{"id":6468,"date":"2014-10-27T09:08:17","date_gmt":"2014-10-27T14:08:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/?p=6468"},"modified":"2022-08-08T10:15:52","modified_gmt":"2022-08-08T15:15:52","slug":"ba-entrepreneur-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/ba-entrepreneur-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"The Entrepreneurial BA Practitioner Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

What do Business Analysis and Entrepreneurship Have in Common?<\/strong>\"Entrepreneurship\"<\/h2>\n

If you are a BA, you may be wondering about your career options. To be honest, we all do that, but I tend to hear about career concerns from business analysts more than anyone. Should we aspire to be project managers when we grow up? That used to be the most common next step, and more BAs are saying \u201cno way\u201d to that. What about becoming business architects? That would be a logical move for \u201clogical\u201d people since architects tend to be abstract thinkers and focused on the \u201cbig picture.\u201d<\/p>\n

In March, 2014, Cathy Brunsting posted an insightful article In Modern Analyst called \u201cBeyond the Business Analyst Role: What\u2019s Next?<\/a>\u201d Besides the above options she mentioned Product Owner, Product Manager, and other managerial roles. To me, the product-oriented roles are the most conducive for a BA to use his or her skills to help their organization grow. Both roles take advantage of business knowledge and\/or BA-type skills to define, refine, and steer development of new products.<\/p>\n

Wait a second. Designing and developing new products is what entrepreneurs do, isn\u2019t it? There is more to being an entrepreneur, which I\u2019ll cover in another blog post. But, a critical part of starting a business or line of business is creating a new product or service or one that is better than the market currently has. That is often what business analysts do, and to some extent, project managers too.<\/p>\n

Entrepreneur<\/h2>\n

. First, let me define entrepreneur; there are many definitions floating around. Translating from the French, entrepreneurs \u201cundertakes a venture\u201d which involves some risk. A longer and more precise definition from Investopedia (a favorite web site of mine) is the following:<\/p>\n

\u201cAn individual who, rather than working as an employee, runs a small business and assumes all the risk and reward of a given business venture, idea, or good or service offered for sale. The entrepreneur is commonly seen as a business leader and innovator of new ideas and business processes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Entrepreneurs have been around for quite a while. The term was first used in the early 1700s. Classic examples of tech entrepreneurs are Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerburg. Coco Chanel was a fashion and perfume innovator and entrepreneur in the 20th century. Levi Strauss created the Levi\u2019s jeans company in the 1800s. James Watt was an 18th<\/sup> century entrepreneur. He didn’t invent the steam engine but he innovated several improvements on it.<\/p>\n

\"Business<\/p>\n

Intrapreneur<\/h2>\n

. If you do entrepreneurial work inside an organization, the common term for you is \u201cintrapreneur.\u201d I don’t like the term because if one doesn\u2019t assume risks then how can they be called a \u201cpreneur,\u201d or someone who accepts risks? On the other hand, I very much like the concept of people in organizations starting up ventures to launch new products and services. Here is the Investopedia definition of intrapreneur:<\/p>\n

\u201cAn inside<\/em> entrepreneur, or an entrepreneur within a large firm, who uses entrepreneurial skills without incurring the risks associated with those activities. Intrapreneurs are usually employees within a company who are assigned a special idea or project, and are instructed to develop the project like an entrepreneur would.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now that we have some definitions in place, let\u2019s move on to comparing business analysis and entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n

Product vs. Project vs. Process<\/strong>. Years ago our company put together something we called the \u201cproductivity triangle.\u201d Any organization is productive when they create or provide products or services that customers want and need. Creating them is done through projects, and project management is at the core naturally. Re-creating the new product on an ongoing basis is done through processes, which need to be improved or optimized periodically. Process management is central to that and projects may need launching to do the improvement.<\/p>\n

Underlying both of these disciplines is product management. The easiest part of product management to grasp are the initial requirements and design. Another huge part of product management is developing business cases, which BAs often do at companies. Over time, additional requirements surface and new features are added and can be anywhere from small pieces to large releases. Product management both drives and supports projects and processes, completing the productivity triangle. See Figure 1.<\/p>\n

\"Business
Figure 1<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Business Analysis and Entrepreneurship. <\/strong>So, what does this have to do with BAs
\nbeing entrepreneurs you may ask? If we view business analysis work as largely product management, BAs can port those skills to creating new products for a startup. Similarly, new product development within an organization can be done in an entrepreneurial way, and business analysis skills are critical. Speaking from experience, formal project management is helpful but not as crucial for a startup. (Scrum methods are more helpful, but that is a separate topic.)<\/p>\n

Managing processes is the least important for a startup, since it won\u2019t have processes to manage until it starts to \u201cre-create\u201d the products it has built. The other two legs of the triangle are essential for growing a company. Product management skills \u2013 which BAs have developed – are essential for starting a company or product.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m just getting started with the topic and will be delivering a keynote called \u201cThe Entrepreneurial BA\u201d at the New Zealand BA Development Day conference in November. Look for additional posts soon!<\/p>\n

References<\/h2>\n

https:\/\/www.investopedia.com\/terms\/e\/entrepreneur.asp<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.investopedia.com\/terms\/i\/intrapreneur.asp<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What do Business Analysis and Entrepreneurship Have in Common? If you are a BA, you may be wondering about your career options. To be honest, we all do that, but I tend to hear about career concerns from business analysts more than anyone. Should we aspire to be project managers when we grow up? That […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":10851,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,166,211,1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[138],"class_list":["post-6468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-analysis","category-entrepreneurship","category-project-management","category-watermark-learning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6468"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10852,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6468\/revisions\/10852"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6468"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.watermarklearning.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=6468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}