Mark 12:41-44
Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins,j worth only a fraction of a penny. Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.”

As the threats to Jesus increase and the attacks of the Pharisees and Sadducees get worse, Jesus continues to patiently teach his disciples rather than being stressed about the terrible things that are to come. What’s most amazing is that Jesus knew exactly what would happen and rather than avoiding the horrid betrayal and crucifixion, he is focussed on sharing the gospel, saving as many souls and clarifying the reality of what God wants for man. This observation he makes of the poor widow is again such a wonderful reminder about the fact that God looks at our hearts not the outward appearances we make.

We are often reminded by Jesus that he doesn’t want us to speak “Churchinese” or “Act holy” or make gestures that show we are Christian in Church specially when we don’t mean it. When we are faced with the world, what’s in our hearts shows in our way of dealing with non-Christians and our lives are a reflection of our hearts. The old widow gave all she had to tell God that her trust was completely on God whereas we will count our pennies and give what we think is right. If that’s our attitude, it will be so even when we serve God and show our love to the lost. What God wants of us is our everything, not just measured portions. If we truly understand the sacrifice God made for us, we will know that our everything will not add up to a fraction of what the Lord has done for us. Lets not count the pennies and count the cost but consider it pure joy to submit our lives to our Lord and Savior and glorify him shamelessly. He will reward us in his time and take care of our every need.

In His Loving Service,
Vineet

PS: Visit http://groups.google.com/group/in-his-loving-service to read the archives or subscribe to the daily devotionals

Nature's Perfect Mirror

Both are needed for Freedom.

It's cold in the desert.

All those movies, have in some way come true.

Needles, California. Population 5246. It is here where you see the real America.

A quiet, small town on the bank of the Colorado river, where it’s cool in the winter but blistering hot in the summer. A town on the edge of time, as driving over the river makes you lose an hour, jumping into another time zone. People living on different sides of the river constantly have to be sure whether they are talking about their time, or your time.

A man asks a woman out on a date. Sure, she says. I’ll pick you up at 7, he says and she smiles. The next Friday he comes to pick her up but doesn’t realize that they don’t live in the same timezone, picking her up an hour late.

The old Route 66 goes right through Needles, a homage to older times where the west was the promised land. Highways and interstates later, fewer people drive through Route 66. Nobody wants to drive over mountains and through small quaint towns like Needles on their way to the ocean. They want their land of opportunities now! With fries and an ocean view.

Needles is  a one bar town, and the bar happens to be the dive bar of dive bars. It’s the type of bar where you wait while the waitress finishes singing her karaoke song of choice before she stumbles back to serve you, her crooked gap-toothed smile equally terrifying as the crazy lady next to you trying to make conversation.

There’s a small town mentality to people here, I’ve been told. People don’t leave Needles, and therefore think, that everything they do, however minuscule it is, is the cat’s pajamas. People think they are the coolest, although they couldn’t recognize coolness and beauty if it stared them in the face. Kids in their early adulthood who don’t go to college get stuck here, making a name for themselves. A name that would probably get flushed down the toilet in a big city world.

Which reminds me a little bit of Iceland. We have a tendency to think that everything we do is the shit. We are trendsetters and suave in every way. In our little country. Here in Needles, and in other small towns it’s called getting out of the town, or escaping for the big city. In Iceland, it’s called getting off the island. People in Iceland like to think that they’re inventive, creative and cool. And maybe, in some way, they are. But just like the cool Needles kid that think he’s the shit, our trendy coolness gets lost down the drain of the big bad world.

I used to think I was fairly intelligent and knew enough to get me far. And maybe, in some way, I still do. But now I have been exposed to things, people and mentalities that beg to differ. There’s a lot of things you can get away with in a small town bubble, but when you expand that bubble, you have to expand yourself. Push the envelope, educate yourself.

There’s a Small Town U.S.A. mentality in all of us. A calm comfort zone that says it’s OK to slow down and get stale. It’s the ones that beat the comfort zone and don’t get swept into the arms of mediocrity that succeed.

There’s a Small Town U.S.A. mentality in all of us. You just have to rise above and beat it, don’t keep on waiting on the world to change.

There he is. Old guy, flat cap, holding in his hand a walking stick. Why I think to myself is he not using it? Surely if he has cause to own said stick, then it would make his journey along the street far easier? This I ponder as the man veers off in a diagonal direction, seemingly unaware of his altered path. Maybe he is biding his time…. making himself walk father than necessary to make the arrival all the sweeter? Possibly he is one of these visionaries we seldom see – He has decided that He’s not going to walk like the mass, He’s going to be truly individual. That doesn’t quite sit right. The question then remains, is He drunk? Or does He have one leg longer than the other?

As I was walking past a building, I noticed this poster from an atheist society :

GOOD LUCK !!!!!!

Clover Bun1460 14-Inch Color Quad Observation System With 4-Channel Digital Video Recorder Review

Check Price Now!

Clover Bun1460 14-Inch Color Quad Observation System With 4-Channel Digital Video Recorder Feature

• Twin Pack Of Cameras
• High-Resolution Image With 480 Lines
• Stand-By Power Mode
• Triplex Dvr With 80 Gb Hard Drive For Recording Up To 140 Days
• 720 X 480 Recording Resolution With Event

Clover Bun1460 14-Inch Color Quad Observation System With 4-Channel Digital Video Recorder Overview

Observation system for home and workplace safety and security. Includes 14in. color slave monitor with 460 TV lines of resolution and 4-channel digital video recorder with 80 GB hard drive.

Clover Bun1460 14-Inch Color Quad Observation System With 4-Channel Digital Video Recorder Specifications

Clover BUN1460

*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Nov 27, 2009 05:10:03

32inch lcd hdtv

I think I must go shopping one of these days. But I have no list to refer to. Of course, eventually, once I land up in a shop that appeals to me, I will buy things, but it helps to have a list initially. That way you don’t veer too much off the cuff and stay well within never mind that you have have spent at least a thousand bucks more than what you promised yourself to.

So let me see what am I going to buy. Underwear? Well, I have a bag full of them – in nearly all shapes and sizes. The one that isn’t included as yet is the g-string. But that will enter the undie bag  soon. Perhaps, I’ll look for this.

Then of course, I think I need a new pair of tight blue jeans. The one I had ripped itself apart near the thigh and Mother, being the puritan that she is, promptly relegated it to the dustbin – without my knowledge. Of course, I don’t know where it is. I am presuming she has thrown it in the bin. She always does. Well, let me ask her today. That asking is going to cost me a lot of lung power but ask I will.

So apart from these, what else? A phone perhaps. The Samsung Corby touchscreen phone. Oh I love the way it looks and I love its sleek smart style. But it’s 8000 bucks and I have promised myself to be stingy in these times of recession.

Okay, that gets struck off the list.  So underwear and jeans. You, my dear reader, may think me to be sleazy for such a short sexy list. But really, this is all I think I need to buy.

Oh how can I forget! I need trousers too. I hardly have a pair to wear to office. Yes, I must add that too.

Ah, that makes the list look rather decent now, doesn’t it?:)

My back’s aching – not aching actually,  scratching. Not even scratching; it’s itching, but slightly. It’s not as if I have to tear down my clothes and rip through the itching area. My back never allows me to do so nor does it give me a chance to do so either.

I was thinking about the times I spent with my ex-boyfriend (Harry). Oh he did not scratch my back, but he did excite me no end. I was so happy being with him. Of course, had it not been for my break-up before I met Harry, I would have still been with him. I broke up with Harry because I realized I wasn’t over the ass I had dated before him.

Today, as I sat in the bus and listened to a Philharmonic Orchestra playing Christmas carols, I began to drift back in time to the days Harry and I were dating. We would meet at places in Bandra and we did coochie-coo like rabbits.

Sigh! I miss intimacy. I miss it like hell. It’s the one thing that I hankered after for so long and when it did come my way, because I was in a skewed state of mind, I dumped it and how! I called Harry and broke up with him on the phone!

Silly of me, really, but then I have reason to say that this is just one of the numerous silly deeds I have participated in in the 30 years of my life here on Earth.

Found this in my email this morning from Wayne. It was attributed to a London Times article but I’ve learned it was originally from 98 from an Indianapolis newspaper. Still rings true, if not more so, today. Read on.

‘Today we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend, Common Sense, who has been with us for many years. No one knows for sure how old he was, since his birth records were long ago lost in bureaucratic red tape. He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons as: Knowing when to come in out of the rain; why the early bird gets theworm; Life isn’t always fair; and maybe it was my fault.

Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies (don’t spend morethan you can earn) and reliable strategies (adults, not children, are incharge). His health began to deteriorate rapidly when well-intentioned but overbearing regulations were set in place. Reports of a 6-year-old boy charged with sexual harassment for kissing a classmate; teens suspended from school for using mouthwash after lunch; and a teacher fired for reprimanding an unruly student, only worsened his condition.

Common Sense lost ground when parents attacked teachers for doing the job that they themselves had failed to do in disciplining their unruly children. It declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer sun lotion or an Elastoplast to a student; but could not inform parents when a student became pregnant and wanted to have an abortion.

Common Sense lost the will to live as the Ten Commandments became contraband; churches became businesses; and criminals received better treatment than their victims.

Common Sense took a beating when you couldn’t defend yourself from a burglar in your own home and the burglar could sue you for assault. Common Sense finally gave up the will to live, after a woman failed to realize that a steaming cup of coffee was hot. She spilled a little in her lap, and was promptly awarded a huge settlement.

Common Sense was preceded in death by his parents, Truth and Trust; his wife, Discretion; his daughter, Responsibility; and his son, Reason. He is survived by his 4 stepbrothers; I Know My Rights, I Want It Now, Someone Else Is To Blame, and I’m A Victim.

Not many attended his funeral because so few realized he was gone. If you still remember him, pass this on. If not, join the majority and do nothing.

It is Thanksgiving. I know you knew that, but I had to start somewhere.

Visions of turkeys at my grandmother’s house get stronger as the smells from the kitchen grow stronger.

We sometimes had Thanksgiving at the homes of other relatives, but I only remember the ones at Nana’s. Heaping bowls of buttery mashed potatoes, tureens of gravy, piles of fresh rolls, casseroles of one kind or another involving green vegetables and thus suitable to be ignored by boys of a certain age.

In the center, of course, would loom the turkeys.

To a kid my age, they were always enormous, a wall of poultry, steaming, savory, the epitome of temptation.

OK, this was before puberty, and my range of temptations was still fairly narrow. But still. Oh. My. God.

I am feel more fondly now of toward some of the people at that table, looking back, than I did then. For one thing, most of them are dead, and it seems unkind to feel otherwise.

It was the usual mix: Mom and Dad, my brother, my grandmother, resigned and unhappy, her own mother, sour, mean of eye and the reason for the dispirited expression in Nana’s face. Assorted other relatives filled the chairs. The older I get, the less distinct their faces become.

They were possessed of the usual hodge-podge of human frailties and strengths, drawn by accidents of birth and a circled date on the calendar to sit down at a feast of gratitude.

Thanksgiving is an ancient word, and an older concept, giving praise to whatever deity you worship for what you have been given. Not that we are required to worship a deity to be grateful. This has long troubled me as a practical atheist. I finally decided it was perfectly logical to feel gratitude for simply being lucky as hell, or at least luckier than you likely deserve.

In a little while I will close this laptop and join a dozen other people at a table groaning with two turkeys and all the accompanying glories of excess, as three dogs roam around the table like religious pilgrims, seeking epiphanies.

It does not take a flash of comprehension for me to know how very lucky I am. I have people who, mysteriously, both know and like me, despite my obvious failings. I have never known serious hunger, been homeless, or suffered many of the insults to self-respect that human culture can pile on. I am in frequent contact with truly amazing people.

Yes, I could win a big lottery. Against all common sense and my own advice, I sometimes buy a ticket, because, well, you never know. But I’m really fine without it. I’m lucky, and I know it, through no effort or grace of my own. How did it happen?

Beats the hell out of me.

Happy Thanksgiving.

==============================.

© 2009 Marsh Creek Media, Gettysburg, Pa.

Burger to Go” is a product of me and my company, Marsh Creek Media and, as such, I am solely responsible for its content.

Check out the two “Burger to Go” blogsites:

http://burger2go.wordpress.com/

http://burger2goclassics.wordpress.com/

Meagan paints some holiday art on Thanksgiving Day.

My original goal was to limit this blog to writing about the South and Southern literature, but I’m easing that restriction on myself. This blog will be my general outlet for creativity in general. It will include my photography and other types of work, too.

I hope by easing the parameters I set for myself I will actually post something here for you to read. I also hope that you enjoy the direction I’m taking this blog.

so many things in one day! first, in the afternoon, i visit my friends at the university campus. i find out how my friend, a young lady, is playing with her boyfriend’s emotion. She knows that he cares about her but, she wants to make sure that he is fully attentive and committed to her. So i realise how some women are never satisfied with their lives and love.

and then, after spending some unproductive hours by the rifles lake at Dhanmondi I go to my workplace. spend some more unproductive hours as it ought to be a day before the holidays begin for eid. and then I go and pick my friend from his home and together we go to a&w. burgers are nowadays called papas and grand papas or so we learn.

as evening calls for late evening, we ride our way to banani to get some new movies as they happen to be my ass-like-friend’s lifeblood or sleeping pill. oh and i also learn that there happens to be something called a sleeper cell in your brain that has to do with hypnotising and programming your brain in certain ways.

everyone seems to be on a very good mood or more on ripping-off mood. everywhere i park my bike, the guard offers a rather too polite greeting. which basically calls for sparing five to ten bucks at the least. while that strikes my mind, it had to be on the same day and right on the moment of rush as i prepare to leave the city for holiday that my bike’s tyre punctures on the street. what a way to add pain in life.

my ass-like-friend, had to leave. and so at banani, where there is no workshop having the expertise to repair my scooter, i basically had to wait for my mechanic to come all the way from katabon. now that calls for an additional, uncalled, unanticipated 140 bucks. thank god the road was banani 11. at least i could find places to fill my stomach with some delicacies like the club gelato ice cream.

i call my friend rafi bluffing him that i came to visit him. but that didn’t work to bring him to meet me. he was in gulshan. so after wasting some more unproductive hours, i returned to the place i parked my bike. the security guard there, a young lad tells me how i caused him trouble by parking my bike at his place. now everyone, including the guard next to him knew how lame his excuse was. that place was a parking space. parking a bike doesn’t trouble anyone there. and as i tell him open and loud that i know he wants some tips before the eid and this is not the way to approach, he feels embarrassed.

but the day doesn’t end there. my friend who earlier left me on the street had returned, not out of concern for me but because he had a fight with his wife. and so i am taken back to the old philosophy that i began my day with. women are never satisfied with their lives. there’s no point in going into the details of what happened but then impartially speaking, he did make some sense. i am not the kind, who will take his friend’s side without critiquing him. i brought the defence for his wife but unfortunately i couldn’t quite protect her with the logic he provided for his prosecution.

anyways, on my way home i see cows travelling on motor vehicles and i say  ‘desh egiye jachhe…ajkal garite korey goru jai’ for there was once the cows that pulled the carts. they have earned the comforts for themselves with the development of civilisation.

but the day doesn’t end there. just before i make home completely finishing everything for the day i learn yet another lesson. this is in fact the biggest one. it’s a pity that most of us, the normal human beings are at worse state than those who are impaired. to ground that note, i find a blind man making his steps carefully so that he doesn’t bump into anyone or anything and a perfect man with no impairment bumping into the blind man. what a contrast!

Happy Thanksgiving folks!!

This is absolutely my most favourite holiday and yet again not able to celebrate it in a style to which I’d like to become accustomed.

Me, I’m thankful for more stuff than you could ever imagine.

Friends, health, senses (the average 5, common and humour included), the divine …

Thankful for my ukes and being able to bash away at them, warbling into the ether.

Recently had an unexpected visit from some folk. They dealt with the state of the house and the state of me, offering good chat and admirable ukulele “stylings”.

Monday night we had the chance to learn “Teenage Kicks” at the Ukearist gathering. Thanks G!

So much more to be thankful for, but preparing for yet another trip …

More on that in future….

Happy Thanksgiving folks!!

This is absolutely my most favourite holiday and yet again not able to celebrate it in a style to which I’d like to become accustomed.

Me, I’m thankful for more stuff than you could ever imagine.

Friends, health, senses (the average 5, common and humour included), the divine …

Thankful for my ukes and being able to bash away at them, warbling into the ether.

Recently had an unexpected visit from some folk. They dealt with the state of the house and the state of me, offering good chat and admirable ukulele “stylings”.

Monday night we had the chance to learn “Teenage Kicks” at the Ukearist gathering. Thanks G!

So much more to be thankful for, but preparing for yet another trip …

More on that in future….

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, why oh why won’t Lucasarts make Star Wars Battlefront 3? With the enormous success of the series, it’s sure to sell millions of copies, and bring welcome relief to a Star Wars fanbase desperate for a return to the classic gaming of the series (especially after the lukewarm The Force Unleashed).

So, here’s hoping this announcement is the beginning of a good thing, here’s hoping that this means Lucasarts has finally started listening to its fans (like me) and is going to announce the next Battlefront.  (Otherwise, I’d settle for Knights of the Old Republic 3, or even Republic Commando 2. But if it’s Super Bombad Racing 2, I’ll not be happy. Take note George!)

Here’s the teaser, which doesn’t give much away:

Take notice of these two picture stills. One shows Luke Skywalker, apparently on Hoth, wielding his lightsaber- much like the Hoth battles of Battlefront 2, but with vastly improved graphics. The other shows a section of cutscene I’m not familiar with, but which bears a resemblance to cutscenes leaked onto the internet last year, allegedly from Battlefront 2’s single player.

Luke Skywalker, possibly on Hoth - and looking a lot like his Battlefront 2 counterpart...

Three stormtroopers on patrol, right before they get blown up.

Am I right or wrong? Watch this space!

Mother likes the fact that we – as a family – are know as a gentle educated family. She hates it if people think otherwise.

I think everyone ought to know we are all anything but gentle all of the time with each other. Of course, we are educated: I have a degree in Computer Engineering and my sister displays her Masters Degree in Statistics with the air of a conjurer who has just made the whole world disappear. Mother too is a double graduate and Father is well-versed in printing technologies. Well, Father doesn’t have a degree; it’s a diploma he earned. But then at least he earned that. I know of Fathers who have merely earned rotten abuses because of their alcoholic habits – My Father has none of those habits.

So, we are educated, but we cannot spend an evening without a quarrel. We argue and we do storm out of the venue of the conversation, but come a knock on the door, we morph into the most amiable family you have ever come across. We are all smiles and we will go out of our way to ensure that you think that there’s not a split in the seams formed by us being stitched together.

But come sometime unannounced and invisible to visit us and you will see what we actually are.

Mother dreads this being discovered and so, always ensures we never quarrel outside the house. Father does make a wan face and at times spoils it so bad, we have difficulty figuring out whether he is thinking or is just in a bad mood.

Well, Mother hates it when he makes those faces but she cannot do anything about it. So, she pretends to assume that no one will notice them and sallies forth as if her family were the best in the world.

I have told so many times to get rid of this best-family title that she so assiduously sticks to. But no, she never will.

Mothers! I think they are born to nurture and born to care. But I also think they are born stubborn!

Oh Lord! I am yawning. I am that tired sitting without a thing to do. Well, yes there is stuff to do but it’s not as if the world will sue me if I don’t do it all today.

Seriously, I think I must think my way out of this. Either that or a handsome company must offer me the handsomest job of my life!

I am bored. And I definitely need another job. But where the hell are the jobs? Either the agencies call, ask for my resume, and then evaporate into oblivion or I e-mail my resume to e-mail addresses, wait for weeks, and then let my hope evaporate into oblivion.

Oh I am a good employee. I don’t mind boasting about that. And I do my work with sincerity that I find lacking in my colleagues.

Yet, with such a respectable reputation, I cannot land up with a new job! It’s so annoying – not to mention humiliating too.

Well, I am overreacting – I know. But tell me, who wouldn’t if they were fed up to the teeth with what they are into right now?!

Since I decided to start this blog, one of the thoughts that keeps popping through my head is ‘Should I start reviewing games?’, and I’m torn about how to answer myself. It would appear that the only way for me to be shut up is by asking myself difficult questions. Who’d have thunk it? As you’ll have noticed throughout the blog, I haven’t written any reviews about anything. Usually, I drop hints about what I’m currently playing. I’ve had many an internal argument about whether I should up my game a bit and start to review them.

Of course, one of the great reasons why I should do it is that it means I start to pay attention to what I’m doing. I could even start taking notes while playing, and pretend I was a professional. No longer will I be playing through a game and forget what the opening was about. An awful lot of the time, I just sit there and play while on autopilot. It’s similar to the ideology behind Chaos style games (Prototype being the closest example I can think of). These games are just about causing mayhem, and you don’t even need to keep track of what you doing. So it would make sense to start to keep track. If I was being particularly egotistical (Or desperate) I could also mention that it would be a way of convincing myself I’m doing a public service and thus people might come and read my blog.

However, the reason I’ve stuck with it, is that I’m an amateur blogger. I’m not on any mailing lists, and I sure as hell don’t get games for free. If I review a game, it’s going to be a game I own. I’m not going to download them illegally, since thats both a)illegal and b)time consuming. And that there is the nub of the matter. If I review a game, it’s going to be one that I’ve decided to part money with, and thus I already think its going to be good. I believe that a games reviewer shouldn’t have already decided that a game is good/bad. The only time that the review will be the opposite is if it turns out its unexpectedly good or shockingly bad. Thus, I still won’t be doing reviews. I will continue doing my random thoughts on the games I’m playing, but I won’t review anything.

Writing can be hard.

Sometimes an idea comes and you can ’stream of consciousness’ it straight out. It can be as simple as opening a window and letting it in.

Of course then there are times when there isn’t an idea and it can be hard to get going. So prevalent and legendary this that it has a name and legend all of its own. Defined as it is. Writer’s block.

The concept is extended across mediums and the artists indulged further. As long as you are writing something creative you are covered. Or are you?

What about worker’s block?

It is a question I have thought about a bit having long since sold my soul, abandoning previous artistic incarnations for wage slavery.

There can be days in the working environment where things are not forthcoming. No inspiration. No flow. Nothing.

Can I not even claim writer’s block when writing for work? Some of the project documentation and proposals I have produced are about as creative as anything I have ever otherwise excreted.

But of course in the professional environment there is no chance of pleading ‘blockage’.

It doesn’t wash.

The best out you can hope for is some solid procrastination, a limp excuse and to live to fight another day.

Still, we need to know. I know what I shall testify next time.

I recently created a post on a BA’s role on agile projects. The essential message was, simply, that there is no BA role. There’s also no PM role either. However, both disciplines have an immense number of skills that are incredibly valuable in agile projects.

Sprint Zero

• Identifying users: Understanding who to talk to and who the prioritised feature sets and requirements represents if the first skill needed on an agile project. A BAs skills in stakeholder segmentation is the perfect starting point as is documenting them as personas.
• Collecting user needs described on story cards: BAs have a great number of skills in eliciting requirements. In Sprint Zero all that is required is documentation as a story card:”As a [role] I need to [activity] in order to [outcome]“This gives you great traceability throughout the project because everything as to tie into enabling the user to undertake the activity and give them the outcome they seek.

Articulating the skinny solution

• Prioritisation of requirements: What requirements are more important than others?  BAs have skills in negotiation, liaison, workshop organisation and execution. Pair a BA with an Information Architect (IA) or user-experience designer (UXD) and you get a good idea of the prioritisation of their needs and how they need to be articulated during the iteration phases as complete feature sets. Remember it’s not about having mandatory, desirable, etc. Instead, agile requirements are listed in priority order with a minimum set — the things we can’t do without — forming the skinny solution.This is where the BAs skills are essentially lacking because it’s more in the province of cognitive and behavioural psychology. The skinny system reflects users’ hygiene factors.Pair a BA with an IA, however, and the way to elicit the hygiene factors will become clear.

Planning an iteration

• Work estimation and benchmarking: What is the team going to produce? What skills are required? What activities will be done in this iteration? How long will elicitation and validation tasks take? These are all questions that BAs because of their ongoing involvement in projects are readily able to answer.I like to ensure that I’ve got a wiki handy to note the aspects of the estimation so that I can change the estimation into a benchmark once the work has been completed. Over time, this becomes a valuable knowledge tool because I can simply say “when we last did it, it took [this long]“
• Risk analysis: While doing work it’s the job of all team members to understand issues and risks as they arise and communicate them to the team’s leader, Sensei or Product Owner. The ability, therefore, to analyse on the fly is vital to the team and a skill that BAs have in spades.I find that differentiating between a fear and a risk is the hardest thing for peope to grasp. People often fear that something will eventuate, but when you start to boil things down into hard facts abouta) the impact the issue will have, and

  b) the actual likelihood of occurence (based on research) then fears can rapidly vanish when also paired with constant communication from standup meetings.

  In this way, the BAs skills are best applied in the Roshi, Scrum Master or Project Lead roles.

Understanding the context

• Elicitation and observation: Analysing how people work, why, and the outcomes achieved is an important part of a BAs skill set.  Whether done through interviews, focus groups or a contextual inquiry (my own favourite), understanding the context of use and communicating it is a BAs core strength in agile environments
• Communication: How do you relate to the rest of your multidisciplinary team that you know the context of use — both from a user and systems perspective? BAs have a variety of tools they use regularly coupled with a talent for customisation of communication mediums and messages so that information is passed on to others with maximum efficiency.So what are some of these tools?
  • Storyboards (which I love to draw!)
  • Plans on a page (epic stories)
  • User pathways
  • Behavioural and process flow diagrams
  • Context diagram
  • Logical data model

  Notice that these are all light-weight, can be done in a short period of time, are easily changed, and are, essentially, placholders for a conversation.

Understanding the human, strategic and system requirements

• Custodianship of requirements: Understanding context is one thing, but then drawing the relationships between context and the needs of different people, and then taking into consideration the constraints, is a BA’s bread and butter. Where other disciplines, particularly UXD, tend to have greater strength in understanding and documenting context, the BAs strength has always been in elicitation, translation and communication of requirements, and then the management of these requiremens through to solution design, validation and implementation.For people like me, who tend to like to work at the ‘big picture’, having a BA who is detail oriented is a must.

Solution design

• Translation, communication and business representation: This is my favourite part of the iteration. While other team members might be responsible for the organisation of information of a system, its interaction design, and its systems architectural design, the BAs skills best served during the design phase is in representation of business and end-users. This is largely because their role as custodian of requirements makes them the most familiar with what is required and what the outcomes need to be when putting everything together.

Validation of the solution

• Diplomacy, negotiation, and whole-of-project representation: While programmers use automated testing in agile environments one aspect that can’t be automatically tested is whether or not the system behaves in the way that matches the way users need and want to use the product. Here the BAs diplomacy is his most valuable asset to bring to the agile project. He has to balance the needs of everyone, as well as their expectations, to help negotiate an agreement that the solution works, or whether additional things need to be incorporated in order for the solution to be acceptable to those who will use it.Of course, the outcome also needs to be communicated to The Powers That Be. With their strong skills in diplomacy and negotiation, a BA is able to represent the team and project as its Roshi, Scrum Master, or Project Lead.Then there’s letting the team know they’ve not suceeded in producing a valid solution. Lots of people get very attached to what they think is the right way to proceed and having users tell you that it’s not what they want can be incredibly frustrating. It means that the BAs skills of diplomacy are not only valued as an outward facing ability but also as an inward facing one as well

Implementation

• Diplomacy and sign-off: Having completed the ISO13407 cycle final implementation the feature set needs to be signed-off. Someone has to remind users and the business of how the iteration has been conducted and the points of agreement throughout. This can be a delicate matter particularly given many users and sponsors want a big thick document to read at their leisure and then sign.I usually print and package all of the smaller deliverables and put them into a folder. The first page lists the milestones and activities, agreement dates and who was present/represented, and when agreement was reached. The bottom of the page has the dotted line on which to sign.
• Setting expectations: I’ve found other sponsors don’t care so much about being this formal, particularly given the BA has been in constant communication with them and set expectations along the entire feature set iteration.

Ultimately, while there is no actual BA role, a BAs skill sets are of incredible importance throughout an agile project. This is a breath of fresh air for those of us who are only invited by the PM to elicit requirements during the first stage of the a waterfall project only then to be brought back onto the scene to help with users acceptance testing. This, ultimately, is why as BAs, we should all be championing agile. And if you’re not, then you should be!

So where are your strengths? What skills do you use most often as a BA in agile environments?

M