CCBA Requirements Elicitation & Documentation 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A business analyst is working with stakeholders who have difficulty articulating their needs verbally. Which elicitation technique is MOST appropriate to help surface tacit knowledge?
- Survey/questionnaire
- Observation (job shadowing) (Correct answer)
- Brainstorming session
- Document analysis
Correct answer: Observation (job shadowing)
Observation allows the BA to watch stakeholders perform their actual work, surfacing tacit knowledge that stakeholders cannot easily verbalize.
Question 2: During a JAD (Joint Application Design) session, participants begin arguing about competing solutions rather than defining requirements. What should the facilitator do FIRST?
- Allow the debate to continue to reach consensus naturally
- Refocus participants on defining the business problem before discussing solutions (Correct answer)
- End the session and reschedule after stakeholders align offline
- Document both solutions as alternative requirements
Correct answer: Refocus participants on defining the business problem before discussing solutions
The facilitator should redirect participants back to the problem statement, since requirements elicitation must precede solution design.
Question 3: Which elicitation technique is BEST suited for gathering requirements from a geographically dispersed group of 200+ end users?
- Structured interviews
- Focus groups
- Surveys/questionnaires (Correct answer)
- Prototyping
Correct answer: Surveys/questionnaires
Surveys/questionnaires are the most scalable technique for gathering input from large, distributed user populations efficiently.
Question 4: A BA is analyzing an existing legacy system to understand undocumented business rules. Which elicitation technique is MOST applicable?
- Brainstorming
- Document analysis (Correct answer)
- Focus groups
- Prototyping
Correct answer: Document analysis
Document analysis involves reviewing existing artifacts—including legacy systems, reports, and logs—to extract embedded business rules.
Question 5: What is the PRIMARY difference between a focus group and a workshop in requirements elicitation?
- Focus groups are used for solution design; workshops are used for problem identification
- Focus groups gather attitudinal data from a representative sample; workshops are structured work sessions aimed at producing deliverables (Correct answer)
- Focus groups are always conducted remotely; workshops are always in-person
- Focus groups require a neutral moderator; workshops do not
Correct answer: Focus groups gather attitudinal data from a representative sample; workshops are structured work sessions aimed at producing deliverables
Focus groups collect opinions and attitudes from a representative sample, while workshops are structured collaborative sessions designed to produce specific elicitation outputs.
Question 6: A BA conducting interviews notices that stakeholders give different answers to the same question. What is the BEST course of action?
- Use the most common answer as the authoritative requirement
- Escalate the conflict to the project sponsor immediately
- Document the variance and schedule a reconciliation session to resolve conflicting views (Correct answer)
- Accept all answers as valid requirements without further investigation
Correct answer: Document the variance and schedule a reconciliation session to resolve conflicting views
Conflicting stakeholder answers reveal ambiguity or differing perspectives that must be documented and then reconciled through further elicitation or prioritization.
Question 7: When using prototyping as an elicitation technique, what is a key risk the BA must manage?
- Prototypes always lead to requirements that are too technical
- Stakeholders may mistake the prototype for the final product and resist changes (Correct answer)
- Prototyping cannot be used for non-functional requirements
- Prototypes require fully detailed requirements before they can be built
Correct answer: Stakeholders may mistake the prototype for the final product and resist changes
A major risk of prototyping is that stakeholders become attached to the prototype and resist changes, believing it represents the committed solution.
CCBA Requirements Elicitation & Documentation 2
A business analyst is working with stakeholders who have difficulty articulating their needs verbally.
Which elicitation technique is MOST appropriate to help surface tacit knowledge?