Questions for the ECBA were updated on : Dec 11 ,2025
"Needs" and "stakeholder engagement approach" are the inputs to which task in the elicitation and
collaboration knowledge area?
B
Explanation:
In the Elicitation and Collaboration knowledge area, the task "Prepare for Elicitation" takes "needs"
and "stakeholder engagement approach" as key inputs. The purpose of this task is to understand the
scope, identify stakeholders, choose elicitation techniques, and prepare the logistics to ensure a
productive elicitation session.
Needs define the business problem or opportunity prompting the elicitation.
Stakeholder engagement approach outlines how stakeholders will be involved, influencing
techniques and planning.
BABOK® Guide v3 – Section 4.1: Prepare for Elicitation:
Inputs: "Needs" and "Stakeholder Engagement Approach"
“The purpose of Prepare for Elicitation is to understand the scope of the elicitation activity, select
appropriate techniques, and plan for the elicitation.”
Which requirements are temporary in nature?
D
Explanation:
Transition requirements are the only category of requirements that are temporary in nature. They
define the capabilities that a solution must have to facilitate the transition from the current state to
the future state, but they are not needed once the transition is complete. These include data
conversion, training, and deployment needs.
They support the implementation but are not part of the long-term functioning solution. This
distinguishes them from business, stakeholder, and solution requirements, which are ongoing or
permanent once implemented.
BABOK® Guide v3 – Section 2.3.4: Transition Requirements:
“Transition requirements describe the capabilities that the solution must have to facilitate transition
from the current state to the future state, but that will not be needed once that transition is
complete.”
Which of the following business analysis tasks is to ensure that requirements and design
specifications and models meet quality standards and are usable for the purpose they serve?
A
Explanation:
The Verify Requirements task ensures that requirements and designs meet quality standards and are
usable for the purposes they are intended to serve. It focuses on confirming that the documentation
is clear, correct, consistent, and testable.
Quality characteristics evaluated during this task include:
Clarity and unambiguity
Feasibility and relevance
Completeness and correctness
Consistency and traceability
This task is typically done before requirements validation (which ensures alignment with business
goals and stakeholder needs).
BABOK® Guide v3 – Section 7.1: Verify Requirements:
“The purpose of Verify Requirements is to ensure that requirements and designs specifications and
models meet quality standards and are usable for the purpose they serve.”
Which of the following tasks is used to ensure that requirements and designs at different levels are
aligned to one another?
B
Explanation:
The task Trace Requirements ensures that requirements and designs across different levels (business,
stakeholder, solution) are consistently aligned with one another. This alignment supports scope
management, impact analysis, verification and validation efforts, and change control.
Requirement tracing also:
Clarifies relationships between business needs and solution features.
Enables efficient scope monitoring and helps avoid scope creep.
Supports linking requirements to their source and derived components.
BABOK® Guide v3 – Section 5.1: Trace Requirements:
“The purpose of Trace Requirements is to ensure that requirements and designs at different levels
are aligned to one another and to support change analysis, coverage, and allocation.”
Which of the following techniques is used to elicit business analysis information by examining
available materials that describe either the business environment or existing organizational assets?
D
Explanation:
Document analysis is a technique used to elicit business analysis information by reviewing existing
organizational assets and materials such as business plans, contracts, audit reports, regulatory
guidelines, and system documentation. It is particularly useful in understanding the current state,
identifying requirements, business rules, and constraints, and preparing for stakeholder interviews
or workshops.
This method provides a baseline of information that can be validated or expanded upon during other
elicitation activities.
BABOK® Guide v3 – Section 10.14: Document Analysis:
“Document analysis involves reviewing existing documentation and materials to elicit requirements
relevant to the change. It helps identify business rules, processes, and data relevant to current
systems.”
When examining requirements relationships, the business analyst (BA) ensures the relationships
satisfy the following quality criteria:
D
Explanation:
When examining requirements relationships, "unambiguous" is a key quality criterion. It ensures that
the nature of the relationship between two or more requirements is clearly understood and not open
to multiple interpretations. This clarity is critical for supporting impact analysis, traceability,
requirement decomposition, and requirement allocation.
Poorly defined or ambiguous relationships can result in incorrect assumptions about dependencies
or sequencing, potentially leading to implementation errors.
Additional Criteria Related to Requirement Relationships (from BABOK® Guide v3, Section 5.1 – Trace
Requirements):
Necessity: The relationship exists because one requirement depends on another.
Correctness: The relationship accurately represents the dependency.
Consistency: The relationship does not conflict with other requirement links.
Unambiguity: All stakeholders interpret the relationship in the same way.
Why would a business analyst (BA) want to define stakeholder assumptions?
A
Explanation:
Defining stakeholder assumptions helps in identifying and managing risks. Assumptions are beliefs
held by stakeholders that influence decisions and requirements. By explicitly documenting and
validating these assumptions, BAs can uncover potential gaps or incorrect expectations that may lead
to project failure if left unchecked.
BABOK® Reference – Task: Plan Business Analysis Approach (Section 3.1):
“Assumptions should be identified and managed to reduce risk and clarify project constraints.”
When creating a use case diagram which of the following relationships may a business analyst (BA)
use?
B
Explanation:
In use case diagrams, the relationships between use cases may include “include” and “extend.”
Include indicates that a use case incorporates another use case as part of its behavior.
Extend shows optional behavior that extends the base use case under certain conditions.
These relationships help modularize functionality and clarify dependencies.
BABOK® Reference – Technique: Use Cases and Scenarios (Section 10.49):
“Use cases can have relationships such as include or extend to indicate reuse or conditional behavior
extensions.”
What is the highest level of a data flow diagram called?
D
Explanation:
The context diagram represents the highest level of a data flow diagram (DFD). It illustrates the
entire system as a single process and shows the interactions between the system and external
entities (actors, users, or systems). This overview is essential in understanding system boundaries
and external data flows.
BABOK® Reference – Technique: Data Flow Diagrams (Section 10.13):
“The context diagram is the highest level in a data flow diagram, showing the overall system
boundaries, external entities, and major information flows.”
To ensure that "all requirements and designs align to business requirements" is the purpose of which
task?
C
Explanation:
The purpose of the Validate Requirements task is to ensure that all requirements and designs align to
business requirements, meet stakeholder needs, and support the business goals. It focuses on
ensuring that the proposed solution addresses the underlying business problem or opportunity.
BABOK® Reference – Task: Validate Requirements (Section 7.6):
“The purpose of Validate Requirements is to ensure that all requirements and designs align to the
business requirements and support the delivery of needed value.”
When reporting business analysis performance, what does the measure of significance indicate?
B
Explanation:
The measure of significance in reporting business analysis performance refers to how well the value
delivered by the BA work products justifies the effort and resources invested. It focuses on whether
the deliverables contributed meaningful value to the organization and whether they supported
decision-making, change enablement, or strategic goals.
BABOK® Reference – Task: Assess Business Analysis Performance (Section 3.5):
“Significance assesses the value delivered by the business analysis work and whether it justifies the
resources expended.”
Which of the following is a guideline or tool, often provided by third parties, used for defining design
options?
B
Explanation:
Existing solutions are considered a guideline or tool when defining design options. These can be
internal systems or third-party offerings that provide baseline capabilities. Evaluating existing
solutions helps the BA define viable design paths, often saving time and cost over custom-built
options.
BABOK® Reference – Task: Define Design Options (Section 7.5, Inputs):
“Existing solutions may include purchased products, components of the current state, or other assets
that may be leveraged when defining design options.”
What is the purpose of brainstorming?
C
Explanation:
The purpose of brainstorming is to generate a large number of creative ideas in a short time, usually
in a group setting. It is especially useful during early stages of analysis or design, where exploring
multiple options is critical.
BABOK® Reference – Technique: Brainstorming (Section 10.5):
“Brainstorming is used to produce numerous new ideas, and to derive from them themes for further
analysis.”
What characteristic of a process is evaluated during process analysis?
B
Explanation:
In process analysis, the BA evaluates a process to determine how efficiently and effectively it is
achieving its goals. This involves analyzing process steps, identifying waste or redundancy, and
seeking opportunities for optimization.
BABOK® Reference – Technique: Process Analysis (Section 10.33):
“Process analysis evaluates the efficiency and effectiveness of a process, identifying opportunities to
improve performance.”
What is the purpose of comparing the results collected through elicitation activities?
B
Explanation:
After elicitation activities are performed, the purpose of comparing the results is to ensure
consistency and accuracy across information gathered from various stakeholders or techniques. This
comparison helps in identifying discrepancies, resolving conflicting inputs, and validating that
stakeholder perspectives are properly reflected.
BABOK® Reference – Task: Confirm Elicitation Results (Section 4.3):
“The purpose of Confirm Elicitation Results is to check the information gathered during elicitation for
accuracy and consistency with other information.”