There are about 6,500 languages spoken in the world today. English, Mandarin, Hindi, Spanish, French, Arabic, Bengali, Russian, Portuguese, and Indonesian make up the top 12.
At a glance:
Lost in translation: How businesses are losing millions due to lack of communication and transparency.
Business analysts: Love them? Hate them? Can't live without them?
This week's podcast
Let's dive in.
THE SITUATION
Source: Dilbert by Scott Adams (https://dilbert.com/)
What languages are spoken in your business? There is a good chance that you are losing time and money due to translation (or lack thereof).
A strong connection between the product and development teams is critical to the growth and success of a company. Keeping the visionary mission-focused product team and the scrappy execution-focused development team on the same page is easier said than done.
One team speaking two different languages In immature or misaligned organizations, the product and development teams are often speaking two different languages.
Product team - Speaks in big picture terms. Thinks about where the product should be and what their customers want.
Development team - Speaks in requirements. Focused on executing and creating the product that they think product team desires.
1 team speaking 2 languages = a proud team with unhappy customers
Misaligned communication creates a misaligned product. When the product team's vision is not translated into the language of development, the product will not satisfy the needs of customers. Where are the receipts? 📃 Consistent and transparent information flow is fundamental to creating a great product. With today's Agile revolution in project management, documentation of information is becoming hard to come by. Nothing great can come from a team making decisions based of off bad information. When information is not properly documented and communicated, teams operate on information that makes sense to them. This information is not always accurate or best for the business.
THE SOLUTION
The controversial role of the business analyst
Regardless of title, business analysts exists in every organization. Your business analysts are the people who are managing ideas from product and turning them into actionable requirements for development. Essential but under fire No one likes documentation, especially when it is not used. The role of the business analyst has been harshly scrutinized and eliminated by organizations as a way to focus more time on building. Though time has been "saved", lack of transparency and traceability have been created.
Follow the 💰 Identifying the person that is doing the business analysis in your organization is as easy as following your organization's flow of money and information. Where value is created and money is generated, there is someone turning ideas into action. Scope and Pull For the business analysts at your organization to be successful, they need to be given direction. In some organizations, direction means identifying problems and weaknesses that need to be addressed. In others, direction is placing your business analyst in the right position between your product and development teams so they can translate problems into solutions with requirements for development.
THE PODCAST
Episode 5 | How The Right Translator Can Save Your Business Time and Money
You can’t avoid it. There’s no such thing as a project where the business analysis function isn’t needed in some capacity. How much energy in your business is getting lost in translation? Here’s what you can do about it, and we aren’t talking about the BRD. 🎤 Take us with you on your morning commute or stroll to your home office: