Article 3: Underlying Competency Comparison for Onsite & Offshore Business Analyst

In continuation from my previous article, I would like to compare the exposure for onsite BA against the offshore BA w.r.t. required underlying competencies.

Analysis of opportunity to display Underlying Competencies for Onsite BA and Offshore BA

Following rating indicates chances of displaying / gaining expertise in the mentioned competency at onsite or offshore – 0% being no possibility to 100% indicating most certainty. 

Please note that this is not the lack of competence at offshore, but it shows limited opportunity to display the competence. 

Each of the following competency group consists of few competencies and I have tried to rate these based on my knowledge.

Highlights of the finding are:

* As you can see in the image, the two competencies which are less utilized at offshore are Analytical Thinking & Problem Solving and Business Knowledge.

* However being an offshore BA, one needs to display Interaction Skills a bit more than that of onsite BA.

Let’s go through each competency one by one. I have mentioned my rationale behind the rating in the comments.

Summary:

• Competency Group - Offshore BA v/s Onsite BA
• Analytical Thinking & Problem Solving – 56% v/s 100%
• Behavioral Characteristics – 100% vs. 100%
• Business Knowledge – 80% vs. 100%
• Communication Skills – 87% vs. 93%
• Interaction Skills – 100% vs. 87%
• Software Applications – 100% vs. 100%

1.  Analytical Thinking & Problem Solving – Overall Rating Offshore 56% vs. Onsite 100%

1a. Creative Thinking

Offshore 80% vs. Onsite 100%   

Since the solution is generally decided onsite, offshore BA gets limited opportunity to display this competency

1b. Decision Making

Offshore 60% vs. Onsite 100%   

Offshore BA can only take decisions related with offshore implementation team’s (development and testing teams) queries or confusions. However opportunity to use this competency at offshore is very limited

1c. Learning

Offshore 60% vs. Onsite 100%

Since one is very close to client, client’s business and stakeholders at onsite, learning grows thousand folds.

1d. Problem Solving

Offshore 60% vs. Onsite 100%

Since the main solutioning happens at onsite, problem solving skills are very frequently used onsite. However offshore problem solving focuses majorly w.r.t. implementation teams’ problems.

1e. Systems Thinking

Offshore 20% vs. Onsite 100%

Offshore BA misses on the big picture. Onsite BA gets to know the complete picture and gets to know the patterns and relations to understand the problem better and suggest a complete / holistic solution.

2. Behavioral Characteristics – Overall Rating Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

2a. Ethics            

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

There is no doubt that every professional should have strong ethical system and should know what is right and what is wrong

2b. Personal Organization

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

Be at onsite or offshore BA must have work ethics and personal organization.

2c. Trustworthiness

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

Onsite BA majorly works to gain trust of client, and Offshore BA works majorly to gain trust of onsite BA and offshore implementation team

3. Business Knowledge – Overall Rating Offshore 80% vs. Onsite 100%

3a. Business Principles & Practices

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

These characteristics are common to all organizations across industries and hence having their knowledge helps a BA to understand the problem better and to find appropriate solution

3b. Industry Knowledge

Offshore 80% vs. Onsite 100%   

This is the understanding of the industry that their client’s organization is in. Offshore BA, might not necessarily have detailed industry knowledge as the holistic solutions are generally provided by onsite BA and then the solution is passed on to the offshore

3c. Organization Knowledge

Offshore 60% vs. Onsite 100%   

Being at client’s site, onsite BA must have detailed client organization knowledge i.e. business architecture, business model, stakeholder influences etc. Offshore BA need not have that much knowledge about organization

3d. Solution Knowledge

Offshore 80% vs. Onsite 100%   

Solution knowledge is majorly required to identify the most effective means of implementing a change. Since onsite BA is closer to business, solution knowledge is critical for him / her

4. Communication Skills – Overall Rating Offshore 87% vs. Onsite 93%

4a. Oral Communications

Offshore 60% vs. Onsite 100%   

Offshore BA majorly interacts with onsite BA and not the actual business owners. But the onsite BA interacts with multiple stakeholders on multiple fronts, hence the score is higher for onsite BA

4b. Teaching

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 80%   

Generally offshore BA has to play a critical role explaining the requirements and solutions to the implementation team (development and QA team). Onsite BA has to have this competency to manage change instigated by the solution implementation

4c. Written Communication

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

Written communication is critical for every BA because eventually the major deliverables by a BA are nothing by artifacts like BRD (business requirements document), user stories, use cases etc.

5. Interaction Skills – Overall Rating Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 87%

5a. Facilitation and Negotiation

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

For onsite BA this competency focuses on assisting business to elicit or extract real business requirements. Also the negotiation skills are required to arrive at the right business solution. For offshore BA, majorly these skills come handy while discussing the implementation with project managers, development and testing teams because many times they want to implement an easier solution than implementing the right solution"

5b. Leadership and Influencing

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

There is no doubt that onsite or offshore BA’s have to display these competencies to get things done the right way. Consultative business analysis requires thought leadership and influencing skills

5c. Teamwork

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 60%   

Since offshore BA has to work closely with the implementation team, this competency is majorly required for him / her. Even though onsite BA might work with onsite teams, his role is more of a individual contributor

6. Software Applications – Overall Rating Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

6a. General-Purpose Applications

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

Since these tools are used to document and track requirements, onsite and offshore BA’s need to be proficient with these

6b. Specialized Applications

Offshore 100% vs. Onsite 100%

Since these tools are used to support the development of formal models, their validation and implementation onsite and offshore BA’s need to be proficient with these specialized applications

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Notes:

Types of Requirements: As per BABOK 2.0, there are four types of requirements as follows:

Business Requirements:

‘Statements of goals, objectives, and outcomes that describe why a change has been initiated. They can apply to the whole of an enterprise, a business area, or a specific initiative.’ These are very high level requirements generally originated from CEO / top management. Their triggers are external factors like competition, expansion or launch of new product etc. E.g. if a banking CEO wants to increase customer servicing channels to improve customer loyalty.

Stakeholder Requirements:

‘(They) describe the needs of stakeholders that must be met in order to achieve the business requirements.’ These are specific to stakeholders. E.g. in above case, the mobile CoE head (stakeholder) can have a requirement to launch a banking app that can provide customers with self servicing options. This becomes a stakeholder requirement

Solution Requirements:

‘Describe the capabilities and qualities of a solution that meets the stakeholder requirements. They provide the appropriate level of detail to allow for the development and implementation of the solution.’ These are basically Functional and Non-Functional requirements. E.g. in above example features of the mobile app will become functional requirements like login feature, check bank balance feature etc. Security or performance features of the mobile app will become non-functional requirements.

Transition Requirements:

‘Describe the capabilities that the solution must have and the conditions the solution must meet to facilitate transition from the current state to the future state, but which are not needed once the change is complete. They are differentiated from other requirements types because they are of a temporary nature.’ These requirements mostly cover anything that to be done to make the change happen from As-is state to To-be state. E.g. in above case, data migration for mobile app or trainings for the mobile app will become transition requirements