How to manage the Project Scope Succesfully for a Business Analyst

Why manage scope?

Successful scope management is necessary to the success of any project. Whether it is not closely controlled within the process a project, there are many issues which can arise:

• The project overruns its timescale
• The project goes beyond budget

In either of those cases, there's a risk that the project gets pulled either as the budget is fixed or it has a delivery deadline that's not negotiable. Even when there's some flexibility in budget or timescales, there's a much greater problem that is credibility.

The project loses credibility whether it is unable to manage budget or timescale and when it has lost credibility, folks that control the finances are more likely to drag the project to forestall further losses.

Techniques for successful scope management

• In a project where the culture is open and consensual, it is usually effective to clarify the issue very clearly to the stakeholder proposing the requirement which contradicts the vision. Thus, the business analyst should explain how the requirement doesn't fit in the vision. He/she also needs to explain that it truly is always the case in any project that it's going to not be possible to deliver the whole requirements as it truly is inevitably the case with a finite budget.
• The business analyst should invite the stakeholder to drop the requirement. It is advisable sweeten the pill by offering to incorporate it in a listing of necessities which are ‘nice to haves’ and may be considered in a future release or for a special project. The stakeholder cannot necessarily take in this ‘opportunity’. 
• If the project is incredibly much management led and scope control is invoked very clearly by the project sponsor, it can be beneficial to give an explanation for this same view to the project sponsor rather than the stakeholder. To that end, the choice may be made more easily but it surely is significant that transparency is maintained the verdict and the justifications are explained to the stakeholder group. Some can be pleased with a less transparent approach but i think this works well to accumulate trust and makes for a more productive working environment. 
•  Another approach is to play off one requirement against another in front of the stakeholders so they can decide the priorities. This is approached very using asking them to visualize the project was completed but requirement "Ex: Automating Sales Process" was not supported because there has been insufficient budget to deliver requirement "Customizing Sales force automation" and requirement "Integration with ERP".
  
  As a consequence, requirement "Automating Sales Process" should sit very clearly in the vision and requirement "Integration with ERP" must be the only you desire the stakeholders to drop.
  
  Again, this helps the stakeholders see for themselves the relative priority of necessities and to query which of them are really critical.
• If none of those approaches work because stakeholders are being resistant then more formal requirements prioritization techniques must be pursued (see article). There's a strong argument that these ought to be undertaken anyway to support discussions later within the project regarding what appears in a release and even when it will be significant to attenuate the scope caused by unforeseen circumstances.

In summary, project success is solely possible when project scope is managed very carefully. The hazards to budget have to be managed to bypass the project losing credibility being cancelled.