Customer Discovery17% of the exam
Business goals, challenges and project scope
How a business analyst sorts discovery statements into goals, strategies, initiatives and challenges, turns vague goals and pain points into measurable targets, traces initiatives to goals, and writes an in-scope and out-of-scope boundary that resists scope creep.
Determine business strategies, goals, initiatives, and challenges to define the scope of a Salesforce project or business initiative.
~8 min read · 9 practice questions ·
What the exam expects
- Classify what a sponsor or user says as a goal, strategy, initiative or challenge, and record it that way.
- Turn a vague goal ("improve the customer experience") or a vague complaint into measurable objectives and agreed success metrics before any solution is discussed.
- Gather the right inputs to define or redefine scope: strategic plan and goals, quantified challenges, and constraints.
- Decide which initiatives belong in scope by tracing each one to the business goal it advances.
- Write a scope statement that says what is in scope and what is out of scope.
Key terms: goal (what the business wants to achieve); challenge or obstacle (a problem in the way of a goal); initiative (what the business does now to reach a goal); success metric or KPI (the agreed measure of results); scope (all the work needed to deliver the outcome, and what is excluded).
Key facts
Goals
- Detail
- What the business wants to achieve
Obstacles
- Detail
- Problems faced while working toward goals, such as rapid growth or new regulations
Metrics
- Detail
- Agree how results will be measured and which KPIs the problem affects
Business need first
- Detail
- The business need guides the rest of the project
Business constraints
- Detail
- Time, budget and resources; constraints narrow the design options (UX design-brief module)
Scope statement
- Detail
- The most fundamental deliverable on any project
Scope boundary
- Detail
- States what is and what is not included; scope creep is unapproved change
Out of exam scope
- Detail
- Building ROI, managing a project, change management
Sources for this section (7)
- Know Your Customerstrailhead.salesforce.com (opens in a new tab)
- Create with Your Customerstrailhead.salesforce.com (opens in a new tab)
- Explore Techniques for Information Discoverytrailhead.salesforce.com (opens in a new tab)
- Define Project Scope and Requirementstrailhead.salesforce.com (opens in a new tab)
- Explore Documentation Typestrailhead.salesforce.com (opens in a new tab)
- Project Scope Managementtrailhead.salesforce.com (opens in a new tab)
- Salesforce Certified Business Analyst Exam Guidetrailhead.salesforce.com (opens in a new tab)
- Why does the BA meet the sponsor before rewriting or estimating an inherited backlog?
- When is "customers wait too long" ready to scope?
- What is the difference between an initiative and a strategy?
- Why does a scope statement list exclusions as well as inclusions?
The questions are free to read. Answers with their sources and self-grading are included with the pack.
Keep reading with the Business Analyst pack
- Core concepts
- Exam traps
- Worked scenario
The pack includes:
- All 22 lessons of the Business Analyst guide, with reading progress
- Interactive decision walks and step-by-step sequence steppers
- Inline practice questions and one-click topic practice (9 questions for this lesson)
- An official source cited for every claim
- An AI tutor that answers from the guide
- Unlimited timed practice exams