Extract from Nick Malik (6th April 2012)
Definitions
Business Architect – A role within various types of enterprises (business, government, non-profit) that is focused on collecting information on the strategic positioning of an area of activity (line of business, business unit, department, team, etc.) and creating a clear picture of the capability gaps that may impede that area from reaching it’s full and required potential.
Business Analyst – A role either within an information technology division of an enterprise, or within a non-IT team serving as a key point of contact with an IT division. This role is focused on understanding the root cause of a specific business problem in order to develop the IT requirements needed to address that problem.
(Inevitably, someone will ask me where I got those definitions. I made them up. I reserve the right to be wrong.)
Comparison
Both of these fields analyze the business… but that is where their similarities end. Let me repeat that: Business Architects analyze the business. Business analysts analyze the business.
| Business Architect | Business Analyst | |
| Why | To uncover the gaps between strategic needs of a business unit, and their abilities to meet those needs, and to charter initiatives to fill those gaps. | To develop and document the detailed knowledge of a business problem that an initiative has been chartered to address. |
| How | Analysis of future-looking strategies, capturing of capabilities, and modelling of inter- and intra- business relationships needed to discover the key capability gaps that a business must be prepared to face, along with the development of cross-functional roadmaps to address them. System requirements are NOT captured. | Interviews with existing business stakeholders and SMEs to elicit business rules, understand processes, information, and systems in use, and detailing the consequences (intentional or not) of making a business change to address a specific issue. The primary result of this activity is the document of System Requirements. |
| When | Ongoing process that is triggered by periodic strategy cycles within a business | As-needed activity that is triggered AFTER a problem has been identified and requirements for a solution are needed. |
| Who | Business or IT Generalists with a strong understanding of business functional issues, interdependencies, and business structural concerns. Must be excellent at capability analysis. Must leverage modelling and rigorous analysis skills. | Business or IT Generalists with a strong understanding of information and application interdependencies, requirements analysis, and system development methodologies. Must be excellent at IT requirements elicitation. Must leverage modelling and rigorous analysis skills. |
| What | Business motivational models, Value Streams, Scenarios, Capability models, Heat Maps, Funding Maps, Risk maps | Business Requirements, Business Rules, Use Cases, and Detailed Business Process descriptions |
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