Comparing the BABOK and SEBOK, Part 6

The BABOK Knowledge Area called “Elicitation” shares some overlap with some of the contents of the SEBOK Knowledge Area called “Concept Definition”, which discusses the elicitation of requirements, among other topics related to concept definition. 

How do the BABOK and SEBOK compare in their coverage of requirements elicitation?

The BABOK “Elicitation” Knowledge Area

This Knowledge Area’s topic is the drawing forth of requirements from the various stakeholder, and documenting these requirements.

The first thing that strikes me about the BABOK’s coverage, is that it’s extremely generic and lacking any real depth.  Most of the discussion touches on what the elicitation tasks are, what the most common inputs are, what the most common elicitation techniques are, and what the most common outputs are.  Notice that I prefixed each item in the list with a ‘what’, because that is pretty much all that the BABOK covers. 

It does not address the why’s and the how’s.  It merely mentions nouns with very little fleshing out.   As an example, one of the outputs is a Requirements Management Plan.  There is no discussion about such a plan contains.  The BABOK identifies which tasks produce this plan, and which tasks use it as input, but that’s about it.

SEBOK Elicitation Coverage

The SEBOK does not have a specific Knowledge Area focused solely on Elicitation.  However, elicitation of stakeholder requirements is discussed under “Stakeholder Needs and Requirements”, which is a topic under the ‘Concept Definition’ Knowledge Area.

The SEBOK distinguishes between ‘needs’ and ‘requirements’.  In fact, it speaks of activities necessary to ‘identify and prioritize the needs of stakeholders, as well as transform those needs into requirements’

The SEBOK stresses that the stakeholder needs (which are obtained as a result of the process of elicitation), are to be transformed into stakeholder requirements.  I could not find something similar in the BABOK, which seems to treat the elicited stakeholder needs as requirements, evidenced by a statement like this:

“Requirements [Stated, Confirmed]: Identical to Requirements [Stated] for all practical purposes, including use as an input to other tasks.”

The SEBOK explains that requirements come from needs (i.e., they are more formal and precise expressions of needs).  It also goes into fair detail about the different types of needs:

• Real Needs
• Perceived Needs 
• Expressed Needs 
• Retained Needs
• Specified Needs
• Realized Needs

Comparison of Elicitation Techniques

Both the SEBOK and BABOK give us a list of common techniques used for elicitation.  This table blow shows their lists:

BABOK	SEBOK
Brainstorming	Structured Brainstorming Workshops
Document Analysis	Technical, Operational, and / or Strategy Documentation Review
Focus Group
Interface Analysis
Interviews	Interviews
Observation
Prototyping (including Storyboarding, Navigation Flow, Paper Prototyping, Screen Flows)	Prototyping
Requirements Workshops
Survey / Questionnaire	Questionnaires
	Simulations and Visualisations
	Modelling
	QFD (Quality Function Deployment)
	Use Case Diagrams
	Activity Diagrams
	Functional Flow Block Diagrams

Comparison of Outputs

The BABOK ‘Elicitation’ activities and the SEBOK ‘Stakeholder Needs and Requirements’ activities produce outputs. The table below compares the outputs:

BABOK Outputs	SEBOK Artefacts	Remarks
Elicitation Results	Stakeholder Interview Reports	A record of what was elicited from the stakeholders.  This is subject to further processing and formalisation.
Scheduled Resources		A schedule of when the elicitation activities will take place, when, how, and who will be involved
Stakeholder Concerns [Unconfirmed / Confirmed]		Issues identified by the stakeholders.  These include assumptions, concerns, risks, and constraints.  The Confirmed version has been signed-off by the stakeholder.
Supporting Materials		“Any materials required to help explain the techniques used or perform them” (BABOK).
Requirements [Stated / Confirmed]	Stakeholder Requirements Document	BABOK - Stakeholder needs as stated by the stakeholder. The confirmed version is signed-off by the stakeholder. SEBOK – does not provide an description of ‘Stakeholder Requirements Document’
	Stakeholder Requirements Database
	Stakeholder Requirements Justification Documents	SEBOK – The SEBOK says this is for ‘traceability purposes’

Comparison of Tasks and Processes

The BABOK provides a clear list of key Tasks related to Elicitation and I have listed them in the table below.  Unfortunately, the SEBOK does not gather the activities in such a defined way.  I collect the main activities mentioned throughout the text and list them in the same table below, for ease of comparison.

BABOK Elicitation Tasks	SEBOK Activities	Remarks
Prepare for Elicitation
Conduct Elicitation Activity	Elicitation
Document Elicitation Results
Confirm Elicitation Results

In conclusion, the SEBOK coverage has more depth and meat.  The BABOK coverage could provide more information in upcoming versions.  As it stands, its current coverage is merely a mapping of inputs to outputs with virtually no description of what characteristics a good quality output should have, and no description of the processes that produce the outputs.  I also think it should deliver more distinction between stated needs and the requirements derived from those needs.

Comparing the BABOK and the SEBOK, Part 5

I want to take a second look at the Knowledge Areas identified by the BABOK and those by the SEBOK, specifically where there is an overlap between the two sets. 

I want to do this in preparation for a deeper comparison of their treatments of their Knowledge Areas and Tasks and Activities.

The table below lists the Knowledge Areas for the BABOK, and what to me might be the corresponding Knowledge Area addressed in the SEBOK.  As can be immediately seen, the SEBOK Knowledge Areas cover a lot more topics.

BABOK Knowledge Area	SEBOK Knowledge Area	Remarks
	Systems Fundamentals
	Systems Science
	Representing Systems with Models
	Systems Approach Applied to Engineered Systems
	Life Cycle Models
	System Deployment and Use
	Product and Service Life Management
	Systems Engineering Standard
Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring
Elicitation	Concept Definition	This SEBOK KA contains the following Activities: Mission Analysis Stakeholder Needs and Requirements
Requirements Management and Communication	System Definition Systems Engineering Management	“Requirements Management” is very briefly treated in the SEBOK under the “System Requirements” topic, which is under the System Definition KA. Configuration Management is considered part of the BABOK KA “Requirements Management and Communication”. In the SEBOK, Configuration Management is discussed under the Systems Engineering Management KA
Enterprise Analysis	Concept Definition	This SEBOK KA contains the following Activities: Mission Analysis Stakeholder Needs and Requirements
Requirements Analysis	System Definition	The topic of "System Requirements” addresses assessing the quality of the requirements and their prioritisation. System Requirements is a topic under the KA System System Definition
Solution Assessment and Validation	System Realization	This SEBOK KA contains the following Activities: System Implementation System Integration System Verification System Validation
	Product Systems Engineering
	Service Systems Engineering
	Enterprise Systems Engineering
	System of Systems
	Enabling Businesses and Enterprises
	Enabling Teams
Underlying Competencies	Systems Thinking Enabling Individuals
	Systems Engineering and Software Engineering
	Systems Engineering and Project Management
	Systems Engineering and Industrial Engineering
	Systems Engineering and Procurement / Acquisition
	Systems Engineering and Specialty Engineering

In the next post on this topic, I will start comparing the contents of the matching Knowledge Areas.

Comparing the BABOK and the SEBOK, Part 4

In this post I’ll compare how the two documents structure their presentation of a Knowledge Area (KA).

BABOK Knowledge Area Structure

The BABOK discusses each of its KA in turn.  The discussion starts with a short overview of the KA,  followed by an Input / Output Diagram showing the Tasks under that KA, the Inputs required by the Tasks, and the Outputs generated by the Tasks (and by extension the KA).

The core of the Knowledge Area is its Tasks, and the BABOK structures the presentation of the KA around the Tasks.  Each Tasks is described in turn using the following sections:

1. Purpose of the Task – brief explanation of the focus of the Task.
2. Description – usually more details about the Task.
3. Input – a list of information (typically documents) needed for performing the Task, also describing why each Input is used for.  This section is accompanied by a context diagram showing the Task, the Inputs it requires, the Task Outputs, and downstream Tasks using the Outputs as Inputs.
4. Elements – describes considerations relevant to the Task which need to be addressed for a successful execution of the Task.
5. Techniques – lists the most common techniques used in performing the task.  Techniques are methods or tools such as ‘Interviewing’, or ‘Brainstorming’.  All of the Techniques are described in more detail in Chapter 9, so this section is just a listing.
6. Stakeholders – is a list of organisation titles generally involved or interested in the Task execution.
7. Output – a list of the Outputs of the Task (generally documents).

SEBOK Knowledge Area Structure

As we have seen in the previous post, the SEBOK has many more KA’s than the BABOK.  Not only are there many more, the scope is more extensive.  Whereas the BABOK KA’s are narrow enough that one can expect every practicing BA to be knowledgeable at a professional level in ALL the KA’s (though perhaps not all the Techniques), the SEBOK KA’s are so expansive, it is unlikely that a majority of professional SEs would have high quality proficiency in all the SEBOK KAs.

Each KA is divided into Topics (contrast with ‘Tasks’ for the BABOK), which confusingly is also called ‘Activities’.  The KA itself is described in great detail (far greater than what is done in the BABOK).  After which a list of Reference work is provided.

After providing a detailed discussion of the KA, each of the Activities under that KA are discussed using the following structure:

1. Introduction – brief narrative about the Topic 
2. Purpose and Definition – detailed description of the Topic / Activity
3. Principles and Concepts - key concepts one needs to know about the Topic.  Depending on the topic being discussed, this can be fairly comprehensive.
4. Process Approach / Activities of the Process – description of the subtasks performed for the Activity
5. Artifacts – listing of most common outputs (generally documents) for the Activity
6. Methods and Modeling Techniques – listing and description of key Techniques one can expect to be used to perform this Activity.  (For the most part, the SEBOK uses the single-ell spelling ‘modeling’, but sometimes also uses ‘modelling’)‘
7. Practical Considerations – tips and lessons learned from the trenches.  
8. References – comprehensive list of Works Cited, Primary References, and Additional References relevant to the Activity.  Since the SEBOK is merely a 'Guide’ to the Body of Knowledge, this References section makes eminent sense – it points to where the reader can go to get more of the Knowledge.

Comparison of the Structures

The table below compares the KA presentation structure of the two BOKs

BABOK	SEBOK	Remarks
Overview	Introduction	Neither of these sections are titled as such.  Both sections are untitled narratives.
Purpose of the Task	Purpose and Definition
Description	Purpose and Definition
Input		It is very surprising that SEBOK seems to have no equivalent section
Elements	Principles and Concepts Practical Considerations
	Process Approach / Activities of the Process	The BABOK has no equivalent
Techniques	Methods and Modeling Techniques
Stakeholders		The SEBOK has no equivalent section
Output	Artifacts
	References	The BABOK references are all collected at the end of the Guide, where it is far less useful for someone wanting to know more about a specific Task.

Comparing the BABOK and the SEBOK, Part 3

Knowledge Areas are subject matters of core interest to a profession or discipline.  They are the sort of knowledge often required to live the profession.  In the medical profession, a knowledge area might include physiology, how the body functions.  For project managers, an example might be scope management.

Knowledge Areas

For the BABOK, Knowledge Areas:

define what a practitioner of business analysis needs to understand and the tasks a practitioner must be able to perform.

In other words, it is an area that a Business Analyst should have knowledge on.

For the SEBOK, Knowledge Areas:

are groupings of information with a related theme

The SEBOK is reluctant to assert that an SE must know about the Knowledge Areas (henceforth KAs), whereas the BABOK claims the KAs are what the BA ‘needs to understand’ and ‘able to perform’.  The difference in these scope will become evident as we look at the KAs listed by each of the BOKs.  We can now say that the BABOK KAs are far more modest in scope than the SEBOKs.

The BABOK Knowledge Areas

The BABOK lists seven KAs:

1. Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring
2. Elicitation
3. Requirements Management and Communication
4. Enterprise Analysis
5. Requirements Analysis
6. Solution Assessment and Validation
7. Underlying Competencies

The BABOK KAs are closely related to skills.  One can develop ‘Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring’ skills, or ‘Elicitation’ skills.

The SEBOK Knowledge Areas

The SEBOK not only lists far more KAs than the BABOK, but the breadth and depth of the subject matter is in a different league.

The SEBOK KAs are divided into 5 Parts, each of which has KAs under it.  Here’s the full list of Parts and KAs under them:

1. Part 2 – Systems
   1. Systems Fundamentals
   2. Systems Science
   3. Systems Thinking
   4. Representing Systems with Models
   5. Systems Approach Applied to Engineered Systems
2. Part 3 – Systems Engineering and Management
   1. Life Cycle Models
   2. Concept Definition
   3. System Definition
   4. System Realization
   5. System Deployment and Use
   6. Systems Engineering Management
   7. Product and Service Life Management
   8. Systems Engineering Standard
3. Part 4 - Applications of Systems Engineering
   1. Product Systems Engineering
   2. Service Systems Engineering
   3. Enterprise Systems Engineering
   4. System of Systems
4. Part 5 – Enabling Systems Engineering
   1. Enabling Businesses and Enterprises
   2. Enabling Teams
   3. Enabling Individuals
5. Part 6 – Related Disciplines
   1. Systems Engineering and Software Engineering
   2. Systems Engineering and Project Management
   3. Systems Engineering and Industrial Engineering
   4. Systems Engineering and Procurement / Acquisition
   5. Systems Engineering and Specialty Engineering

The SEBOK list of KAs is comprehensive, ranging from the abstract subject of Systems, down to performance assessment of individual SEs.

At a first approximation, it seems to me that the scope of the BABOK KAs fall within this subset of the SEBOK KAs

1. …
2. Part 3 – Systems Engineering and Management
   1. Life Cycle Models
   2. Concept Definition
   3. System Definition
   4. System Realization
   5. System Deployment and Use

No surprise, SE is far more broad than BA if the KAs are to be the basis.  But that is not the main point of this series.  The key interest is where they overlap.   We will look more closely at these overlapping KAs in the next parts.

Comparing the BABOK and the SEBOK, Part 2

Business Analysis and Systems Engineering seem to share a substantial in their perceived areas of scope, so it might be informative to see what their respective BOK Guides say about the other discipline.

Do They Know Each Other?

It is interesting that neither the term “Systems Engineering” nor its variant “System Engineering” appear in the BABOK.  This is strange because the BABOK authors are evidently aware of the SE discipline, since the BABOK Bibliography includes these two SE-centric books:

Stevens, Richard, Peter Brook, Ken Jackson, and Stuart Arnold. 1998. System Engineering, Coping with Complexity

Forsberg, Kevin, Hal Mooz, and Howard Cotter-man. 2005. Visualizing Project Management: Models and Frameworks for Mastering Complex Systems

As for the SEBOK, it mentions “business analysis” three times, each time using it as a synonym for mission analysis, such as in this extract:

MA, in some domains called market analysis (glossary) or business analysis, is the identification, characterization, and assessment of an operational problem or opportunity within an enterprise (p. 253).

Judging from this, the SEBOK considers business analysis as limited to mission analysis, which is only a part of the Concept Definition Phase

What is Business Analysis?

If Business Analysis is synonymous to Mission Analysis (according to SEBOK), it should be useful to compare and contrast BA as understood by the BABOK with MA as understood by the SEBOK. 

The table below lists the functions of BA as described by BABOK, and the functions of MA as described by SEBOK.  I tried to match them, with some degree of interpretive freedom on my part.

Business Analysis According to BABOK	Mission Analysis According to SEBOK
Liaison among stakeholders
Understand the structure, policies, and operations of an organisation
Recommend solutions that enable the organisation to achieve its goals	Analyse the solution space
Understanding how organisations functions to accomplish their purpose
Defining the capabilities an organisation requires to provide products and services
Definition of organisational goals
Define how goals connect to specific objectives
Determine courses of action that an organisation has to undertake to achieve those goals and objectives
Defining how the various organisational units and stakeholders within and outside the organisation interact.
	Establish a set of stakeholder requirements for a potential SoI (System-of-Interest)
	Focuses on the identification of the primary purpose(s) of the solution
	Part of the larger set of concept definition activities -
	Understand a mission / market problem or opportunity
	Initiate the life cycle of a potential solution that could address the problem or take advantage of an opportunity
	Define operational actions, not hardware / software functions; that is, it is focused on defining the problem space, not the solution space
	The primary products of MA are the revised ConOps of the enterprise, the operational concept, the operational scenarios for the mission, and the context in which the solution will exist.
	MA evaluates alternative approaches to determine which best supports the stakeholder needs (among both materiel and non-materiel solution alternatives, also known as product solutions and service/operational solutions).
	MA defines the problem space and analyses the solution space alternatives using quality attribute constraints driven by the enterprise objectives.

I could not match the two sets of functions and find very little, almost no direct intersection between what Business Analysis is according to BABOK, and what Mission Analysis is according to the SEBOK (which treats business analysis as a synonym for Mission Analysis.

And yet, my instinct tells me there is a strong intersection, it’s just that the two BOKs use very different terminology and very different ways of explaining.  (I find the BABOK a bit more refined in its explanations, while the SEBOK tend to ramble a bit).

Number of Pages

This is an easy comparison.  Version 2.0 of the BABOK has 253 pages.  The SEBOK is primarily laid to for reading online using a Wiki platform, but a PDF version is available for download.  This PDF runs to 850 pages.  Better have a full ream of office paper ready if you decide to print this.

Authors

The SEBOK lists 70 authors, some of whom I recognise as respected leaders in the SE discipline.  The ones I know by reputation include: Barry Boehm (but I know him from the software engineering field, not the SE field), Erik Aslaksen, Edmund Conrow, Dov Dori, Kevin Forsberg, and James Martin.

The BABOK also credits as Content Contributors about 19 names, of whom the only one I recognise (but recognise only the name, not what she’s about): Ellen Gottesdiener.  They do have an Expert Advisory and Review Group, from which I recognise the following names: Scott Ambler, Dean Leffingwell, Meilir Page-Jones, James Robertson, Suzanne Robertson, Steve Tockey.

Comparing the BABOK and the SEBOK, Part 1

I find it interesting that the disciplines of Business Analysis and Systems Engineering share an apparently substantial overlap in their areas of declared responsibilities and specialties.

In the domain of system related projects, both specialise in requirements development, in cost / benefit analysis, in solution assessment and selection, and in verification and validation of the solution.  Could it be they are one and the same thing?

The SE community recently completed its SEBOK Version 1.0 (Systems Engineering Body of Knowledge), available at http://www.sebokwiki.org.  The BA community, through the auspices of the IIBA, has its BABOK (Business Analysis Body of Knowledge), currently at version 2.0 (available at the IIBA website). 

I think it will be interesting to compare the two documents and see what each has to say in areas they have in common, but also in areas which the other is silent.  Where exactly are they similar?  How do they differ?

Since both documents are lengthy, I’ll do the comparisons in several parts. 

To start, let’s look at what each BOK has to say about their particular discipline. 

What is Systems Engineering?

What is Systems Engineering? SEBOK offers this brief definition:

Systems engineering is an interdisciplinary approach and means to enable the realization of successful systems

This is a very thin definition, almost to the point of meaningless.  One can probably can use it to describe project management, or even portfolio management, both of which can be argued as enabling the realisation of successful systems. The SEBOK also provides a longer description:

“an interdisciplinary approach and means to enable the realization of successful systems” (INCOSE 2012). It focuses on holistically and concurrently understanding stakeholder needs; exploring opportunities; documenting requirements; and synthesizing, verifying, validating, and evolving solutions while considering the complete problem, from system concept exploration through system disposal.

In the glossary, it provides two other definitions, taken from unrelated official documents. The first is from ISO/IEC/IEEE 2010 which says that Systems Engineering is an:

Interdisciplinary approach governing the total technical and managerial effort required to transform a set of customer needs, expectations, and constraints into a solution and to support that solution throughout its life.

The SEBOK also quotes the INCOSE Systems Engineering Handbook (v 3.2.2). The first sentence is exactly the same as SEBOK’s definition:

An interdisciplinary approach and means to enable the realization of successful systems. It focuses on defining customer needs and required functionality early in the development cycle, documenting requirements, then proceeding with design synthesis and system validation while considering the complete problem:

• Operations
• Performance
• Test
• Manufacturing
• Cost & Schedule
• Training & Support
• Disposal

Systems engineering integrates all the disciplines and specialty groups into a team effort forming a structured development process that proceeds from concept to production to operation. Systems engineering considers both the business and the technical needs of all customers with the goal of providing a quality product that meets the user needs.

The focus therefore, of SE is defining what the customer needs, and delivering the solution that fills the need.

What is Business Analysis?

The BABOK provides the following:

Business analysis is the set of tasks and techniques used to work as a liaison among stakeholders in order to understand the structure, policies, and operations of an organization, and to recommend solutions that enable the organization to achieve its goals.

So, where SE is an ‘approach’ that ‘governs’ and ‘integrates’, BA is a ‘set of tasks and techniques’ and is meant as ‘liaison’. 

The BABOK continues:

Business analysis involves understanding how organizations function to accomplish their purposes, and defining the capabilities an organization requires to provide products and services to external stakeholders. It includes the definition of organizational goals, how those goals connect to specific objectives, determining the courses of action that an organization has to undertake to achieve those goals and objectives, and defining how the various organizational units and stakeholders within and outside of that organization interact.

Here we get some clarity about the focus of BA work: the organisation.

Business analysis may be performed to understand the current state of an organization or to serve as a basis for the later identification of business needs. In most cases, however, business analysis is performed to define and validate solutions that meet business needs, goals, or objectives.

Business analysts must analyse and synthesize information provided by a large number of people who interact with the business, such as customers, staff, IT professionals, and executives. The business analyst is responsible for eliciting the actual needs of stakeholders, not simply their expressed desires. In many cases, the business analyst will also work to facilitate communication between organizational units. In particular, business analysts often play a central role in aligning the needs of business units with the capabilities delivered by information technology, and may serve as a “translator” between those groups.

While BA work is clearly meant to identify the customer requirements, it is clear that BA work sits in the non-technical area of the organisation, specialising in what the organisation does and needs.  In contrast, the SE definition does not make it clear whether the SE is more focused on the technical aspects of the solution (we can assume so from the word ‘Engineering, but that is not the same as having it asserted directly).

A business analyst is any person who performs business analysis activities, no matter what their job title or organizational role may be. Business analysis practitioners include not only people with the job title of business analyst, but may also include business systems analysts, systems analysts, requirements engineers, process analysts, product managers, product owners, enterprise analysts, business architects, management consultants, or any other person who performs the tasks described in the BABOK® Guide, including those who also perform related disciplines such as project management, software development, quality assurance, and interaction design.

When you do work that is in the BA domain, you are doing Business Analysis, regardless of title.  So if you are an SE, you might also be a BA.

I’ll continue the comparison in another post.