Business Analysis, Digital Innovation, Business Strategy & Transformation at Building Business Capability 2019

At IIBA® we are eagerly anticipating the kickoff of Building Business Capability 2019 in sunny Fort Lauderdale, Florida. This year is extra special because it marks the 10th anniversary of BBC. Over the years this conference has continued to grow and evolve into the must-attend North American conference it is today.

 

If you haven’t registered yet you still have time (register here), or you can do it on site the week of November 11th. As the official conference of IIBA our membership receives a 20% discount off the conference fees which could translate up to $600 USD in savings*.

This year’s event is themed Unleashing Creativity and from November 11th to 15th it promises some great opportunities to learn and share. This year BBC is featuring a Leaders Symposium with peer-among-peer sessions. The Cybersecurity and Privacy session on Thursday, November 14th at 2pm will be facilitated by Ken Fulmer, president and CEO of IIBA. This is a learning-oriented session that will explore key cybersecurity issues facing organizations to help BAs balance business factors with making the right decisions at the right time. Be sure to sign up on your registration indicating you wish to attend the Symposium. If you didn’t do this, reach out to regsupport@risingmedia.com for assistance.

In a recent survey of our corporate members, IIBA asked what organizations think are the future skills that BAs will need. Their response was that the number one skill area in 3 years will be Data Analytics. This doesn’t mean BAs need to become data scientists but rather we’ll see an opportunity for BAs to support business data analytics. To help you understand the opportunities, be sure to attend the Business Data Analytics – Using Data to Drive Better Business Outcomes session presented by Laura Paton, CEO, BA Academy, Inc. and Ken Fulmer on November 14th at 10:40am. In this informative session Laura and Ken will explore how BAs are being challenged to learn more about Data Analytics in our data-driven economy so they can translate data rapidly into value-add information to leverage their skills as the “translator” to make business requirements make sense for the technical and data scientists and the business teams. Ultimately, the business data analytics role will help organizations better able utilize and consume the results. This session will show how business data analytics offers a real improved value proposition to business leaders to get better results from their investments in data analytics and business intelligence.

While IIBA’s recent salary survey shows adoption of agile by organizations continues to grow, there continues to be challenges. In this session on The State of Agile Analysis 2019 presented by Angela Wick, CEO, BA-Squared and Kupe Kupersmith, CBAP, Principal, Kupe Talks on November 13th at 4:15pm, they will tackle the topic of common anti-patterns that stifle analysis and look at what teams that are getting great results are doing from a customer, product and analysis perspective. They’ll share how to put the customer back into the product and your team’s work. This session will help you discover what practices you can put to work on the team to get better visioning, better backlog refinement sessions, deeper conversations about the customer, and a more relevant product. Following this session, you will walk away with the know-how to connect analysis to agile team results and agile values.

Planning Your Time

For a full list of must-attend sessions IIBA has created a featured sessions list to help you maximize your time at BBC 2019. This year’s conference features 15 Tracks and 4 Trails to help you plan your conference time so you can hit all the agenda sessions you want and make note of the speakers you wish to connect with during the week. On November 13th and 14th the exhibit hall will be open where you’ll have a chance to visit with vendors, attend a technology session, and of course stop by IIBA’s booth to learn about what’s new and what’s coming soon. Check the BBC app to request meetings with participants and register to participate in an IIBA Focus Group to share your opinion on our new BABOK® Perspectives including Product Ownership, our new Career Centre and share feedback on your website experience on iiba.org.

As I mentioned above, IIBA has selected some of our recommended sessions to attend to take some of the work out of studying the agenda. No matter which workshop or sessions you attend you will find everything you want to know about, didn’t know you want to learn about and of course, make some great connections with both existing and new contacts. As we wind down the conference before our last sessions on Friday, plan to drop by IIBA’s members’ reception on November 14th. This year we’ve hired dueling piano performers, so the evening promises to be lots of fun.

 

 

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