Many project professionals struggle to speak the language of executives, grasp cross-functional priorities and clearly articulate the business impact of their projects. Enter GenAI as a powerful and accessible partner in developing stronger business acumen.
Backlogs are everywhere—and they’re useful. But when teams start treating them as the plan, trouble follows. It’s time for a smarter approach—one where PMs and BAs work together to turn scattered tasks into a roadmap with purpose.
Business acumen is often associated with high-level strategic thinking, strong communication and effective leadership. But there are other crucial skills that significantly impact an individual’s ability to drive business success.
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Over the years business analysis has continued to grow at a rapid rate and is often seen as a critical leadership competency for Projects, Programs, and Portfolios. Business Analysis provides important value by reducing project costs and increasing the potential return, or benefits. This PMI virtual event will provide insights on just how critical of a role business analysis plays in the overall success of project while giving you the BA insights, resources, and tools you need for total project and career success.
If you perform business analysis, your work is vital to project and program success. To most effectively support your organization and advance in your career, you need to know how to apply BA to any situation and delivery method. The new PMI Guide to Business Analysis will help you achieve this! Get an exclusive preview, with in-depth insights, at the PMI Business Analysis Virtual Conference 2017.
Advance your BA skills! Don’t miss the most popular Business Analysis event of the year! We’re sharing career journeys and talking about the hottest BA and agile BA topics. Catch these sessions from the only event designed with your future in mind to help you get ahead.
The Agile Enterprise: From Good Intentions to Good Governance – Ethics in Volunteer Leadership” explores how agile ways of working can strengthen ethical behavior and governance in organizations that rely on volunteers. Agile Enterprises value adaptability, transparency, and collaboration, but these strengths only translate into real benefits when guided by ethical principles and clear accountability.
For project professionals, this topic highlights how intelligent automation can improve operational efficiency, reduce manual dependencies, and enable scalable pricing strategies that support enterprise growth.
As we navigate 2026, the complexity of enterprise-scale delivery has surpassed the limits of manual coordination. This session explores the transition from "Doing AI" (using chatbots) to Being Agentic, integrating autonomous AI agents into the heartbeat of DA and SAFe.
The project financial analysis template calculates key metrics to determine the business case for a project. The template is an Excel file that can be used by a project manager, project sponsor or a relevant professional to determine if a project should be pursued.
Traditional, multi-page business cases often don’t work well. They contain too much subjective information, and the relevant details are lost in the “sales pitch.” This lightweight business case template is more in the spirit of a Lean Business Case than a traditional one, but is more likely to be accepted by leadership.
This template is for creating a process inventory and detailed process descriptions for the purpose of Business Analysis prior to IT project implementation. Processes are analyzed step by step in order to identify software functional requirements that are necessary to execute the process. A companion to the article The Role of Business Process Design in Business Analysis on IT Projects.
Whether you are a BA, a PM or have your feet in both camps, you'll want to check out this webinar. Not only will it broaden your vocabulary, but it will expand your perspective of the how BAs and PMs can and should relate to each other differently.
The aim of your business case is to gain organizational support and funding approval for an initiative by providing all necessary rationale for informed decision making. You as the sponsor must document the business case after satisfactory analysis has been conducted to understand business need, examine alternatives and conclude recommendations. Use this checklist as a reference in building a better business case.
It is essential to pursue a career development path that not only enhances your technical skills, but also sharpens your strategic thinking and leadership abilities. Make project management, business analysis and AI three of your priorities.
Practitioners that “pressure test” their assumptions and strengthen the weak points in their logic tend to produce business strategies and plans that are stronger, more capable, and yield more consistent results. Here are three simple steps to help you clarify assumptions and strengthen any plan of action.
The advantages of using AI tools to manage projects can no longer be ignored, from improving efficiency and productivity in repetitive tasks to saving time and money. But the technology must be balanced with human creativity and critical thinking.
Have you thought about the business model of your company? With the practicality of a template, this article describes a great strategic tool—and how to build one with your team and stakeholders to enhance understanding and value on your project.
Project managers today recognize the importance of the business context to their projects, but what does that mean in practical terms? How deep should your business acumen actually be?
For external projects, there isn't a lot of direct connection with customers—and that is a lost opportunity. There is tremendous value in trying to make these customers "real." How can we achieve that level of understanding?
Given that 90% of his career has been in the private sector, this practitioner's approach is very much from a business perspective. How would that translate in his role as an elected official in his local community?
A business case describes the current situation, the various benefits of changing that situation, and then the options and their benefits. But if you need to write a business case, remember what matters to the person who reads it.
Projects managers talk about the “business context” or the “business purpose” of a project. And that’s a problem, because there is no such thing.
There is no single strategy that will progress your career—but there are specific deficiencies that may be holding you back, and insufficient business acumen is one of them. It is a quiet killer for your dreams of advancement. These five tips can help.
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