A Project Managers Guide to Use Cases Part 3

A PM’s Guide to Use Cases Part 3: Use Case Narratives

Originally published in PM Times on December 8, 2015. As promised, this is the fifth article in our modeling series and the third on use cases. We’ll start with a short summary of the main concepts covered previously. SUMMARY OF PREVIOUS ARTICLES Here are the highlights of the requirements modeling articles written to date: To get …

Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, PMI-PBA, CSM

Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, CSM is a consultant and advisor for Watermark Learning/PMA. She has over 35 years of experience in project management and business analysis. Elizabeth has co-authored four books and chapters published in five additional books, as well as articles that appear regularly in BA Times, Project Times, and Modern Analyst. Elizabeth was a lead author/expert reviewer on all editions of the BABOK® Guide, as well as the several of the PMI standards. Elizabeth also enjoys giving presentations, and her speaking history includes repeat keynotes and presentations for national and international conferences on five continents. Elizabeth enjoys traveling, hiking, reading, theater, and spending time with her 7 grandkids.

A Project Managers Guide to Use Cases Part 2

A PM’s Guide to Use Cases Part 2: Use Case Diagrams Explained

Originally published in PM Times on November 10, 2015. This is the third article in our requirements modeling series and the second article in our use cases series. We had promised that in future articles we would show examples of use case diagrams, explain how to build them, and describe why we should create use case …

Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, PMI-PBA, CSM

Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, CSM is a consultant and advisor for Watermark Learning/PMA. She has over 35 years of experience in project management and business analysis. Elizabeth has co-authored four books and chapters published in five additional books, as well as articles that appear regularly in BA Times, Project Times, and Modern Analyst. Elizabeth was a lead author/expert reviewer on all editions of the BABOK® Guide, as well as the several of the PMI standards. Elizabeth also enjoys giving presentations, and her speaking history includes repeat keynotes and presentations for national and international conferences on five continents. Elizabeth enjoys traveling, hiking, reading, theater, and spending time with her 7 grandkids.

A Project Managers Guide to Use Cases Part 1

A PM’s Guide to Use Cases Part 1: What is a Use Case and Why Should PMs Care?

Originally published in PM Times on May 22, 2015. Use case models have been around for decades. Long after Information Engineering was all the rage and through object-oriented analysis and design they hung around. They threatened to disappear when Agile methods gained popularity, but here they are–discussed, dissected, and the subject of many blogs. Aren’t they …

Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, PMI-PBA, CSM

Elizabeth Larson, PMP, CBAP, CSM is a consultant and advisor for Watermark Learning/PMA. She has over 35 years of experience in project management and business analysis. Elizabeth has co-authored four books and chapters published in five additional books, as well as articles that appear regularly in BA Times, Project Times, and Modern Analyst. Elizabeth was a lead author/expert reviewer on all editions of the BABOK® Guide, as well as the several of the PMI standards. Elizabeth also enjoys giving presentations, and her speaking history includes repeat keynotes and presentations for national and international conferences on five continents. Elizabeth enjoys traveling, hiking, reading, theater, and spending time with her 7 grandkids.

Putting Your Product Backlog in Order

Putting Your Product Backlog in Order

Earlier versions of Scrum described prioritizing the Product Backlog based on development priority, but the current Scrum Guide just says that it is ordered in order to “best achieve goals and missions” (Scrum Guide, July 2013). Ordering the backlog is the responsibility of the Product Owner, who is also responsible for optimizing the value of the …

Marsha Hughes, CSM, CBAP, PMP

Marsha is a senior instructor and consultant for Watermark Learning, and has more than thirty years of experience in the software, technology, telecommunications, and Internet business sectors. She has numerous accomplishments in Agile methods, project management, business analysis, software development, methodology development, process improvement, and courseware development and training. She is a Certified Scrum Master and Professional, a Certified BA Professional, and a Certified PM Professional. She is also a contributor to the IIBA’s Agile Extension to the BABOK, and the agile perspective in version 3.0 of the BABOK.

Why Spend Time on Use Cases in Agile Projects

Why Spend Time on Use Cases in Agile Projects?

Someone at a recent conference asked me how to respond to project stakeholders when they say that Use Cases take too long in an agile environment.  I was presenting a talk on “BA Toolkit for an Agile Project (or any other for that matter).”  Here are my answers with some added depth. (Thanks to Justin …

Richard Larson, PMP, CBAP, PMI-PBA

Richard Larson, PMP, CBAP, PMI-PBA, was the founder of and is now a consultant for Watermark Learning. He is a successful entrepreneur with over 35 years of experience in product development, business analysis, project management, training, and consulting. As an internal entrepreneur, Rich led the development of several Watermark Learning online products as a business analyst and product owner. Rich is a frequent speaker at Business Analysis and Project Management national conferences and IIBA® and PMI® chapters around the world. He has contributed as a lead author to the BA Body of Knowledge version 2.0 and 3.0 and was a lead author on PMI’s Business Analysis Practice Guide. He and his wife Elizabeth Larson have co-authored five books on business analysis.