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Essential Data Modeling: Business Analysts Driving Data Requirements
Description Speaker(s)

As a Business Analyst, you play the primary role in ensuring all user requirements are correct, clear, consistent, complete and relevant - including the data requirements.   As a Project Manager, you are responsible for planning and coordinating the work efforts to produce the requirements deliverables - including the data requirements.  This workshop provides a fundamental understanding of data modeling for people responsible for creating or validating the data model as well as those managing requirements development.  

You will learn a step-by-step approach to elicit and detail business data requirements.   We will explore tips on using use cases and business rules to uncover data requirements.  Detailed data requirements are captured in a logical data model (i.e., entity-relationship diagram) and in the business rules. Identifiers, foreign keys and normalization are explained.  Fill-in-the-blank forms are used to capture details for entities, relationships, and the data dictionary’s attributes.  The various techniques studied are traced to the relevant knowledge areas in the IIBA BABOK (e.g., Enterprise Analysis, Requirement Elicitation, Requirements Analysis). 

Learning Objectives:

  • Ability to explain the role Business Analysts play in modeling data requirements
  • Skill in building a logical data model: identifying entities and attributes; capturing relationship cardinality
  • Keen awareness of  the value of modeling data in tandem with process models

Skill Level: Intermediate

Mary Gorman, CBAP

Senior Associate, EBG Consulting

EBG Consulting helps software development and business experts to positively and productively define and achieve shared goals. EBG offers services including training, consulting, requirements clinics and professional workshop facilitation. Mary Gorman, CBAPTM and Senior Associate with EBG Consulting, Inc. helps project teams build robust business and system requirements. Prior to her association with EBG, Mary had over 20 years experience working with many organizations, including numerous Fortune 100 companies, as a consultant, mentor, trainer, facilitator, process engineer, developer and analyst. Mary is a member of the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA). She serves on the IIBA’s Body of Knowledge (BOK) committee and is the leader of the Requirements Elicitation sub-committee.