T. A.

PAI MANAGEMENT INSTITUTE (TAPMI), MANIPAL

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY CONSULTING AND BUSINESS ANALYSIS

Programme: PGDM
Batch: 2020-2022
Term: 4
Course Name: Information Technology Consulting and Business Analysis - ITS 6001

Credits: 3 (30 Hours)

Course Instructors: Prof. Selvaraj Vadivelu (Core), Prof. Guruprasad R(Visiting)

PART 1
INTRODUCTION
This course aims to introduce the students to the role of an IT consultant in the industry, and how
the consultant serves to deliver IT-related solutions to enhance the effectiveness of client
organizations. This course will enable the students to understand the general landscape of the
knowledge-intensive consulting industry while allowing them to explore the intricacies of the
specific IT consulting domain.

The first part of the course focuses on the bouquet of skills that a successful IT consultant needs to
bring to the table, how the consultant can analyze the client issues, and also how the consultant
proposes and implements IT-based solutions to effectively deal with such issues. The course
participants will develop an understanding about the workings of the IT consulting industry, the IT
consulting lifecycle and how the IT consulting service is actually delivered. The students will be able
to view the IT consulting industry from two perspectives: first as a prospective IT consultant seeking
a successful career in a leading consulting firm, and second as a manager employed in a client
organization who is looking to engage with and extract maximum value from external consulting
resources.

The second part of the course delves into the complementary domain of business analysis. It seeks
to introduce the students to the fundamentals of business analysis and the typical tasks that a
business analyst is expected to perform. The course participants will learn about successful project
initiation, accurate elicitation of requirements, modeling techniques to enhance the
understandability of requirements by both business as well as technical stakeholders, techniques for
eliminating ambiguities from requirements, and the successful facilitation of requirement approval
meetings.

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Overall, this course will enable the participants to develop general abilities related to problem
identification and solving, along with some formal processes, methodologies, and models, which
together will help them navigate the challenging IT consulting landscape.

COURSE OBJECTIVES (CO)

On the completion of this course, the participant will be able to:
1. Understand consulting as a service
2. Understand various types of decisions handled by IT consultants
3. Understand consultant’s tools and techniques for the above decisions.
4. Understand the process of Business Analysis
5. Understand Business requirement elicitation and modeling techniques

COURSE LEARNING OUTCOMES (CLO)

At the end of this course, students will be able to:

CLO 1: Demonstrate the ability to understand the given IT-RFP (Request for proposal) and
dynamics that exist around real-life scenarios dealing with RFPs and Proposals. (PLG 3)

CLO 2: Demonstrate clear understanding of the concepts related to IT Consulting and the
various stages of business analysis i.e., Enterprise analysis, Requirements management,
elicitation, Communication, Analysis, Solution Assessment and Validation stages (PLG
1)

CLO 3: Be able to clearly identify tools and techniques that could be best deployed at various
stages of the requirements lifecycle management as an IT consultant/Business analyst
role. (PLG 2)

COURSE CONTENT
 Consulting Industry Landscape
 Types of IT consultants/Business Analyst roles and responsibilities
 Types of consulting projects
 Pricing Aspects
 Consulting Operations Framework / Engagement model
 Business Analysis
 Requirement elicitation, analysis, communication, management
 Tools and techniques used in various stages of Requirements Lifecycle Management

PRESCRIBED TEXT BOOK

Management and IT Consultancy - Sanjiva Shankar Dubey: Tata McGraw Hill

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HANDOUTS & REFERENCES:
1. Handout 1 Consulting as a profession
2. Handout 2-Basics of Consulting
3. Handout 3-Consulting Etiquettes
4. Handout 4-Cloud Computing basics
5. Handout 5-Initiating the Sales Process and acquiring business
6. Handout 6-Closing the sale
7. Handout 7-Types of Price contracts
8. Handout 8- PWC report on Software pricing trends
9. Handout 9-Pricing strategies of Software vendors
10. Handout 10-How to write a proposal
11. Handout 11-Consulting Models
12. Reference 12-BABoK-Business Analysis book of knowledge, IIBA
13. William Cohen - How to Make it Big As a Consultant
14. Peter Block (2011) “Flawless consulting A Guide to Getting Your Expertise “2nded,
Jossey Bass

POLICY ON PLAGIARISM:
Plagiarism percentage score up to 5% in submission of any word based assignment is
permitted. Beyond this percentage, negative marks would be applied as penalty.

ASSESSMENT SCHEME AND WEIGHTAGE

{a} END-TERM

Weightage Duration (in Open/close

Evaluation (%) minutes) Book CLO Tested

End-Term 50 120 Closed CLO 1 & CLO 3

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 {b} OTHER ASSESSMENTS

Unit of Weig
S. No. Evaluation Item* Time CLO
Evaluation ht

1 Quiz 1 Individual 7% After Session 12 CLO 2

2 Quiz 2 Individual 8% After Session 26 CLO 2

3 Opportunity (RFP) Analysis Group 20% After Session 24 -

Last 3 Sessions of
Assignment-Application of Group 15%
4 -
Technology in Consulting the course

PART 2: SESSION PLAN

Session Topic (s) Pedagogy Reading

Basics of Consulting: - Chapter 1, 2, 3,6 of textbook

Business and IT consulting - Role of a consultant: Page 3 to 8 of
Lecture
1-2 Consulting Career, Hierarchy Handout-1
and career progression - Handout 2 and 3
Types of Consulting-ERP,
Pre-Sales etc. Key concepts
and practices, Consulting
lifecycle,
Types of IT consulting,
Technology and impact on Lecture - Chapter 3, 12, 14 of textbook
3-4
Consulting as a career,
Impact of digital
transformation
/ emerging technologies on
IT consulting
Critical skills for IT
consultants (Overview) - Chapter 8, 12 of textbook
5 - Interpersonal, Consulting Lecture - Various Forms of consulting: Page 9 to
and Technical- Emerging 13 of Handout-1
Technologies

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Session Topic (s) Pedagogy Reading

- Critical skills for IT

consultants (Contd.)
Technical Skills - Chapter 8 of textbook
6 Lecture
-Development and - Handout 4
Management
-Certifications
Understanding the
- Chapter 4,5,6 of text book
Consulting process:
- The future: Up to page 18 of Handout-
Prospecting to Lecture
7-8 1
Implementation-Customer
acquisition and commercials
Financial Aspects of
Consulting:
- Pricing Consulting services, - Chapter 8,9,10 of textbook
Lecture
9 - 10 Implementation and - Handout 7
Software, Pricing Models,
OEM, VAR pricing

Request for Proposals

11 (RFPs) Lecture &
- RFP discussion in the class
-RFP basics, Responding to Discussion
RFP, Pre-sales situations

Proposal Writing
Introduction, Understanding
Lecture - Handout 10
12 Proposals, Persuasive
proposal writing
Quiz-1 (WT-7%)

-Introduction to Business
Analysis: Key Concepts, BA -Chapter 1, 2 of Reference 12 with class
13 Lecture
Role, Value BAs Provide, slides
Competencies
-Initiating a Project:
Understanding the Business
Objective, Creating a Business
-Chapter 2, 3 of Reference 12 with class
14 Case, Identifying Lecture
slides
Stakeholders, assigning
responsibilities using RACI
matrix

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Session Topic (s) Pedagogy Reading

-Requirement Elicitation:
Introduction to requirements, -Chapter 4, 10 of Reference 12 with class
15 - 16 Lecture
Techniques-Brainstorming, slides
Workshops, Interviewing
-Requirement Elicitation:
Surveys, Documentation
-Chapter 4, 10 of Reference 12 with
17 - 18 reviews Lecture
class slides
-Requirement Analysis: Visual
Models
-Requirement Analysis:
Prioritize requirements,
-Chapter 6, 7 of Reference 12 with
19 - 20 Organize requirements, Lecture
class slides
Specify and model
requirements
-Requirement Analysis:
Define assumptions and
-Chapter 6, 7 of Reference 12 with
21 - 22 constraints, Lecture
class slides
Verify requirements,
Validate requirements
-Requirement Specification:
Assigning Requirement
Attributes, Prioritizing
Requirements, Validating Lecture and
Requirements, Business discussion -Chapter 5, 6, 7 of Reference 12 with
23 - 24
Requirements Document with BRD class slides
(BRD) -Requirement template
approval: Gaining the
Business, Technical and
sponsor Approval.
RFP -Opportunity Analysis – Group Submission (WT - 20%)
- Appendix C and chapter 5 of
- Models, framework,
textbook- Consulting frameworks and
techniques and tools used in
Lecture tools
25 - 26 consulting and business
- Chapter 10 of Reference 12
Analysis
- Handout 11

Quiz-2 (WT - 8%)

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Session Topic (s) Pedagogy Reading

-Managing Client Expectation - Handout 11

Lecture
27 and relationships - Chapter 9, 11 of textbook

-Students are expected to identify

issues/problems in a specific Industry
Application of Technology in vertical and see how they can
Discussion
28 Consulting recommend a combination of
emerging technologies to resolve or
better these issues.
Application of Technology in
29 Discussion Same as above
Consulting
Application of Technology in
30 Consulting Discussion Same as above
Summary of the course

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 PLG MAPPING FOR THE COURSE

Addresse CLO
d by No.
PLG# Program Level Learning Goal
Course?
(Yes / No)
Application of Fundamentals
PLG1 Traits: Demonstrate application of functional / conceptual Yes CLO2
knowledge to business situations
Problem Identification and Solution
PLG2 Traits: Demonstrate ability to identify a problem, critically assess Yes CLO3
various alternatives and suggest appropriate solution
Integrative Thinking
Traits:
PLG3 Demonstrate ability to identify inter-linkages among functional areas Yes CLO1
within an enterprise and assess the impact of external environment
on its performance
Effective Communication
PLG4 No NA
Traits: Demonstrate proficiency in Oral and Written Communication
Ethical Responsibility
PLG5 Traits: Demonstrate awareness and assess impact of ethical behavior No NA
on business
Leadership
PLG6 Traits: Demonstrate capability to take leadership role in a business No NA
situation

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