Team Questions
How big was your team?
What is 9 people (My Team consists of 9 people)
Do you work in Agile or Waterfall?
I have experience in both waterfall and agile but currently working in an agile environment.
What do you do when you need to get in contact with Stakeholders or LOB and they are unavailable?
When you can’t get ahold of key stakeholders I always set up meetings with my SME, PM, or PO& email them, or contact them through Microsoft teams.
What tool do you use to gather requirement?
Initially, use Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel but mainly word. I upload and manage them through JIRA
Why are you looking for a new BA job?
My project is in its delivery and maintenance phase and I am looking to expand my experience and learning as a BA and I think this will give me the opportunity to challenge myself and do just that
Were you the only BA? How big was your team?
No, there was one senior BA. We had 3 developers, and 2 QA’s. One developer and one QA was offshore.
What is you experience working in Agile compared to Waterfall? Which in your opinion is the best approach?
Based on my experience, I think there are pros and cons in both methodologies. The best approach depends on nature of the project and the needs of the client.
What do you do in a situation where the stakeholders or LOB said they never said something or agreed to something when in fact they did?
That’s why I always take meeting minutes and make sure to send them to my team and my stakeholders via email.
Sending through email leaves a Papertrail and gives a date and time to reference back to just in case stakeholders forget what they said. I give sign-offs as well for any updates.
How are requirements provided or given to you?
The requirements are given to me by conducting JAD sessions with the stakeholders
How did you start a career as a BA?
I initially went to school for communications. I was already interested in getting a career in the business field.
Were you ever involved in UAT testing?
I assisted the QA team in testing the comparison tool to ensure that customers were able to select up to three cards to compare and that the system was working as intended.
How do you determine the level of effort the team can take on in Sprint?
The level of effort is determined using the Fibonacci sequence/theory. Then the velocity (sum of all story points and how much work a team take on in a given sprint) is figured out. We look at past sprints to determine how much (the average) velocity we can take on in the next sprint.
What do you do when you have conflicting opinions from Stakeholders or LOB?
I would evaluate the risk associated with each perspective and a consider the project outcome, scope and goals, timeline and budget.
I would conduct a meeting with my stakeholders and my team and this analysis and come up with alternative solutions.
How do you determine priority level for requirements?
Put user stories into JIRA product backlog.
What are some ways to effective ways to facilitate a daily stand up meeting to ensure team members are paying attention and not bored?
Keep the meeting short. Encourage active participation from team members to promote engagement.
How do you manage working with an offshore team? What are some difficulties?
There are no difficulties with offshore team members other besides the time difference and scheduling conflict.
To resolve this, I always make it a priority to send over meetings minutes after JAD sessions and meetings. I also made myself available to schedule one on one meetings when needed.
How often do you do Sprint Retrospective meetings?
End of each phase. Phases are generally 6-8 months due to the size of the project. Or between 4-5 sprints.
What do you do if Stakeholders or LOB do not agree or like what you are presenting to them?
I seek feedback on the aspects they disagree on. I ask them to provide details to support their viewpoint so I can get a better understanding on why they feel that way.
I also explain how the presentation aligns with the project goals. If they disagree with what I am presenting then I explore alternatives together and make sure to document those changes.
What is a functional and non-functional requirement?
Functional requirements is something you want/desire (It describes what’s the system should do).
Non-functional requirements describe how the system should work (It determines the desired qualities and characteristics of the system).
Have you worked on wireframes or process flow diagrams?
Yes, I’ve worked on wireframes. For my most recent project I created wireframes to show what the user interface for the travel and reward card section would look like. (Change)
How do you manage projects on low resources?
I like to identify the most critical tasks and them by having a meeting with the stakeholders, QA, and developer and discussing which requirements have the highest priority.
The QA & developer informs the stakeholder how those requirements will affect the project in terms of resources & the project outcome. This helps ensure that the limited resources are granted to the most important tasks first.
What does your team do if you do not complete the items on the current sprint?
I see if it’s possible to work extra hours to get it done. If that isn’t possible, then my team reassess and prioritize the user stories that were not completed in the next sprint.
Do you have experience using diagrams? What kinds? What are they used for?
I have experienced using UML (unified modeling language) diagrams and wireframes.
How do you know when the requirements are ready to become use cases or user stories?
Requirements are ready to become use cases or user stories when they fit S.M.A.R.T guideline and I have gotten the sign-off from my stakeholder(s).
But it depends on the methodology. In an agile environment, requirements can be refined over time and I can always add more requirements based on the stakeholders as the project evolves
Let’s say you’re working with multiple stakeholders for the same project, and the stakeholders are having conflicts regarding how the requirements should be, how do you handle a situation like that?
JAD session everyone has different personalities better to understand my stakeholders and establish a good relationship (have open conversation) do my own analysis and present to stakeholder how the requirement s affect the project if then ask the JAD team level of effort.