A–Z reference

The language of business analysis

318 acronyms and terms covering BABOK concepts, techniques, modeling notations, methodologies, and BA roles. Search or filter to find what you need.

Showing 318 of 318 terms

A

ACAcceptance Criteria Requirements: Predefined conditions a solution or work item must satisfy to be accepted by a stakeholder or user.
ACAcceptance Criteria General BA: Conditions a solution or requirement must satisfy to be accepted by the customer or stakeholder.
Activity Diagram Modeling: UML diagram that models the flow of activities, decisions, and parallelism in a process or system.
Affinity Diagram Techniques: Technique for grouping a large number of ideas or items into related categories.
Agile Process & Methodology: Iterative, incremental approach to delivery emphasizing collaboration, adaptability, and customer value, defined by the Agile Manifesto.
AIArtificial Intelligence Data & Analytics: Field of computer science focused on building systems that perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence.
Anonymisation Data & Analytics: Irreversible removal of personally identifying information from a dataset so individuals cannot be re-identified.
APIApplication Programming Interface General BA: Defined interface that allows software components or systems to communicate with one another.
ARPUAverage Revenue Per User Business & Strategy: Total revenue divided by the number of users or accounts over a defined period.
ARRAnnual Recurring Revenue Business & Strategy: Normalised annual value of subscription revenue from existing contracts at a point in time.
As-Is General BA: Description or model of the current state of a process, system, or organization.
Assumption General BA: Factor considered to be true, real, or certain without proof, that influences planning.

B

BABusiness Analyst Roles: Practitioner who identifies business needs and recommends solutions that deliver value to stakeholders.
BA InformationBusiness Analysis Information BABOK Core: All information that BAs elicit, create, compile, and disseminate, including requirements, designs, models, and stakeholder concerns.
BABOKBusiness Analysis Body of Knowledge BABOK Core: The globally recognized standard for the practice of business analysis, published by IIBA. The current edition is BABOK Guide v3.
BACCMBusiness Analysis Core Concept Model BABOK Core: Conceptual framework of six core concepts essential to business analysis: Change, Need, Solution, Stakeholder, Value, and Context.
Backlog Management Techniques: Practice of recording, prioritizing, and refining items to be addressed by the team.
Backlog Refinement Process & Methodology: Ongoing activity of adding detail, estimates, and order to product backlog items.
BAPMBusiness Analysis Planning and Monitoring BABOK Core: Knowledge area abbreviation (KA 1) covering how BA work is organized, governed, and improved across an initiative.
Baseline General BA: Approved version of a work product used as a basis for comparison and change control.
Benchmarking Techniques: Comparing organizational practices, performance, or processes against peers or industry leaders.
BIBusiness Intelligence General BA: Technologies and practices for collecting, integrating, analyzing, and presenting business information.
Big Data Data & Analytics: Datasets too large or complex for traditional tools, typically characterised by volume, velocity, variety, veracity, and value.
BMCBusiness Model Canvas Business & Strategy: One-page strategic template describing nine building blocks of a business: customer segments, value propositions, channels, relationships, revenue, resources, activities, partners, and costs.
BPMBusiness Process Management Business & Strategy: Discipline that uses methods to discover, model, analyze, measure, improve, optimize, and automate business processes end-to-end.
BPMNBusiness Process Model and Notation Modeling: Standard graphical notation maintained by OMG for modeling business processes.
BPMNBusiness Process Model and Notation Modeling: OMG-standard graphical notation for modeling business processes, designed to be readable by both business and technical stakeholders.
BPOBusiness Process Outsourcing Business & Strategy: Contracting a third-party service provider to perform specific business processes such as payroll, support, or accounting.
BPRBusiness Process Re-engineering Business & Strategy: Radical redesign of core business processes to achieve dramatic improvements in productivity, cycle time, quality, and customer satisfaction.
Brainstorming Techniques: Group creativity technique for generating a large number of ideas in a short time without immediate judgment.
Burndown Chart Process & Methodology: Chart showing the amount of work remaining over time in a sprint or release.
Burnup Chart Process & Methodology: Chart showing work completed and total scope over time, useful for tracking scope changes.
Business Analysis Approach BABOK Core: The set of methods and techniques used to perform BA work on an initiative, ranging from predictive to adaptive.
Business Analysis Information Management BABOK Core: Defines how BA information is captured, stored, integrated, accessed, and reused across the initiative.
Business Analysis Planning and Monitoring BABOK Core: The knowledge area that organizes and coordinates BA work, defining how it will be performed, governed, and improved.
Business Capability Business & Strategy: What an organization does — a stable building block of the business expressed as a noun phrase, independent of how or where it is performed.
Business Case General BA: Justification for a proposed change based on expected benefits, costs, risks, and alternatives.
Business Requirement Requirements: Higher-level statement of the goals, objectives, or needs of the enterprise. Describes why a change is being undertaken.

C

CACCustomer Acquisition Cost Business & Strategy: Average cost of acquiring a new customer, including marketing and sales spend, divided by new customers won.
CBACost-Benefit Analysis Techniques: Comparison of expected costs and benefits of a solution to assess its overall value.
CBAPCertified Business Analysis Professional BABOK Core: Senior IIBA certification requiring at least 7,500 hours of BA work experience within the past ten years.
CCBChange Control Board Process & Methodology: Group authorized to review, evaluate, approve, defer, or reject change requests.
CCBACertification of Capability in Business Analysis BABOK Core: Mid-level IIBA certification requiring at least 3,750 hours of BA work experience within the past seven years.
CDContinuous Delivery Process & Methodology: Practice of keeping software in a deployable state at all times, with automated release to staging or production.
CDContinuous Delivery Process & Methodology: Practice of keeping software in a deployable state at all times through automated build, test, and release pipelines.
CDCChange Data Capture Data & Analytics: Technique for tracking and propagating only the data that has changed in a source system.
CESCustomer Effort Score Business & Strategy: Metric measuring how easy it was for a customer to get an issue resolved or a task completed.
Change Strategy General BA: High-level approach for moving from the current state to the future state, including timing and risks.
Churn Rate Business & Strategy: Percentage of customers, accounts, or revenue lost over a given period.
CIContinuous Integration Process & Methodology: Practice of frequently merging code changes into a shared branch and automatically building and testing them.
CIContinuous Integration Process & Methodology: Practice of frequently merging code changes into a shared branch and automatically building and testing them.
Class Diagram Modeling: UML diagram that shows the static structure of a system: classes, attributes, operations, and relationships.
CLVCustomer Lifetime Value Business & Strategy: Total revenue a business can reasonably expect from a single customer account throughout the business relationship.
CMMICapability Maturity Model Integration Process & Methodology: Process improvement framework that rates organizational maturity across five levels.
CMMICapability Maturity Model Integration Business & Strategy: Process improvement framework with five maturity levels, often used to assess process discipline in organizations.
CMMNCase Management Model and Notation Modeling: OMG-standard notation for modeling knowledge-intensive, event-driven case work that does not follow a fixed flow.
Concept Model Modeling: Model showing key business concepts, their definitions, and the relationships between them.
Conceptual Data Model Data & Analytics: High-level model that describes business entities and their relationships, free of technical detail.
Constraint General BA: Limitation or restriction imposed on the solution or on the BA work itself.
Constraint (Requirement) Requirements: A restriction on the design or implementation of the solution, often technical, regulatory, or budgetary.
Context Diagram Modeling: High-level diagram showing a system as a single process and its interactions with external entities.
Continuous Deployment Process & Methodology: Extension of continuous delivery in which every change passing automated checks is released to production automatically.
CRChange Request Process & Methodology: Formal proposal to modify a product, system, requirement, or other baselined item.
CRMCustomer Relationship Management General BA: Strategy and software for managing an organization's interactions with current and prospective customers.
CSATCustomer Satisfaction Score Business & Strategy: Metric capturing customers' satisfaction with a specific interaction, product, or service, typically on a 1–5 scale.
CSFCritical Success Factor Business & Strategy: Element required for an organization or initiative to achieve its mission or strategic objectives.
Current State General BA: The way the enterprise operates and performs today, before the change is implemented.
Customer Roles: The stakeholder who consumes a product or service produced by the enterprise.
Customer Journey Map Modeling: Visualisation of the steps, touchpoints, emotions, and pain points a customer experiences while achieving a goal with an organization.

D

Daily Scrum Process & Methodology: 15-minute daily Scrum event where developers inspect progress and adapt the plan for the day.
Data Catalog Data & Analytics: Inventory of data assets in an organization, with metadata describing meaning, ownership, lineage, and usage.
Data Cleansing Data & Analytics: Process of detecting and correcting (or removing) corrupt, inaccurate, or irrelevant records from a dataset.
Data Dictionary Modeling: Centralized repository defining the meaning, structure, and usage of data elements in a system.
Data Dictionary Data & Analytics: Centralised reference describing the data elements in a system: name, definition, type, allowed values, and relationships.
Data Fabric Data & Analytics: Architectural approach that integrates data services and metadata across distributed environments to provide unified access.
Data Governance Data & Analytics: Framework of policies, roles, and processes that ensures data is accurate, available, secure, and used responsibly across an organization.
Data Lake Data & Analytics: Centralized repository that stores large volumes of raw structured and unstructured data in its native format.
Data Lineage Data & Analytics: End-to-end record of where data comes from, how it moves, and how it is transformed across systems.
Data Mart Data & Analytics: Subset of a data warehouse focused on a specific business area or function (e.g. sales, finance).
Data Mesh Data & Analytics: Decentralized data architecture where domain teams own and serve their data as discoverable, interoperable products.
Data Modeling Data & Analytics: Process of creating a visual representation of data and the relationships between data elements, at conceptual, logical, or physical level.
Data Owner Data & Analytics: Senior role accountable for a data domain, including its protection, integrity, and value to the business.
Data Pipeline Data & Analytics: Series of automated steps that move and transform data from source systems to a destination, such as a warehouse or report.
Data Privacy Data & Analytics: Discipline concerned with how personal data is collected, used, stored, and shared in line with regulation and ethics.
Data Profiling Data & Analytics: Examining data to collect statistics and information about its structure, content, and quality.
Data Quality Data & Analytics: Degree to which data is fit for its intended use — measured by accuracy, completeness, consistency, timeliness, validity, and uniqueness.
Data Steward Data & Analytics: Role accountable for the quality, definition, and proper use of a specific data domain or dataset.
Decision Analysis Techniques: Formal evaluation of a problem and possible decisions, often using techniques like decision trees or pros/cons.
Decision Table Modeling: Table mapping combinations of conditions to the actions or outcomes they produce.
Decision Tree Modeling: Tree-shaped diagram used to model decisions and their possible consequences, often with probabilities and values.
Deliverable General BA: Any tangible or intangible output produced as a result of project work.
Dependency General BA: Relationship in which one item, task, or requirement relies on another.
Descriptive Analytics Data & Analytics: Analytics that summarises what has happened, typically through dashboards and reports.
Design Requirements: A usable representation of a solution. Designs focus on how value is realized; requirements focus on what is needed.
DevOps Process & Methodology: Set of practices combining software development and IT operations to shorten the delivery life cycle.
DevOps Process & Methodology: Cultural and technical movement combining software development and IT operations to shorten the delivery life cycle and improve reliability.
DFDData Flow Diagram Modeling: Graphical representation of how data moves through a system between processes, stores, and external entities.
Diagnostic Analytics Data & Analytics: Analytics that explores why something happened, often through drill-down, segmentation, and root-cause analysis.
Dimension Table Data & Analytics: Table in a dimensional model that holds descriptive attributes (e.g. time, product, customer) used to slice facts.
DMAICDefine, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control Process & Methodology: Six Sigma improvement cycle for existing processes: define the problem, measure performance, analyze causes, improve, and control gains.
DMNDecision Model and Notation Modeling: OMG-standard notation for modeling business decisions and the rules behind them, often paired with BPMN.
Document Analysis Techniques: Reviewing existing documentation to elicit information about the business, system, or domain.
DoDDefinition of Done Requirements: Shared agreement on the criteria a work item must satisfy to be considered complete.
DoDDefinition of Done General BA: Shared agreement on the criteria a backlog item must meet before it can be considered complete.
Domain SMEDomain Subject Matter Expert Roles: Stakeholder with expertise in some aspect of the business domain affected by the change.
DoRDefinition of Ready Requirements: Criteria a backlog item must meet before a team will commit to working on it in a sprint.
DoRDefinition of Ready General BA: Shared agreement on the criteria a backlog item must meet before the team commits to working on it.
DWData Warehouse Data & Analytics: Centralized, structured store of integrated data from multiple sources, optimized for reporting and analytics.

E

EAEnterprise Architecture General BA: Conceptual blueprint of an organization's structure, processes, information, and IT systems.
ECElicitation and Collaboration BABOK Core: Knowledge area abbreviation (KA 2) covering tasks to draw out, confirm, and communicate BA information with stakeholders.
ECBAEntry Certificate in Business Analysis BABOK Core: IIBA's entry-level certification for individuals beginning a career in business analysis. No prior BA work experience is required.
Elicitation General BA: Iterative process of drawing out information from stakeholders and other sources.
Elicitation and Collaboration BABOK Core: The knowledge area covering tasks performed to obtain information from stakeholders, confirm results, and communicate BA information.
ELTExtract, Load, Transform Data & Analytics: Modern variant of ETL where raw data is loaded into the target store first and then transformed in-place.
End User Roles: The person who will ultimately interact with the solution to perform their work.
Epic Requirements: A large body of work that can be broken down into smaller user stories.
ERDEntity Relationship Diagram Modeling: Diagram showing data entities, their attributes, and the relationships between them.
ERDEntity-Relationship Diagram Data & Analytics: Diagram showing entities, their attributes, and the relationships between them.
ERPEnterprise Resource Planning General BA: Integrated software system that manages core business processes such as finance, HR, supply chain, and operations.
Estimation Techniques: Forecasting the cost, effort, duration, or resources needed for work. Techniques include analogous, parametric, and three-point.
ETLExtract, Transform, Load General BA: Data integration process that extracts data from sources, transforms it, and loads it into a target system.
ETLExtract, Transform, Load Data & Analytics: Data integration pattern that extracts data from sources, transforms it, and loads it into a target system.

F

Fact Table Data & Analytics: Central table in a dimensional model that stores measurable events, transactions, or metrics.
Feature Requirements: A distinct piece of functionality that delivers value to users or the business.
Fishbone Diagram Techniques: Cause-and-effect (Ishikawa) diagram used to identify possible causes of a problem grouped by category.
Focus Group Techniques: Facilitated discussion with a selected group of stakeholders to gather opinions, attitudes, and ideas.
Functional Requirement Requirements: Behavior the solution must perform and information it must manage.
Future State General BA: The way the enterprise will operate after the change has been implemented.

G

Gap Analysis General BA: Comparison of current state and future state to identify capabilities that are missing or need to change.
GDPRGeneral Data Protection Regulation General BA: European Union regulation governing the protection of personal data and privacy.
Glossary Modeling: Collection of business terms with agreed definitions, used to ensure consistent understanding.
Governance Business & Strategy: The framework of decisions, accountability, and oversight that directs how an organization or initiative is run.
GUIGraphical User Interface General BA: Visual interface using elements like windows, icons, and buttons that allows users to interact with software.

H

Hybrid Process & Methodology: Combination of predictive (waterfall-style) and adaptive (agile) approaches tailored to an initiative.

I

IaaSInfrastructure as a Service General BA: Cloud service offering virtualized computing resources over the internet.
IIBAInternational Institute of Business Analysis BABOK Core: The professional association that maintains the BABOK Guide and the ECBA, CCBA, and CBAP certifications.
Implementation SMEImplementation Subject Matter Expert Roles: Stakeholder with expertise in the implementation of solution components, e.g., developers, architects, testers.
Incremental Development Process & Methodology: Approach in which a solution is delivered in successive pieces, each adding usable functionality.
Interview Techniques: Direct conversation, structured or unstructured, used to elicit information from a stakeholder.
INVESTINVEST Requirements: Quality criteria for user stories: Independent, Negotiable, Valuable, Estimable, Small, Testable.
IRRInternal Rate of Return Techniques: Discount rate at which the net present value of an investment's cash flows equals zero.
IRRInternal Rate of Return Business & Strategy: Discount rate that makes the net present value of all cash flows from a project equal to zero.
Issue General BA: A risk that has materialized or a current problem that requires action and tracking.
Item Tracking Techniques: Capturing and managing stakeholder concerns, issues, risks, action items, and decisions through to resolution.
Iterative Development Process & Methodology: Approach in which a solution is built and refined through repeated cycles of planning, building, and evaluating.
ITILITIL Process & Methodology: Information Technology Infrastructure Library — a framework of best practices for IT service management.
ITILInformation Technology Infrastructure Library Process & Methodology: Framework of best practices for IT service management (ITSM) across the service life cycle.

J

JTBDJobs To Be Done Business & Strategy: Framework describing what customers are trying to accomplish ('the job they hire a product to do'), independent of features.

K

KAKnowledge Area BABOK Core: A grouping of related BA tasks. BABOK v3 defines six knowledge areas, each containing a set of tasks.
Kanban Process & Methodology: Lean method that visualizes work on a board, limits work in progress, and manages flow.
KPIKey Performance Indicator Techniques: A measurable value that shows how effectively an objective is being achieved.
KPIKey Performance Indicator Business & Strategy: Quantifiable measure used to evaluate the success of an organization, team, or activity against a defined objective.
KRIKey Risk Indicator Data & Analytics: Metric used to signal increasing risk exposure in an activity, process, or organization.

L

Lean Process & Methodology: Philosophy and practices focused on maximizing customer value while minimizing waste.
Lean Process & Methodology: Management philosophy focused on maximizing customer value while minimizing waste across a value stream.
Lean Canvas Business & Strategy: Adaptation of the Business Model Canvas for startups, replacing partner/relationship blocks with problem, solution, key metrics, and unfair advantage.
Lessons Learned Techniques: Information gained from an initiative used to improve future performance.
Logical Data Model Data & Analytics: Detailed model of entities, attributes, keys, and relationships, independent of any specific database technology.

M

Market Analysis Techniques: Studying customers, competitors, and market conditions to inform decisions about products and services.
MDMMaster Data Management General BA: Discipline for defining and managing an organization's critical shared data to provide a single trusted view.
Milestone General BA: Significant point or event in a project, often marking completion of a major deliverable.
Mind Mapping Techniques: Visual diagram used to organize information around a central concept and explore relationships.
MLMachine Learning Data & Analytics: Branch of AI in which systems learn patterns from data to make predictions or decisions without being explicitly programmed.
MMPMinimum Marketable Product Process & Methodology: Smallest product that can be released to customers and generate value in the market.
Mockup Modeling: Higher-fidelity static design of a user interface showing visual style and content.
MoSCoWMust, Should, Could, Won't Techniques: Prioritization technique categorizing requirements as Must have, Should have, Could have, or Won't have this time.
MRRMonthly Recurring Revenue Business & Strategy: Normalised monthly value of subscription revenue, used widely in SaaS finance and product analytics.
MVPMinimum Viable Product Process & Methodology: Version of a product with just enough features to satisfy early users and validate learning.
MVPMinimum Viable Product General BA: Earliest version of a product with just enough features to validate key assumptions with real users.

N

NFRNon-Functional Requirement Requirements: Quality attribute or constraint such as performance, security, usability, reliability, or maintainability.
NoSQL Data & Analytics: Family of non-relational databases (document, key-value, column-family, graph) optimized for flexibility and scale.
NPSNet Promoter Score Business & Strategy: Customer-loyalty metric calculated from responses to: 'How likely are you to recommend us?' on a 0–10 scale.
NPVNet Present Value Techniques: Current value of expected future cash flows from an investment, discounted to today using a required rate of return.
NPVNet Present Value Business & Strategy: Present value of all future cash flows of an investment minus the initial cost, using a chosen discount rate.

O

Observation Techniques: Studying people performing work to understand processes, environments, and unstated needs. May be active or passive.
OKRObjectives and Key Results Business & Strategy: Goal-setting framework pairing a qualitative Objective with measurable Key Results that show progress toward it.
OLAOperational Level Agreement Techniques: Internal agreement between IT teams that supports delivery of an SLA to the customer.
OLAPOnline Analytical Processing General BA: Class of systems optimized for complex queries and multidimensional analysis of business data.
OLAPOnline Analytical Processing Data & Analytics: Class of systems optimized for complex analytical queries and multidimensional analysis of business data.
OLTPOnline Transaction Processing General BA: Class of systems optimized for managing transaction-oriented workloads such as order entry.
OLTPOnline Transaction Processing Data & Analytics: Class of systems optimized for high-volume, short transaction-oriented workloads such as order entry.
Operating Model Business & Strategy: Description of how an organization delivers value, integrating people, process, technology, data, and governance.
Operational Support Roles: Stakeholder group responsible for the day-to-day management and maintenance of the solution after deployment.
Organizational Modeling Modeling: Modeling of an organization's roles, responsibilities, and reporting structures.

P

PaaSPlatform as a Service General BA: Cloud service that provides a platform for developing, running, and managing applications.
Pain Point General BA: Specific problem or frustration experienced by a stakeholder that the solution aims to address.
Payback Period Techniques: Time required for an investment's cumulative cash inflows to equal its initial outlay.
PDCAPlan-Do-Check-Act Process & Methodology: Iterative four-step management method for the control and continuous improvement of processes and products.
Perspective BABOK Core: A view of business analysis used in a specific context. BABOK v3 defines five: Agile, Business Intelligence, Information Technology, Business Architecture, and Business Process Management.
PESTLEPolitical, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal, Environmental Techniques: Framework for analyzing macro-environmental factors affecting an organization. Variants include PEST and STEEPLE.
Physical Data Model Data & Analytics: Database-specific model showing tables, columns, data types, indexes, and constraints as they will be implemented.
PIIPersonally Identifiable Information General BA: Information that can be used on its own or with other data to identify an individual.
Planning Poker Techniques: Consensus-based estimation technique used in agile teams, often using a Fibonacci-like scale.
PMProject Manager Roles: Person responsible for planning, executing, monitoring, and closing a project within scope, time, and budget.
PMBOKProject Management Body of Knowledge Process & Methodology: PMI's standard for project management knowledge and practices.
PMBOKProject Management Body of Knowledge Process & Methodology: PMI's standard guide for project management practices, processes, and terminology.
PMIProject Management Institute Process & Methodology: Global professional association for project, programme, and portfolio managers; publisher of the PMBOK Guide and PMP credential.
PMPProject Management Professional Process & Methodology: Globally recognized PMI certification for experienced project managers.
POProduct Owner Roles: Scrum role accountable for maximizing product value and managing the product backlog.
PoCProof of Concept General BA: Small implementation built to demonstrate that an idea, technology, or approach is feasible.
POCProof of Concept Process & Methodology: Small exercise to verify that a concept, technology, or design is feasible.
Power/Interest Grid Techniques: Stakeholder analysis matrix that classifies stakeholders by their level of power and interest in the change.
Predictive Analytics Data & Analytics: Analytics that uses historical data and statistical or ML techniques to forecast likely future outcomes.
Prescriptive Analytics Data & Analytics: Analytics that recommends actions, often combining predictive models with optimisation or decision rules.
PRINCE2PRojects IN Controlled Environments Process & Methodology: Process-based project management methodology widely used in the UK public sector and globally.
Process Map Modeling: Visual representation of the steps, actors, and decisions in a business process.
Product Backlog Process & Methodology: Ordered list of everything that might be needed in the product, owned by the Product Owner.
Product Manager Roles: Role responsible for the strategy, roadmap, and feature definition of a product over its life cycle.
Prototyping Techniques: Building an early model of a solution to elicit, validate, and refine requirements.
Pseudonymisation Data & Analytics: Replacing identifying fields with reversible tokens so data can be processed without exposing identity.

Q

QAQuality Assurance Process & Methodology: Process-oriented activities ensuring that the methods used to deliver products are effective and produce quality outcomes.
QCQuality Control Process & Methodology: Product-oriented activities focused on identifying defects in deliverables.

R

RACIResponsible, Accountable, Consulted, Informed Techniques: Responsibility assignment matrix mapping each task or decision to one Accountable party and one or more Responsible, Consulted, and Informed roles.
RADDRequirements Analysis and Design Definition BABOK Core: Knowledge area abbreviation (KA 5) covering specifying and modeling requirements, verifying and validating them, and defining design options. Heaviest ECBA weighting (~30%).
RCARoot Cause Analysis Techniques: Method to identify the underlying cause of a problem rather than its symptoms. Common tools: 5 Whys, Fishbone diagram.
Regression Testing Process & Methodology: Re-testing of unchanged areas of a solution to ensure existing functionality still works after changes.
Regulator Roles: Stakeholder responsible for defining and enforcing standards or rules that the solution must comply with.
Requirement Requirements: A usable representation of a need, focused on understanding what kind of value could be delivered if the requirement is fulfilled.
Requirements Analysis and Design Definition BABOK Core: The knowledge area for structuring, specifying, modeling, validating, and recommending solution options. Carries the highest ECBA weighting.
Requirements Life Cycle Management BABOK Core: The knowledge area for managing and maintaining requirements and design information from inception through retirement.
Retrospective Process & Methodology: Scrum event where the team reflects on the past sprint and identifies improvements for the next one.
RFIRequest for Information Process & Methodology: Document used to gather general information about vendor capabilities before issuing an RFP.
RFPRequest for Proposal Process & Methodology: Document soliciting proposals from vendors for a product or service, with selection criteria.
RFQRequest for Quotation Process & Methodology: Document inviting vendors to bid prices on specified products or services.
Risk General BA: Uncertain event or condition that, if it occurs, has a positive or negative effect on objectives.
Risk Analysis and Management Techniques: Identifying, assessing, and treating uncertainties that may affect outcomes.
RLCMRequirements Life Cycle Management BABOK Core: Knowledge area abbreviation (KA 3) for managing requirements and designs from inception through retirement, including tracing, prioritizing, and approving.
RLMRequirements Life Cycle Management BABOK Core: Common short form for Requirements Life Cycle Management (KA 3). Same knowledge area as RLCM.
ROIReturn on Investment Techniques: Ratio measuring financial return relative to the cost of an investment, expressed as a percentage.
ROIReturn on Investment Business & Strategy: Ratio of net benefit to cost, expressed as a percentage, used to compare the efficiency of investments.
Roles and Permissions Matrix Modeling: Matrix that maps user roles to the actions or data they are allowed to access.
RTMRequirements Traceability Matrix Requirements: A grid linking requirements to their origin, related requirements, design elements, and the test cases that verify them.

S

SAStrategy Analysis BABOK Core: Knowledge area abbreviation (KA 4) for identifying business need, assessing capabilities, and defining the change strategy.
SaaSSoftware as a Service General BA: Software licensing and delivery model in which software is hosted centrally and accessed over the internet.
SAMServiceable Available Market Business & Strategy: Portion of the TAM that a company's products and services can realistically serve.
SCDSlowly Changing Dimension Data & Analytics: Pattern for handling changes to dimension attributes over time (Type 1 overwrite, Type 2 history, Type 3 limited history).
Schema Data & Analytics: Formal definition of the structure of data, including tables, fields, types, and relationships.
Scope General BA: The boundaries of what a solution, product, or project will and will not include.
Scope Creep General BA: Uncontrolled expansion of scope without corresponding adjustments to time, cost, or resources.
Scope Modeling Modeling: Techniques such as context diagrams or feature lists used to define solution and project boundaries.
Scrum Process & Methodology: Lightweight agile framework with defined roles (Product Owner, Scrum Master, Developers), events, and artifacts, organized into sprints.
Scrum Master Roles: Scrum role that serves the team by removing impediments and ensuring Scrum is understood and enacted.
SCVSingle Customer View Data & Analytics: Consolidated, consistent record of all data an organization holds about an individual customer.
SDLCSoftware Development Life Cycle Process & Methodology: Structured process used to plan, design, build, test, deploy, and maintain software.
SDLCSoftware Development Life Cycle Process & Methodology: Structured process for planning, building, testing, deploying, and maintaining software, with stages such as requirements, design, implementation, verification, and maintenance.
SESolution Evaluation BABOK Core: Knowledge area abbreviation (KA 6) for assessing solution performance and value and recommending improvements.
Sequence Diagram Modeling: UML diagram that shows how objects interact over time through ordered messages.
Service Blueprint Modeling: Diagram extending a customer journey with the front-stage, back-stage, and supporting processes that deliver the service.
SITSystem Integration Testing Process & Methodology: Testing performed to verify that integrated components or systems interact correctly.
Six Sigma Process & Methodology: Data-driven methodology for reducing process variation and defects, often using the DMAIC improvement cycle.
SLAService Level Agreement Techniques: Formal agreement defining the expected level of service between a provider and a consumer, including metrics and remedies.
SLAService-Level Agreement Business & Strategy: Formal commitment between a service provider and customer specifying performance metrics and remedies if missed.
SLIService-Level Indicator Business & Strategy: A measured value of a service attribute (e.g. latency, uptime) compared against the SLO and SLA.
SLOService Level Objective General BA: Specific measurable target for a service attribute, supporting the broader SLA.
SMARTSpecific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound Techniques: Criteria for writing clear, actionable objectives or goals.
SMESubject Matter Expert Roles: Individual with deep, specialized knowledge of a domain, process, product, or system.
Snowflake Schema Data & Analytics: Variation of the star schema where dimension tables are normalized into multiple related tables.
SOAService-Oriented Architecture General BA: Architectural style in which services are provided to other components over a network through standard interfaces.
Solution Evaluation BABOK Core: The knowledge area covering tasks to assess solution performance and value, and recommend ways to increase value.
Solution Requirement Requirements: Capabilities and qualities of a solution that meet stakeholder requirements. Split into functional and non-functional.
Solution Scope General BA: The set of capabilities a solution must deliver to meet the business need.
SOMServiceable Obtainable Market Business & Strategy: Realistic share of the SAM a business can capture in the short to medium term.
SOWStatement of Work Process & Methodology: Document defining the activities, deliverables, timelines, and acceptance criteria for project work.
Spiral Model Process & Methodology: Risk-driven life cycle that combines iterative development with the systematic aspects of waterfall.
Sponsor Roles: The stakeholder who authorizes the change and provides resources, funding, and high-level direction.
Sprint Process & Methodology: Time-boxed iteration in Scrum, typically 1–4 weeks, that produces a potentially releasable increment.
Sprint Backlog Process & Methodology: Set of product backlog items selected for a sprint, plus the plan to deliver them.
Sprint Planning Process & Methodology: Scrum event at the start of a sprint where the team plans the work to be performed.
Sprint Review Process & Methodology: Scrum event at the end of a sprint where the increment is inspected with stakeholders.
SQLStructured Query Language Data & Analytics: Standard language for querying, manipulating, and managing data in relational databases.
SRESite Reliability Engineering Process & Methodology: Discipline applying software engineering practices to operations problems, balancing reliability with feature velocity through SLOs and error budgets.
SSOTSingle Source of Truth General BA: Practice of structuring information so that every data element is stored exactly once in an authoritative location.
Stakeholder General BA: Any individual or group affected by, or who can affect, the change, the need, or the solution.
Stakeholder Analysis Techniques: Identifying and assessing stakeholders by attributes such as influence, interest, attitude, and authority.
Stakeholder List, Map, or Personas Techniques: Tools used to record stakeholders, visualize their relationships, and represent typical user types.
Stakeholder Requirement Requirements: Needs of a stakeholder or stakeholder group that must be met to achieve a business requirement.
Star Schema Data & Analytics: Dimensional modeling pattern with a central fact table connected to descriptive dimension tables.
State Diagram Modeling: Diagram showing the states an object can be in and the events that cause transitions between them.
Story Points Techniques: Unitless measure of relative effort, complexity, and risk used to size user stories in agile.
Strategy Analysis BABOK Core: The knowledge area focused on identifying business need, gaps in current capabilities, and the change strategy to reach a future state.
Supplier Roles: External stakeholder who provides products or services to the organization.
Survey or Questionnaire Techniques: Set of written questions used to elicit information from a large group of stakeholders.
Swimlane Diagram Modeling: Process diagram that uses lanes to show which actor or system is responsible for each step.
SWOTStrengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats Techniques: Strategic analysis framework evaluating internal strengths and weaknesses, and external opportunities and threats.

T

TAMTotal Addressable Market Business & Strategy: Total revenue opportunity available if a product or service achieved 100% market share.
TCOTotal Cost of Ownership General BA: Estimate of all direct and indirect costs of acquiring and operating a system over its life cycle.
Tester Roles: Stakeholder responsible for verifying that the solution meets requirements and quality standards.
Three Amigos General BA: Practice of bringing together a business representative, developer, and tester to discuss and clarify a story before development.
Three-Point Estimation Techniques: Estimation using optimistic, most likely, and pessimistic values to derive a weighted average.
To-Be General BA: Description or model of the desired future state of a process, system, or organization.
TOCTheory of Constraints Process & Methodology: Management paradigm that views any system as limited by a small number of constraints and focuses improvement on identifying and elevating them.
TOMTarget Operating Model Business & Strategy: The desired future-state operating model that supports a strategic change.
Transition Requirement Requirements: Temporary capability needed only to move from current to future state, e.g., data migration, training, or parallel running.
Transition State General BA: Intermediate state between current and future state during the change.

U

UATUser Acceptance Testing Process & Methodology: Final testing performed by end users to validate that the solution meets their business needs.
UIUser Interface General BA: The visual and interactive elements through which a user interacts with a product.
UMLUnified Modeling Language Modeling: Standardized general-purpose modeling language used to specify, visualize, and document software systems.
UMLUnified Modeling Language Modeling: OMG-standard family of diagrams for specifying, visualising, and documenting software-intensive systems.
Underlying Competencies BABOK Core: Behaviors, characteristics, knowledge, and personal qualities supporting the practice of business analysis (per BABOK v3).
Unit Testing Process & Methodology: Testing of individual code units in isolation, typically performed by developers.
Use Case Requirements: Description of the interactions between an actor and a system to achieve a goal, including main and alternate flows.
Use Case Diagram Modeling: UML diagram that shows actors, use cases, and their relationships within a system boundary.
User Story Requirements: Short description of functionality from a user's perspective, typically: As a <role>, I want <goal>, so that <benefit>.
UXUser Experience General BA: The overall experience a person has when interacting with a product, system, or service.

V

V-Model Process & Methodology: Variation of waterfall in which each development phase has a corresponding testing phase, drawn as a V.
Validated Requirement Requirements: A requirement confirmed to deliver business value and meet a stakeholder need (built the right thing).
Value Proposition Business & Strategy: Clear statement of the benefits a product or service delivers to a customer segment, and why it is better than alternatives.
Value Stream Business & Strategy: End-to-end set of activities that delivers a specific result of value to a stakeholder, used in lean and business architecture.
Velocity Process & Methodology: Average amount of work (often in story points) a Scrum team completes per sprint, used for forecasting.
Verified Requirement Requirements: A requirement confirmed to be well-formed, clear, and of high quality (built right).
VoCVoice of the Customer Business & Strategy: Structured collection of customers' explicit and implicit needs, expectations, and preferences.

W

Waterfall Process & Methodology: Sequential SDLC model where each phase (requirements, design, build, test, deploy) is completed before the next begins.
Waterfall Process & Methodology: Sequential project life cycle in which each phase (requirements, design, build, test, deploy) is completed before the next begins.
WBSWork Breakdown Structure Process & Methodology: Hierarchical decomposition of project work into manageable deliverables and work packages.
Wireframe Modeling: Low-fidelity sketch of a user interface layout focused on structure and content placement.
Workaround General BA: Temporary or alternative method of achieving a task when the standard approach is unavailable or inadequate.
Workshop Techniques: Structured working session with stakeholders to elicit, refine, model, or validate requirements.