Functional decomposition is the process of breaking down the functions of an organization into greater levels of detail.
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Answers
Generally speaking, Decomposition is the process of breaking complex entities (processes, technology, business problems, business needs) into smaller sub-parts, and then breaking those smaller parts down even more, until the complex entity has been broken down into more discreet components with a more understandable structure.
It is a common analytical technique, and business analysts use it frequently. Among the things business analyst’s commonly decompose are:
Systems – into processes, functions, rules, and decisions
Processes – into steps, actors, and decisions
Goals – into sub-goals and objectives
Requirements – into functional requirements, non-functional requirements, business rules, decisions, and constraints
Decomposition is perhaps the single most-practiced technique in business analysis. A common output of a decomposition is a hierarchical diagram of some sort, such as the Functional Decomposition Diagram. This is similar to a number of other Business Analysis techniques, including Organizational Analysis, Feature Tree’s, Work Breakdown Structures, and Mind Mapping. The key difference between decomposition and those other analysis techniques is that the sub-components (the “children”) of something that is decomposed should completely describe the component (the “parent”) that has been decomposed. This may not be true of something like an Org Chart (which may not show all sub-units).
Types of Decomposition
Koopman[6] describes three basic types of decomposition that are described below:
Structural Decomposition
Structures are physical components, logical objects, attributes, fields, or arrangements of other structures within a design. Structures typically answer the question of “what” in a design, and are typically described using nouns and adjectives. For business analyst’s, structural decomposition is most likely to take the following forms:
Logical Objects – as part of or preparation for object modeling
Data (logical) Objects – as part of creating a data map, data dictionary, data flow, or similar activity
Organizational Units – as part of organization modeling
System components – either hardware or logical components, as part of solution analysis. This might include databases, data elements, hardware components, etc.
Behavioral / Functional Decomposition
Behaviors are an action, force, process, or control that is exerted on or by a structure with respect to the structure’s external environment. In the case that only a portion of a design (a sub-design) is under consideration, other sub-designs constitute a portion of the external environment for the behavior under consideration. Behaviors typically answer the questions of “how” and “when” in a design, and are typically described using verbs and adverbs. For most business analyst’s, this takes the form of Functional Decomposition (where the business function is the “action” in question).
Functional Decomposition is the type of Decomposition that is described in many Business Analysis references and is one of the core business analysis techniques according to the IIBA[1]. It’s also a good idea to know that Functional Decomposition exists in other disciplines, although it is often done in different ways. It exists in mathematics (for decomposing formulas and mathematical problems), signal processing, machine learning, database theory, knowledge representation, software development, and systems engineering.[2,3] Just be aware that when you refer to functional decomposition others may have different understandings of exactly what is being done than you do, so be sure you clarify.
Goal Decomposition
Goals are emergent properties that satisfy the needs which the effort or design is intended to fulfill. Goals include any result that is not directly available as an “off-the-shelf” building block. Goals thus include performance targets, costs and aesthetics. For business analysts’, goal decomposition can include:
Strategic Goals – decomposed into departmental and business unit goals such as customer satisfaction, profitability measures, market share, etc.
Project Goals – decomposed into specific (measurable) results or objectives. This includes cost limits, number of bugs, development time, etc.
Personal Development Goals – decomposed into specific milestones. An example might be a goal to achieve CBAP certification broken down into specific sub-goals.
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Functional decomposition is the process of breaking down the functions of an organization into greater levels of detail.
A.TRUE
B.FALSE✓✓
C.
D.
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