BBC 2017 Speaker Series – Practitioner: Giovanni Diviacchi, Senior Business Analyst/Product Owner at Fannie Mae

Regarding his presentation at Building Business Capability in Orlando, Nov. 6-10, 2017, we asked Giovanni Diviacchi, Senior Business Analyst/Product Owner at Fannie Mae, a few questions about transforming the business. Check out this interview in relation to his BBC presentation entitled, Testing Agility in the World of Scrum.

Q: In what ways do you see your group helping your organization handle business transformation?

A: We are at the forefront of helping our organization redefine the way America does housing and mortgage finance.

Q: Can you describe the challenges you face or have already overcome in establishing more robust business transformation capabilities for your organization?

A: We have overcome the challenge of transforming ourselves into a smart, agile company who can better deliver on the needs of our customers.

Q: What are your short-term goals for becoming more agile?

A: Our short term goals are to continue delivering our enhancements in small increments and developing our testing tools to give us the confidence that we need when moving new code into production.

Q: What’s the most valuable thing you’ve learned in the past year?

A: That a setback here can lead to several steps forward in the future.

Q: What do you see as the most important goal or trend for business analysts and other professionals to keep in mind?

A: That they need to be ready to be empowered to make quick, educated, and decisive decisions on the ground in order to compete in the digital age.  This entails being open to new ideas and ready to learn new skills as needed.

Q: What’s the latest method/process/tool you’ve implemented to help your business operate more effectively? Have you seen any results?

A: In the past several months we have been able to implement new technology that will enable us to retire our legacy systems for the Warehouse and Certification needs of our customers.  By delivering in small increments and asking for fast feedback in an agile manner, we are confident that we will be meeting the needs of our customers.

Q: If you could go back 5 years in time and give some professional insight or advice to yourself, what would it be?

A:  Don’t worry about how the industry changes will impact you, just keep your head up and be open to the new opportunities which may come up in the digital age.

Q: What’s one question you wished you were asked in this interview but were not? And how would you answer?

A:  Question:  What was the one big thing that your company did to help move your group towards adopting the agile methodology?  A: We’ve adopted a new workplace strategy that encourages transparency and corroboration

Q: Please tell us a take-away that you provided during your talk at the Building Business Capability (BBC) conference this year?

A:  Open the door a little to the idea of using AI technology to partner with business rule technology to rethink how we process business rules in the future.

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Giovanni’s presentation, Testing Agility in the World of Scrum, at Building Business Capability was presented on Thursday, November 9, 2017.