What is a JAD session?

Joint Application Design (JAD) session which is also known as Requirement Workshop is a very important process to gather effective requirement. This is a technique where a workshop is organized and all the stakeholders and subject matter experts participate, discuss and define the requirements. In this session, the Business Analyst also participates and present them the Wireframe, Prototype or the Paper UI which will make them understand what the application will look like and behave like. This workshop helps the user to go through the real-time scenario and decide whether the application will work for them or not.

This JAD session generally being used in the preliminary stage of the SDLC process. This workshop helps to bring together a number of stakeholders from the different region to participate and come up with some valuable inputs. The stakeholders include clients, business or product owners, users, system analysts, architects, developers, management.

In a JAD session, a Business Analyst generally acts as a facilitator for what the business needs, its objectives, and requirements. As a facilitator, the role of the Business Analyst is to ensure the meeting keep running smoothly and all the participants are actively participating. The Business Analyst should be fully aware and attentive in the meeting. The Business Analyst must be ready with all the required information and the business needs. Here the BA should be able to provide the close picture to the technical staff regarding how the business would like to see something implemented.

Here is a list of key elements what a Business Analyst need to perform pre, post and during the JAD session

1. The BA should act as a facilitator in the JAD session.
2. The BA should clearly articulate the Business needs, objectives & requirements.
3. The BA must be ready with all the required documents, presentations in the session.
4. Whenever required, the BA should prepare the agenda of the session and circulate them with all the participants before the session begins.
5. The BA should stay prepared with multiple copies of the agenda and business requirement document.
6. The BA should capture all the requirements discussed by the participants effectively.
7. The BA should prepare the minutes of meeting post to the JAD session and circulate it to all the participants.