agree with Ian's answer here. from my experience, adding a layer (Like BA) calls for loss of information + more meetings + Filling backlog with important and non-important stories. We are inviting rework here and are also compromising on Just-In-Time projects. Management level thinks that since we have resources who can type things for the development team- we tend to accept more work from business.
In my experience if we let BA work with team and it consumed lot of their time. Our requirements were not at single place and not even not consistent across the sources as well. Hence dev team had to jusggle around a lot figuring out what was the true source of requirement and then data proofing , cleaning all has to get done before you put this thibgs in real system. I never got BA with us however I see a benefit of adding it:
1) Get the clean requirements and make the messy one clean.
2) assist PO in clearing defining backlog.
I think I like the idea of BA working with PO rather than with dev team .