Facilitation Techniques PDF

Facilitation Techniques for
Requirements Development
BA Certification
A brief overview of various facilitation techniques employed during
Business Analysis
Pershing
12/1/2015
BA Certification Facilitation Techniques for Requirements Development
Course Topic: Facilitation Techniques for Requirements Development
Course Objectives
– Define facilitation in the context of BA
– Explain role and responsibilities of a BA facilitator
– Use appropriate facilitation technique for a given session
– Conduct facilitation session using best practices
– Manage conflict during a session
– Identify facilitation opportunities in BA
– Plan a facilitation session
Course Synopsis
A very important role of a BA is the facilitation role. A BA is required to interact with all the
stakeholders during different phases of project. And very often these stakeholders are together
discussing the project. At these times the role of a BA turns into a facilitator when he/she is
responsible for extracting opinion/suggestions from all the parties. In the best of times it can all go
very smoothly but there are hardly any ideal scenarios. Difficulties arise when there is
– A conflict amongst stakeholders
– Not all stakeholders are participating
– Only some dominant participants are driving the meeting
At these times it is very important that the BA dons the hat of a facilitator and drives the meeting
agenda towards a fruitful result. The facilitation techniques course will prepare the participants in
different stages of facilitation which include
– Planning stage
– Conducting stage
– Evaluation stage
Recommendation: The material presented in this course provides the foundation necessary for
building the necessary Facilitation skills. If you plan to take additional courses in the Business
Analysis Professional Development Program, you will need this foundation.
Class Length: 4 hrs Theory / Case study +30 min Evaluation
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Information Classification: Internal
Table of Contents
Course Topic: Facilitation Techniques for Requirements Development ............................................................2
Course Objectives ...........................................................................................................................................2
Course Synopsis ..............................................................................................................................................2
Roles, Definitions and Key Principles..................................................................................................................5
What is a Facilitator ........................................................................................................................................5
Facilitation Process .........................................................................................................................................5
Facilitating in Business Analysis ......................................................................................................................6
Key Participants ..............................................................................................................................................6
Role and Responsibility of BA facilitator ........................................................................................................7
Facilitation opportunities ...............................................................................................................................7
Facilitation Session Considerations ....................................................................................................................8
Session Objective:...........................................................................................................................................8
Participants: ....................................................................................................................................................8
Potential Risks: ...............................................................................................................................................9
Environmental Considerations: ....................................................................................................................10
Executing a facilitation session .........................................................................................................................11
Facilitation Techniques .....................................................................................................................................13
BRAINSTORM ................................................................................................................................................13
Prioritizing Technique: ...........................................................................................................................13
Brain writing .................................................................................................................................................14
Steps in conducting a session .................................................................................................................14
Focus Group ..................................................................................................................................................14
Joint Application Design - JAD ......................................................................................................................15
Organize the JAD team ............................................................................................................................15
Develop the JAD workbook ....................................................................................................................15
Locate the JAD facilities ..........................................................................................................................15
Conduct the JAD session .........................................................................................................................16
GAP Analysis .................................................................................................................................................16
Steps in conducting a session ...................................................................................................................16
Root-Cause Analysis .....................................................................................................................................16
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The five WHYs .........................................................................................................................................17

Why use the five whys? ..........................................................................................................................17
Force Field Analysis ......................................................................................................................................17
Facilitation Practices .........................................................................................................................................18
An overview of the business requirements: .................................................................................................18
Generating Participation ..............................................................................................................................18
FLIP CHARTS:................................................................................................................................................18
Trigger questions, case studies, video, audio clips .......................................................................................19
Getting extensive user involvement ......................................................................................................19
Focus Groups ...........................................................................................................................................20
Focus on User Tasks......................................................................................................................................20
Active listening .............................................................................................................................................20
Paraphrasing: ..........................................................................................................................................20
TRACKING...................................................................................................................................................21
BALANCING.................................................................................................................................................21
NEUTRALITY ...............................................................................................................................................22
Feedback.......................................................................................................................................................22
Summarizing .................................................................................................................................................22
Facilitation Conflict Techniques........................................................................................................................24
Case Studies and Discussion ................................................................................ Error! Bookmark not defined.
Excerpts from the Case study .................................................................... Error! Bookmark not defined.
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Roles, Definitions and Key Principles
What is a Facilitator
In context of Business Analysis, a facilitator plays a very important role. Any project involves
people from different groups. These are called stakeholders. It is the role of Business Analyst that
all the stakeholders are on the same page. For this he/she has to conduct meetings, discussion,
conf calls.
At this point it is important to note that following points must be kept in mind when facilitating
– A facilitator does not stand in front of a group and lecture.

– A facilitator is an active unbiased member of the learning process.
– The role of the facilitator is to skillfully assist a group of people to understand their
common objectives and to help them to achieve these
– Objectives without taking sides in any argument.
– The facilitator guides and helps achieve understanding and consensus.
The basic skills required of a Facilitator are
– Following good meeting practice

– Timekeeping
– Following an agreed agenda
– Assisting a group to brainstorm and problem solve
An experienced facilitator will also have the following skills
– The ability to intervene in a way that adds creativity to a discussion rather than leading the
discussion and taking away creativity from the group
– The ability to understand the group process and dynamics – successfully addressthese
inequalities in the group dynamic
 Who is dominating in the group and how to stop them?
 Who is withdrawn and how to involve them?
 Who is bored and how to draw them into process?
Facilitation Process
Facilitation is an integrated process. It consists of
– A planning stage of preparing participants, the site and session plan; it is the responsibility
of the facilitator to plan the session
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– A conducting stage of assisting the participants in identifying their needs and making
decisions, managing conflicts, validating and documenting results.
– An evaluating stage of assessing facilitation and decision processes and following up to
ensure open issues are resolved.
Facilitating in Business Analysis
Facilitation in Business Analysis helps stakeholders determine requirements by providing a

process. There are two elements to requirements session
– Content: What is being discussed

– Process: How it is being discussed
The BA facilitator guides stakeholders through the process. Note that the BA should participate in
either content or process, but not both at the same time. If content, the BA gains the opportunity
to contribute to the discussion. If process, the BA steers the process but gives up the opportunity
to contribute.
Facilitation in Business Analysis is iterative
– Vision: generating ideas, done in Enterprise Analysis

– Defining: describing, qualifying and quantifying requirements; done in Requirements
elicitation
– Analyzing: finding gaps and problems; done in Requirements Analysis
– Deciding: evaluating options; done in solution assessment and validation
Key Participants
A facilitation session will have following participants
1. Decision Maker or Sponsor
The decision maker/Sponsor may have one of four possible decision intents for the session.
The intent is based on how the decision will be made and how much input the session will
have.
– Management has made or will make the decision and the session will not have
impact on the decision.
– Management needs input from the session to make a decision
– Management needs a recommendation from the session to make a decision.
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– Management has delegated the decision to the session; thus, further approval to act
is not required.
The intent must be addressed in the beginning to avoid potential conflict during the session
2. Subject Matter Expert

As a group member, the SME also has the responsibility to play a positive role on the
session by
– Following the ground rules

– Respecting communication styles
– Checking that the facilitator is fulfilling his/her functions
3. BA Facilitator
The role of the BA facilitator is to guide the stakeholders on how to determine, discuss, and
agree on results by providing process. Results may be goals, requirements, solution
options, or a recommendation.
A successful BA facilitator will require all of the BA core competencies.
Role and Responsibility of BA facilitator
At a session, the BA facilitator has the responsibility to
– Introduce the facilitator role

– Explain the objectives, agenda, processes, and ground rules for the session
– Establish a professional and positive atmosphere of respect and openness
– Maintain neutrality on content and foster a process of building a consensus
– Ensure that all participants participate and establish their interests, assumptions and
perceived constraints
– Adjust process as necessary
– Manage stakeholder conflict and keep them on track
– Document and distribute results
– Assess facilitation and decision process
– Follow up and assist in resolving open issues
Facilitation opportunities
There are many facilitation opportunities for the BA within and outside a project. The following
address these opportunities
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– Enterprise Analysis
EA is the collection of pre project or early project activities and approaches for capturing the
business needs and defining the solution scope.
– Elicitation and Requirement Analysis
Elicitation includes working with stakeholders to identify and understand their needs and
concerns. Requirements analysis includes prioritize and progressively elaborating stakeholder
and solution requirements.
– Requirement Management and Communication
Requirement management and communication is the collection of activities and

considerations for managing the conflict and change the communicating requirement to
stakeholders. The BA conducts formal and informal presentations with stakeholders
– Solution Assessment and Validation
Solution assessment and validation includes assessing solutions to ensure they meet the
business need, identifying gaps in the solution and assessing solution after deployment.
Facilitation Session Considerations
Like any other worthwhile activity, planning is essential for facilitation session. The following will
be considered while planning for a successful session.
Session Objective:
The first consideration in session planning is a clear objective with defined success criteria. The
facilitator must ensure that all participants understand why the session is being conducted and the
targeted results.
Participants:
The next step in session planning is to identify the participants to be invited.
If the session is about requirement elicitation, facilitator has to invite project sponsor to express
the project goal and organization needs. The facilitator should also consult with the sponsor to
determine who needs to be invited to discuss the requirements.
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The facilitator should note the participants’ profile to ascertain his role and responsibility,
authority and involvement with respect to the project.
The facilitator should also note whether the participant is local or remote and any time zone
considerations to be made while scheduling a session. Time zone differences will be contemplated
under environmental considerations which will be covered in the subsequent steps under session
planning.
Potential Risks:
Risk is the next consideration. There are potential risks involved during the session that may
hamper to meet the session objective. Some of the possible risks are
- Participants see no value in the session.

- Not invited the key resource like SME. Additional expertise needed.
- Key participant is absent.
- Participants hesitate to be involved due to management presence in the session.
- Lack of information
- Deadlock between participants on decision or priorities.
Under session planning, define all the potential risks and the likelihood of it occurring and its
impact on the session by assigning a priority to each risk – High, Medium or Low.
The facilitator needs to plan for risks associated with the facilitation session and if possible, for the
risks associated with the content (project).
Once the possible risks are determined, review the four possible scenarios. These are the
contingency plans that would be followed to lower the risk.
– Avoidance: For any potential risk, first check the possibility how it could be avoided. For
instance, if the key participant is absent due to some unavoidable circumstance on the
scheduled day of the session, the facilitator can reschedule the session to a time
convenient of all the participant including the key member.
– Mitigation: If the potential risk cannot be avoided, the next choice is to mitigate the risk. In
the above example, the Facilitator can request key participant to send his colleague to
represent in the absence of him.
– Transfer: The third alternative is move the risk elsewhere but not the accountability.
– Acceptance: The last option is to accept the risk (typically the low risk).
For example, if the facilitator couldn’t setup a video conferencing session for remote participants.
Instead he can manage by setting up a WebEx session.
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Environmental Considerations:
The session environment (local or remote) is the next consideration in the session planning. For
local sessions, the facilitator should ensure that the facility is setup to allow for maximum
participation. The room should have enough chairs for all the participants to be seated and small
tables to allow face to face, sub group discussions. The facilitator should ensure that the room has
the required equipments and accessories including flip chart/pens, writing paper/pen, projector,
computer/network systems.
In case of remote session, time zone considerations will be taken into account and the facilitator
will schedule the session at a timeframe convenient to all the participants.
For remote session, the facilitator will be responsible to setup video conferencing or webex if
needed. Prior to the session, rehearsal of videoconferencing/webex will be prudent if the
facilitator is not familiar with these services.
There is no indication of eye contact, facial expression or body language between facilitator and
participants in a remote session. Remote participants pose great challenge to the facilitator, as the
participants may engage in other activities like Sametime chat, or email reading. Facilitator should
keep all the participants attentive by asking for opinions, validation of understanding, giving
opportunity to participants who don’t have much content to contribute to the session.
Language may also be a challenge to the facilitator although all the participants speak a common
language. This is because the common language is not the native language for all the participants.
The facilitator should ask the participant who are highly familiar with the common language and
communicate rapidly to slow down the speech as the other participants who are not familiar may
find difficult to understand the conversation.
Prior to the session, the facilitator can contact the remote parties and create positive one to one
relationship. Also, discuss who needs to be involved from the remote site and inquire about
language options and determine whether interpretive services are needed. The facilitator will
make sure that there is enough session time to cover if interpretive service is used.
During the remote session, facilitation will start off with a roll call, introduce all parties, and
confirmed they received the agenda and other materials. While wrapping up the session, the
facilitator has to summarize the topics discussed and the results, the action items that have been
identified and any other issues determined. Finally, the facilitator should distribute the minutes of
the discussion within a set time frame and thank all the attendees for their participation.
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The final considerations in session planning are the agenda and the facilitation technique. Each
topic needs to have a specific time frame and planned facilitation technique.
Any material to be used during the session should be sent to all the participants with enough lead
time (a week) for proper review. This would help the participants to understand the topic of
discussion and will be prepared to raise any queries and get it clarified.
Executing a facilitation session

Facilitating productive discussions which lead to great results in less time, whether participants
converse face-to-face, via phone, web or a combination is what is expected out of an
analyst/facilitator.
Most of the clients put a premium on participants’ time. That’s why it is better to consider a
"blended facilitation" approach, which is an optimum blending of virtual and face-to-face
facilitation, as well as the best use of asynchronous ("any time") and synchronous (simultaneous)
communication methods. This way, conversations are both efficient and effective, consistently
meeting or exceeding objectives in a surprisingly short period of time. Having said that, following is
a list of pointers to consider as pre-requisites before running a facilitation session.
PRE-REQUISITES
As pre-requisites to the facilitation session we can consider
– Essentials of the session plan

o Example:
 A video conference. Ensuring all technical equipments, connectivity and other
protocols are taken care of. Also time zone differences have to be taken care of
when sessions are organized for a global audience.
 A conference room session. Ensuring availability of the room, projectors, flip
charts, markers, participant information, maintaining timelines are some of the
key factors.
– Identifying the stakeholders for the facilitation discussion
– Preparing the agenda
– Rules and guidelines
– Arranging the session dynamics
THE PRELUDE
The main objective of the prelude stage begins with the question: What are we here to
accomplish?
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Once the objective is zeroed down the following pointers are worth considering.
– The start-up of the session is often best done by the problem owner or business sponsor.
– It can be as short as a few minutes of verbal introduction and as long as a 10 to 15 minute
formal presentation. The rest of the participants essentially listen.
– When the problem owner/business sponsor is finished, the facilitator should take some
time to ask the other participants to state their version of the problem. Out of this
dialogue, the facilitator will need to recommend a single problem statement in no more
than 1 to 3 sentences.
RUNNING THE FACILITATION SESSION
The prelude is followed by the actual run up of the facilitation session. The following pointers are
nothing but the collective knowledge of all that we learnt in the facilitation techniques and
practices in the chapters discussed so far.
– Setting expectations for the discussion on what the participants can expect
– Driving and keeping to the agenda
– Getting engagement and commitment
– Building consensus
– Handling hidden agendas
– Handling the different participant styles
– Sidetracking and intervention
– Other facilitation techniques
The ideal way to wind up a facilitation session is to have either reached a consensus on the
issues/problem areas discussed and what benefits can be reaped out of the solution OR to have a
list of follow up action items to keep track of and discuss with the next facilitation session that
might take place to address those items further.
Thus by learning the best practices of facilitation and the nuances of running a facilitation session
one can gain,
– Improved understanding of the facilitation process and refined skills in facilitating

– Improved session planning
– Ability to apply the skills across various types of sessions
– Greater versatility in handling different types of participants
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Facilitation Techniques
Good facilitation techniques should
– Help the participants to be comfortable with each other

– Create a fun and interesting learning environment
– Boost the energy levels of workshop participants
– Organize interesting and productive group work activities
– Use participatory activities which enable dynamic reviews of what has been learnt
– Increase group activity so that workshop participants can expand on the newknowledge
they have received and localize that knowledge
BRAINSTORM
The brainstorming technique is used to elicit numerous creative ideas about any given question or
topic. It allows for thinking out of the box. This technique works by focusing on a topic or problem,
then coming up with many radical solutions to it. It promotes diverse types of thinking.
While many people are familiar with brainstorming, there are some important tips that make it
work effectively. These include:
– Three guidelines: Always review the guidelines, inviting participants to generate them if
they know them:
1. Quantity not quality;
2. No put downs, comments, or discussion; and
3. Repeats are okay
– Use a recorder (or two): it makes your job as the facilitator who must pay attention to the
group’s behavior much easier.
– Write topic at the top. Write your topic/question on the paper, board, or whatever so that
everyone can see it. Check for clarification.
– Use two colors on flip charts, alternating them for better readability.
– Don’t crowd items.
– Enforce the guidelines
– Add ideas: Yes, the facilitator and recorders may add ideas at the end; note that you are
stepping out of your role.
Prioritizing Technique:
Often, groups get stuck in discussing items that are not of interest to most of the members. The
Prioritizing Technique is a strategy for eliminating this. Here’s how it works.
After a brainstorm or list has been generated, as facilitator number and count the items. Then,
explain that the group will go about prioritizing the items that they want to explore more. This
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isn’t a vote, although it has similar elements. Rather, it is a way for participants to indicate their
interest in “keeping the item alive” for discussion, research, consideration, etc.
Count the number of items and divide by 3 (if there are less than 10) or 4 (if there are more than
10). For example, with 9 items, everyone gets to prioritize 3. With 20 items, everyone gets to
prioritize 5.
Since this is not a vote, people can place all of their “priority dots” or checkmarks on one item or
spread them however they wish. Use sticky dots, colored markers, or other tools to do this
visually, with everyone participating.
Brain writing
Brain writing is a non verbal technique to generate a free flow of creative ideas that asks
participants to write their ideas and share with group members to further brainstorm the idea. It is
especially useful when the issue or topic is sensitive. This technique gives people the anonymity
and hence discretion to express their ideas.
In this type of session it is unlikely that the leader will overly influence participants. Everyone has
the equal opportunity to contribute. Ideas are often more relevant because they are written
down.
Steps in conducting a session

1. Announce a brain writing session and set session rules
2. Define the topic, provide slips of paper participants and allow some think time.
3. Ask for folded slips with written ideas from participants, then group and place them in a
common pool.
4. Ask each participant to take a folded idea from the pool and build on that idea
5. Discuss each idea and note the elaborations
6. Consolidate similar ideas
7. To set priority on ideas, employ a decision technique to sort out the best ideas (possible
follow up session)
Focus Group
A focus group is a technique to elicit ideas and attitudes about a product and attitudes about a
product, service or opportunity in an interactive group environment. The group has typically 8-12
participants. The broadness of the topic influences who should be invited. There are two types of
groups
a. Homogeneous: Composed of individuals with similar jobs and is best for defining job
practices
b. Heterogeneous: Composed of individuals with different but related job perspectives
Focus groups must be facilitated to prevent
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– Meeting within meeting

– Off topic tangents
– Open conflict between participants

1. Pose questions that call for an elaborate answer (open-ended question)
a) How do you perform your job (as-is)?
b) What would make your job easier (to-be)?
2. Ask for verbal ideas and encourage group to build on ideas
3. Discuss each idea and note elaboration from others
4. Employ an analysis technique to develop possible ways to achieve ideas (possible follow up
session)
5. To set priority on ideas, employ a decision technique to sort out the best ideas (possible
follow up session)
Joint Application Design - JAD

Joint application design (JAD), also known as joint application development, is a technique for
quickly determining system requirements by obtaining input from a representative cross section of
interested parties. An ad hoc team composed of major users, managers, and systems analysts (or
information consultants) is assembled. The team then meets in an intensive session to gather
data, brainstorm, discuss ideas, reconcile differences, identify and prioritize requirements, and
generate desirable alternative solutions.
Organize the JAD team

The members of a JAD team consist of end users from the relevant business functional areas,
managers from those same functional areas, systems analysts or information consultants, and
appropriate systems specialists. The moderator or session leader is usually the senior systems
analyst or information consultant. A scribe takes notes, records all discussions, and organizes and
compiles the necessary documents.
Develop the JAD workbook

The JAD workbook consists of a management definition guide, information relevant to the project,
any special criteria or constraints, any assumptions, an overview of existing technology and
standards, a statement of the system’s scope and objectives (# 12), and information about the
existing system and/or relevant new technology. The purpose of the workbook is to help the team
members understand the proposed project. The design of the workbook should facilitate note
taking.
Locate the JAD facilities

As a minimum, a conference room large enough to accommodate all the team members and
equipped with whiteboards or chalkboards, an overhead projector, and a slide projector must be
available. With the emergence of the electronic meeting systems (EMS), group decision support
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systems (GDSS), and computer aided software engineering (CASE) tools, additional requirements
might include computers for conducting an electronic meeting, teleconferencing facilities, and a
master station equipped with CASE software.
Conduct the JAD session

A JAD session is an intensive (typically) two- or three-day meeting of the complete JAD team. Team
members are expected to give the JAD session their complete attention, scheduling no other
conflicting activities.
GAP Analysis
It is a technique for determining the steps to be taken in moving from a current state to a desired
future-state. Also called need-gap analysis, needs analysis, and needs assessment.
Gap analysis consists of

– Listing of characteristic factors (such as attributes, competencies, performance levels) of
the present situation ("what is"),
– Cross listing factors required to achieve the future objectives ("what should be"), and
– Highlighting the gaps that exist and need to be filled.

1. Set up 3 flip charts: AS-IS, Gap, and TO-BE
2. On the TO-BE flip chart, describe the future state
3. On the AS-IS chart, describe the current state
4. Pose open questions to groups
a) What are the barriers that are keeping us from the vision?
b) How can we achieve the vision?
Root-Cause Analysis
RCA is a class of problem solving methods aimed at identifying the root causes of problems or
events.
A root cause analysis should be performed as soon as possible after the error or variance occurs.
Otherwise, important details may be missed. All of the personnel involved in the error must be
involved in the analysis. Without all parties present, the discussion may lead to fictionalization or
speculation that will dilute the facts. Asking for this level of involvement may cause staff to feel
hostile, defensive, or apprehensive. Managers must explain that the purpose of the root cause
analysis process is to focus on the setting of the error and the systems involved. Managers should
also stress that the purpose of the analysis is not to assign blame. The comfort level with the
technique increases with use, but the analysis will always be somewhat subjective.
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The five WHYs
1. Write down the specific problem. Writing it down helps you formalize the problem and
describe it accurately. It also helps a team focus on the same problem
2. Use brainstorming to ask why the problem occurs then, write the answer down below
3. If this answer doesn't identify the source of the problem, ask ‘why?' again and write that
answer down
4. Loop back to step three until the team agrees that they have identified the problem's root
cause. Again, this may take fewer or more than five ‘whys?'
Why use the five whys?
1. Helps you to identify the root causes of a problem

2. Helps you to determine the relationship between different root causes of a problem
3. It is one of the simplest analysis tools as it's easy to complete without statistical analysis
4. It is easy to learn and apply
Force Field Analysis

Force Field Analysis is a useful technique for looking at all the forces for and against a decision. In
effect, it is a specialized method of weighing pros and cons.
This technique is usually a precursor leading in to a gap or root cause analysis and is best done
early when there is a need to understand the impacts of a project. It only identifies the positive
and negative forces that impact success, not the requirements.

1. Briefly define the goal on the flip chart and display sheet
2. Divide a second flip chart into two sections: positive forces and negative forces
3. Employ a vision technique to develop possible ways to address the positive and negative
forces
4. To set priority on ideas, employ a decision technique to sort out the best ideas
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Facilitation Practices
Business analysts have the responsibility to gather, analyze, and validate business and technical
requirements for their projects, thus they need facilitation skills to manage requirements meetings
and workshops.
Facilitation discussions are a great way to get the workshop participants to apply their past
experiences, work through case studies and solve problems; not to mention - build their skills in
working in a team environment. However, unless well facilitated, these discussions/sessions will
not have much value.
Following are the set of best practices to ensure that the sessions held during the
workshops/discussion forums are valuable to the participants.
An overview of the business requirements:

The facilitator begins by giving an overview which is a short vision statement that describes what
the product/requirement could ultimately become. However, you probably won’t implement the
grand product vision in a single release. Therefore, you should include the project’s scope and
limitations with the business requirements. The scope description should summarize the major
features included in the initial release and describe how you will more fully realize the vision
through subsequent releases. The limitations identify specific capabilities the product will not
include. Having given the overview, the following best practices are worth considering for the any
facilitation discussion. These are in addition to the facilitation techniques discussed in section 3.
Generating Participation
To ask the participants to provide their reactions to the business problem presented.
– How would they do it better?
– Could the situation have been handled differently?
– What do they find most challenging about addressing aggressive customers.
A variety of questions helps you to keep the discussion moving along. Additionally, listen carefully
to participants’ thoughts and ideas in the meeting/telecon and follow up with additional probing
questions to get more details. Keep participants on track with the discussion. If it goes off track,
write down the idea for discussion later and pull them back to the current discussion. For those
who are very talkative, ask them to hold on ideas so that you can have others’ ideas on the table
for discussion. Encourage the quieter folks by asking them questions directly. “Flip charts” is one
of best practices to generate active participation.
FLIP CHARTS:
The facilitator can use flip chart writing to:
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– Create a record of the requirement facilitation discussion. Participants can see the notes
and make corrections or ask for clarification as the conversation progresses
– Organize thinking i.e., draft wording, pose options, connect ideas, depict consequences,
narrow choices, summarize decisions, organize tasks
– Keep the participants on track by referring to the topic on the flip chart, or specific agenda
items.
The information on the flip chart must be "user friendly." Use large letters, space between
concepts (so ideas can be added), alternating colors, and make sure the paper can be
posted rather than just flipped over.
Trigger questions, case studies, video, audio clips

Use a variety of ways to set up the discussion and stimulate the participants with ideas so they can
more effectively contribute to the discussion. For example, ask them what might happen if we
don’t respond effectively to a customer complaint, or have them read case studies of what
happens when customers’ complaints are not addressed, or show a video of a customer who is
unhappy and the support engineer is not addressing the complaint effectively.
Getting extensive user involvement

Multiple studies indict insufficient user involvement as a common reason why software projects
struggle and fail. Every project should identify its distinct user classes and their characteristics.
Users might differ in their frequency of product use, features used, privilege levels, or skill levels.
Determine which of your user classes will carry the most weight in priority discussions, when
resolving conflicting feature requests, and in driving design choices.
Next, find suitable representatives who can serve as the voice of the customer for each important
user class.
Example: A "product champion" model to engage user representatives in the development

process. Product champions should be actual users of the new product, not surrogates such as
user managers, funding sponsors, marketing staff, or developers. Document your general
expectations of the product champions to serve as a starting point for negotiating each
champion’s responsibilities. Typical responsibilities include:
– Developing usage scenarios
– Resolving conflicts between proposed requirements
– Defining implementation priorities
– Specifying quality attributes
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– Inspecting requirements documents
– Evaluating and prioritizing enhancement and change requests
Focus Groups
A slight variation of the product champion approach is the Focus group.
The product champion approach works well for internal systems development where users are
readily accessible. Commercial product development often demands more creative approaches for
optimizing customer involvement. Focus groups can serve as a sounding board for feature ideas
but they generally don’t have the decision-making authority that product champions have.
However focus groups would act as suitable engaging customer representatives facilitating your
discussions.
Focus on User Tasks

Typically, employing use cases is one of the best practices in requirement facilitation to maintain
focus. Use cases shift requirements discussions from the traditional focus on features and
functionality to the perspective of what the user will do with the product.
The use case approach helps you avoid missing essential functional requirements. They can also
help you identify exception conditions the system must handle, which sometimes are overlooked
in the focus on expected system behaviors. Use cases are valuable for deriving conceptual system
test cases very early in the development process.
User representatives can generally describe their business processes and itemize the tasks a new
application must let them perform. Skillful facilitation keeps elicitation workshops focused on user
tasks, rather than drifting into discussions of functional requirements or detailed user interface
design. The analyst should emphasize on how a user imagines interacting with the system to
accomplish each task. That understanding lets the analyst derive the necessary functional
requirements.
Now, let us look into a few more popular practices that get the best out of requirement facilitation
sessions.
Active listening
Active listening is one of the best followed practices of requirement facilitation discussions and
gets categorized further into these techniques.
Paraphrasing:
Paraphrasing is used in explaining the ideas of an expert in your own words to make it more
reachable to other participants. It takes skill to alter the form of information without changing the
meaning of that information, and it is a skill well worth developing. The ability to properly
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paraphrase technical text/ideas depends in large part on an analyst’s conceptual understanding of

the ideas being processed and his/her mastery and command of the technical language involved.
So to summarize, paraphrasing is:
– The analyst/facilitator putting the source information into other words and phrases. This
means that they are systematically translated into a natural language description.
– A requirement document to be necessarily written in natural language because of the

variety of stakeholders who have to read it.
 Examples of paraphrase starters: “let me see if I am understanding you…..?”, “It

sounds like what you are saying…..”, “So what you are saying is….”
 The starting phrase is followed by your own explanation of the idea to make it
reachable to a wider audience.
TRACKING
– Participants often act as if their point is the one that everyone should focus on, they
wonder why others do not respond to their ideas. However the facilitator should keep
track of various lines of thought related to the topic.
– Example:
 Indicate that you are stepping back from the discussion to summarize the different
tracks. Mention the different tracks: “it sounds like there are three different
conversations going on now….”, “Am I getting it right?”
 Even if somebody wants to clarify, the facilitator can also ask for clarifications from
the others
BALANCING
– The direction of a discussion often follows the lead set by the first few people who speak.
The following pointers are worth noting.
 Silence does not necessarily mean consent
 Facilitator should try to balance this and offer assistance for other opinions
 Example:
 “Okay, now we know the opinions/ideas of three people, does anyone else
have different opinions/ideas?”
 “Does everyone else agree with this?”
 “Are there other ways of looking at this?”
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 “So, we have heard x and y point of view, is there a third way of looking at
this?”
NEUTRALITY
Keeping the factor of Balancing in mind, facilitation can take a lot of mental effort, meaning that it
can be difficult to think about and contribute content while facilitating. Neutrality is also
important. So if you have an interest in the outcome, or have skills, experience, information or
authority which is important for a successful outcome, then consider bringing in an external
facilitator.
Feedback
The main question the analyst needs to ask to himself during a response outcome of a facilitation
discussion is “What feedback are you looking for?”.
Before scheduling a requirements review meeting, take some time to consider your desired
outcome. What do you want to achieve? What do you want to learn? What input do you need
make the project more successful? Here are some pointers to consider for getting the feedback
you are looking for in requirements discussions:
– If the purpose is discovery, list out your unknowns in a list of discussion points for the
meeting. Organize them in a logical manner than aligns with a visual you can talk through.
– If the purpose is to validate and flesh out hidden assumptions, have a list of talking points
to ensure the attendees are “thinking through” the process in the same level of detail you
are. Maybe this can be accomplished through a use case review.
– If the purpose is to facilitate collaboration where there is conflict, have a preliminary

understanding of each individual’s point of view and some ideas for resolving the issue.
– What are the uncertain parts of the process you want to validate?
End of it, we have to consider separating how you document your requirements and how you
communicate your requirements for the purpose of getting meaningful and that is where targeted
feedback will make your software projects more successful.
Summarizing
When there are no further ideas and thoughts on a discussion/session, summarize the discussion
with some key points and debrief on the discussion. Review the ideas you heard and ask how the
participants can apply those ideas as the next appropriate step.
As an analyst, facilitating discussions is not easy and takes quite a bit of practice. However,
discussions are a great way to open up new ideas to solving a problem. When participants can
Page 22
contribute to how to do something better, they are more apt to use what they learn back on the
job.
Page 23
Facilitation Conflict Techniques

Conflict resolution can help you maintain a productive workforce and keep your company focused
on growth. Conflict resolution generation depends on the definition of “conflict”. In business
requirements analysis, conflict can occur in two different facets.
– Requirement inconsistency: often refers to the technical nature of constructing a

requirements document—any condition in which two parts of a requirements specification
do not obey some liaison that should essentially exist between them. [also two (or more)
requirements and their differences]
– Requirement conflict: often refers to the stakeholders of a requirements document with

different points of view towards an agreeable solution. The groups can be two or more
who disagree and cannot resolve the disagreement amongst themselves.
The requirements of the system are collected from stakeholders, and each stakeholder might have
different priorities for each requirement. Moreover, each stakeholder might have a different level
of importance to the organization.
Conflict resolutions are generated by modifying the requirements—specifically, their structured

representation and the core aim of the conflict management problem is to select requirements
that can maximize the stakeholders’ satisfaction and respect the availability of resources [ex:
developers, tools, testers, hardware, software, schedule, cost etc]
Stake holders
A systematic approach to identify key conflicts is stakeholder profile analysis. All stakeholders in a
collaborative group do not have the same expertise or experience regarding the issues being
discussed. Based on profiles of each stakeholder, commonality and differences between
stakeholders in each group who have the same or similar positions can be analyzed.
In some cases, there is a general agreement among the majority of the stakeholders. The few
stakeholders whose opinions differ from the majority are referred to as “key contenders”. These
stakeholders have the most divergent opinions in the group. Thus, it is imperative to identify such
stakeholders who can either revise their position or annotate their vote accordingly.
So to summarize, while resolving a conflict, we have to consider
– Stakeholders
– Stakeholder priorities
– Stakeholder importance
Page 24
– Availability of resources
Having said that, let us classify requirements and stake holders into the following categories
– Very Important [or a “must have” requirement]
– Important [or a “should have” requirement]
– Average [or a “need to have” requirement]
– Not so important [or a “nice to have” requirement]
Effective requirements negotiation among stakeholders at an early stage of software life cycle is a
key factor of successful software projects. In order to effectively support requirements negotiation,
the WinWin system and tradeoff analysis tools are two popular techniques developed to assist
stakeholders to elicit their win conditions (initial objectives/requirements), identify conflicts among
the win conditions, generate options to resolve the conflicts, and reach agreement by iterating,
rejecting, and negotiating the options with arguments, debates and other intervening strategies.
Challenges:
What are the challenges to reach agreement from options among stakeholders?
– Representing and understanding the different perceptions of multi-disciplinary

stakeholders in order to evaluate options
– Communication overhead of negotiating options
– Distributed and asynchronous environment that might make negotiation harder [ex: a
teleconference medium used to negotiate a conflict]
How to Represent Stakeholders’ Perception? How to Measure the Degree of Consensus?
Steps to Resolving a conflict
STEP 1 - DETECT CONFLICT
When analysts/managers encounter disagreements in requirements/project discussions and if left

unresolved, they do so at risk of minor disagreements or misunderstandings escalating over time
into full-blown conflict, with a negative pattern that can affect a whole team.
"The key to controlling the cost associated with conflict is to address disputes early in their life
cycle before they escalate beyond an organization’s ability to effectively intervene."
When a conflict is detected and if the analyst/manager does not intervene at the appropriate
juncture then the negative effects of unresolved conflict are:
Page 25
– Time and energy is diverted away from activities to accomplish organisational goals
– Poor communication and/or lowered morale, reduced motivation and collaboration,

and/or lowered productivity
– Stress-related symptoms, absenteeism and/or staff resignations.
On the other hand, Timely intervention [with diverse intervention strategies like mediator,
negotiator or arbitrator] that is positive, inclusive and thorough has the following benefits:
– A discussion medium that can tolerate creative tension
– Reduces the risk of escalation and people becoming entrenched in their respective
positions
– Provides the opportunity for exploring ideas and alternative approaches to problems
– Enables a deeper and broader understanding of issues impacting on resources or project

progress
– increases associates’ desire to collaborate and strengthens their commitment to work

together to achieve workplace goals
Choosing not to intervene in a timely manner can make a conflict situation often more difficult to
resolve in the long term.
STEP 2 - OPTIMIZE THE PROBLEM
After detecting conflict and successfully intervening to resolve it over a finite period of time, the
next step is to maximize stakeholder priorities.
– Maximize stakeholder’s satisfaction by considering the stakeholder’s importance level and

priorities, and computing the effort needed to implement the requirements considering
the availability of resources. [refer to section stake holders mentioned above]
Example: - Maximizing stakeholder importance
Consider the following table –
Stakeholder Requirement Requirement Requirement Requirement

Weightage Weightage
S1 R1 [Need to 0.6 R2 [Very 1.0

have] Important]
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S2 R1 [Very 1.0 R2 [Important] 0.8

Important]
 Stakeholder S1 consider Requirement R1 as “need to have” and requirement R2 as “Very

Important”.
 Stakeholder S2 consider Requirement R1 as “Very Important” and requirement R2 as

“Important”.
Let us say, Stakeholder S1 has a Weightage of 1.0 and is one of the key decision makers and
stakeholder S2 has a Weightage of only 0.4.
Now the equation goes like,
Stakeholder1 Weightage * Requirement1 Weightage * Requirement1 feasibility +
Stakeholder2 Weightage * Requirement2 Weightage * Requirement2 feasibility
 1 * 0.6 * R1 + 1 * 1 * R2
+ 0.4 * 1.0 * R1 + 0.4 * 0.8 * R2
Let us say, the availability of resource is to implement only one of the requirements now.
The equation would have two possibilities R1 = 1 and R2 =0.
 0.6 + 0.4 = 1.0
Or if R2 = 1 and R1 = 0
 1 + 0.32 = 1.32
Hence we implement R2 – which is considered “very important” and “important” by both the
stake holders.
STEP 3 - NEGOTIATE WITH STAKE HOLDERS
After steps 1 and 2, if the business problem still has conflicting requirements, then negotiation among
stakeholders is needed. The output of the previous activity can be used to help the stakeholder’s reason
about the conflicts and agree on a resolution.
Page 27
– Win-Win strategy
– Trade-off
– Arguments, Debates
Win-Win context
In the Win-Win context, several options to resolve issues are explored and evaluated by
stakeholders. Each stakeholder may have different perceptions regarding evaluation criteria for
issues. The WinWin system is a requirements negotiation technique which supports the
collaboration of a number of stakeholders with the goal of identifying, analyzing, and reconciling
requirements.
The Win-Win System is used by all teams to negotiate the requirements of their systems and it is
primarily based on four artifact types:
– Win Conditions
– Issues
– Options
– Agreements
 Win Conditions capture the stakeholders’ goals and concerns with respect to a new system. If
a Win Condition is non-controversial, it is covered by an Agreement
 Otherwise, an Issue artifact is created to record the resulting conflict among Win Conditions
 Options allow stakeholders to suggest alternative solutions, which address Issues. Finally,
Agreements may be used to adopt an Option, which resolves the Issue
Win conditions
Involve
Issues
Address
Options
Adopt
Page 28
Cover Information Classification: Internal
Agreements
Trade off
The practice of Requirements Trade-offs involves engaging success-critical stakeholders in making

explicit trade-offs between required functionality, schedule, time, project or product stability, and
risk without compromising overall system objectives. Common examples include a priority rating
to enable trade-offs in the face of finite resources and a status value to enable project progress to
be monitored. [As mentioned in the stakeholder scenario in page3].
It will not be possible to perfectly satisfy the requirements of every stakeholder, and it is the
analyst's job to negotiate trade-offs which are both acceptable to the principal stakeholders and
within budgetary, technical, regulatory, and other constraints. A prerequisite for this is to prioritize
the requirements with the stakeholders identified, the nature of their "stake" analyzed, and their
requirements elicited.
Establishing a sound process for negotiating and making requirements trade-offs reduces risks by
providing the following benefits:
– Control of “Scope Creep”
– More finite, complete requirements in the early stages of a project
– Fewer requirements changes during development
– Setting the process of negotiation methods as the rationale for decision making
Argument vs Debate
An argument is defined as an informal intense discussion that does not end in a resolution. It may
start out as peaceful, but it is quite common to involve a strident approach. An argument can take
place anywhere and is basically a disagreement.
A debate is a formal discussion that usually does end in a peaceful resolution. A debate is a
challenge between two groups of people in a game setting. Each side knows what the subject
matter of the debate is to be and prepares their point of view. One side starts off by making their
case for the point of view it is presenting and then the other side presents its case. The rest of the
debate progresses as the sides rebut the points put forward by their opponents. It is very
Page 29
deliberate and the participants in a debate do their best to present both sides of an issue and the
setting usually offers a lot of clarity to get a bigger picture of the problem.
So from a requirement engineering point of view, it is the analyst responsibility to set a formal
discussion modes to foster more of debates to resolve issues amicably and avoid the debates
getting into an argument mode in case of a stakeholder disagreement.
Page 30

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Facilitation Techniques for

Course Topic: Facilitation Techniques for Requirements Development

Class Length: 4 hrs Theory / Case study +30 min Evaluation

The five WHYs .........................................................................................................................................17

Roles, Definitions and Key Principles

– A facilitator does not stand in front of a group and lecture.

The basic skills required of a Facilitator are

– Following good meeting practice

An experienced facilitator will also have the following skills

Facilitation is an integrated process. It consists of

Facilitating in Business Analysis

Facilitation in Business Analysis helps stakeholders determine requirements by providing a

– Content: What is being discussed

Facilitation in Business Analysis is iterative

– Vision: generating ideas, done in Enterprise Analysis

A facilitation session will have following participants

1. Decision Maker or Sponsor

2. Subject Matter Expert

– Following the ground rules

A successful BA facilitator will require all of the BA core competencies.

Role and Responsibility of BA facilitator

At a session, the BA facilitator has the responsibility to

– Introduce the facilitator role

– Elicitation and Requirement Analysis

– Requirement Management and Communication

Requirement management and communication is the collection of activities and

– Solution Assessment and Validation

Facilitation Session Considerations

The next step in session planning is to identify the participants to be invited.

- Participants see no value in the session.

Executing a facilitation session

As pre-requisites to the facilitation session we can consider

– Essentials of the session plan

RUNNING THE FACILITATION SESSION

– Improved understanding of the facilitation process and refined skills in facilitating

Good facilitation techniques should

– Help the participants to be comfortable with each other

Steps in conducting a session

– Meeting within meeting

Steps in conducting a session

Joint Application Design - JAD

Organize the JAD team

Develop the JAD workbook

Locate the JAD facilities

Conduct the JAD session

Gap analysis consists of

Steps in conducting a session

The five WHYs

Why use the five whys?

1. Helps you to identify the root causes of a problem

Force Field Analysis

Steps in conducting a session

An overview of the business requirements:

– How would they do it better?

– Could the situation have been handled differently?

– What do they find most challenging about addressing aggressive customers.

Trigger questions, case studies, video, audio clips

Getting extensive user involvement

Example: A "product champion" model to engage user representatives in the development

– Developing usage scenarios

– Resolving conflicts between proposed requirements

– Defining implementation priorities