Achieve Business Analysis Certification

A Concise Guide to PMI-PBA®, CBAP® and CPRE Exam Success

Klaus Nielsen

• Publisher: J. Ross Publishing
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9781604271119
• eBook ISBN: 9781604277692
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Project Management
• Index: Business

This unique and easy-to-use exam study guide is the most comprehensive and cost-effective on the market for business analysis certification. It covers the exam content of the PMI-Professional in Business Analysis (PMI-PBA), the Certified Business Analysis Professional (CBAP) from the IIBA, and the Certified Professional for Requirements Engineering (CPRE) Foundation Level from the IREB. Achieve Business Analysis Certification, used in conjunction with the Body of Knowledge guides published by PMI and the IIBA, provides everything needed to achieve BA certification on the first try and a level of knowledge that will set users of this guide apart from the crowd!

Part 1

Overview, How to Use This Guide, Study Tips, and Pre-Test Knowledge Assessments

1: Business Analysis Certification Overview

1.1 BRIEF INTRODUCTION: CERTIFICATION

For every project, investment, or pitch for new products, a compelling requirement specification is vital in order to succeed. This powerful, easy-to-use, and concise book is that tool for enhancing your professional development and greatly improving your chances of passing these world-recognized business analysis certifications.

Based upon the knowledge and experience of numerous experts on business analysis and packed with additional material from leading researchers, this comprehensive study guide, used in conjunction with the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide), provides all you need to know about the Project Management Institute Professional in Business Analysis (PMI-PBA)® examination content, PMI recommended reference material, and the Business Analysis for Practitioners: A Practice Guide, to successfully pass the PMI-PBA certification exam. This authoritative reference gives you a unique look into the PMI-PBA exam content, from needs assessment to planning, analysis, traceability, monitoring, and evaluation; and enables you to learn from the best in an easy and timely manner.

Used in conjunction with A Guide to the Business Analysis Body of Knowledge (BABOK® Guide) v3 and the Agile Extension, you will also have all you need to know to successfully pass the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA®) Certified Business Analysis Professional (CBAP®) exam. Furthermore, this study guide provides the knowledge covered in the Certified Professional for Requirements Engineering (CPRE)-Foundation Level (FL) syllabus and all you need to achieve the CPRE-FL designation offered by the International Requirements Engineering Board (IREB).

Some of the materials that you will need to pass these three business analysis certifications will be made available to you in electronic format; the rest is presented in this one book. The first chapter will set the stage and introduce you to how you can maximize the value of the book in order to pass the certifications within a relatively short period of time and with a high level of knowledge and confidence. After reading the first chapter, you will be ready to begin your journey toward achieving exam success and learning the value of the business analyst certifications.

1.2 BUSINESS ANALYSIS CERTIFICATION ORGANIZATIONS

“The Project Management Institute is the world’s leading not-for-profit professional membership association for the project, program, and portfolio management profession. Founded in 1969, PMI delivers value for more than 2.9 million professionals working in nearly every country in the world through global advocacy, collaboration, education, and research” (PMI, 2015).

PMI delivers the wide range of certifications listed below, with corresponding frameworks including processes, tools, and techniques for project success, as well as program and portfolio management:

• Professional in Business Analysis (PMI-PBA)®
• Project Management Professional (PMP)®
• Agile Certified Professional (PMI-ACP)®
• Risk Management Professional (PMI-RMP)®
• Program Management Professional (PgMP)®
• Portfolio Management Professional (PfMP)®
• Scheduling Professional (PMI-SP)®
• Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM)®

As highlighted throughout this book, the PMI-PBA certification is very much entangled with the PMP-ACP, as well as the PMI-RMP certification, because it is the business analyst who delivers the organizational needs throughout projects.

The IIBA was founded in Toronto in 2003, and is globally recognized today for the IIBA standard for practice of business analysis, which is a generally accepted practice for business analysts. The standard for practices are found and verified in the CBAP® designation, which is a professional certification for individuals with extensive business analysis experience.

Since 2007, the IREB has certified business analysts with their CPRE exam, which includes Foundation, Advanced, and Expert levels. As of 2014, the exam has been taken by practitioners in 51 countries, with 17,000 successfully passing, of which a large number are based in European, German-speaking countries.

1.3 BUSINESS ANALYST CERTIFICATION AND BODY OF KNOWLEDGE

The business analyst certification (PMI-PBA) is based upon a role delineation study (RDS) where leaders, skilled practitioners, and key organizational stakeholders—who span a wide variety of industries and geographies in order to maintain a broad and all-encompassing perspective—were taken into account, in order to create the best practice body of knowledge for business analysts. By doing so, PMI employs the very best of project management, and it is reflected in the PMBOK® Guide—Fifth Edition and in the Body of Knowledge from the PMI-ACP certification, in order to create a competitive and relevant business analyst designation.

The CBAP® from the IIBA is based upon the BABOK® Guide v3, while the CPRE-FL has a syllabus and recommended reading materials, which are to the degree needed, included in this study guide.

A business analyst’s work is partly project management related, and partly requirements management related—with both, project management as well as requirements management, being fields with a growing demand. However, there are areas where many projects have the possibility of doing much better. The following research highlights some of the challenges that requirements management is facing today:

• PMI’s 2014 Pulse of the Profession® study said that poor requirements management is a major cause of project failure—second only to changing organization priorities. That same Pulse study found that 37 percent of organizations report inaccurate requirements gathering as a primary reason for project failure.
• Business Analysis Benchmark 2009: The Path to Success, a study by IAG consulting, found that poor requirements definition and management maturity undermines organizational competitiveness.
• Poor requirements management made the list of Top 5 Project Failure Reasons, or Why My Project Fails, by Eric McConnell.
• Companies with poor business analysis efforts will have three times as many project failures as successes (Ellis, BA Benchmark Report, 2009).
• Companies pay a premium of as much as 60% in time and budget when they use poor requirement practices on their projects (Ellis, BA Benchmark Report, 2009).
• 50% of defects are related to requirement errors (Schwaber, 2006).
• Getting requirements right early in the project can save you one-third or more of your overall project budget (Hooks and Farry, 2001).
• 90% of projects that delivered on time and on budget did not deliver expected business outcomes (Burdette, 2013).
• On average, large information technology (IT) projects run 45% over budget and 7% over in time, while delivering 56% less value than predicted (Forrester, 2012).

Additionally, the benefits of increasing the quality and value of requirements management are tremendous, as costs associated with fixing a defect in the requirements later in the project are very high, and symptoms for inadequate requirements engineering are as numerous as their causes.

1.4 THE VALUE OF BUSINESS ANALYST CERTIFICATIONS

When it comes to career and professional development, education is important, and in order to determine the value of certifications, professionals should ask, “How can a specific certification help me achieve my career goals?”

Part of the answer to this question is related to the organization behind the certification. Professionals and organizations alike need to put trust in the organizations that have developed the certifications. The PMI-PBA certification is developed and managed by PMI, an entity that is well-known and trusted by organizations and their hiring managers for their credential standards. If we examine PMI a bit closer, the statistics of interest, as of May 31, 2014, show 450,011 active members and 650,000 certified individuals globally; these numbers depict an organization th...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• WAV™ page
• Part 1 Overview, How to Use This Guide, Study Tips, and Pre-Test Knowledge Assessments
• Part 2 The Domains
• Part 3 Knowledge, Skills, Methodologies, and Standards
• Part 4 IIBA CBAP® and IREB CPRE Knowledge Areas and Alignment
• Part 5 Practice Exam
• Part 6 Appendices