Effective flow for business analysis
Process Flow
Process flow diagrams used to display various functions of a product or system. It simply shows which functions of applications are connected and user navigation from one process to another. This is a high-level diagram and doesn’t show inside activities/tasks required to complete a process.
For example, A process flow for an ATM shows various operations a user can perform on an ATM i.e., cash withdrawal, balance inquiry, fund transfer, pin change, etc.
Data flow diagram
This is a techno-functional diagram and shows how user’s or back-end data flow within the system or product. In a typical data flow diagram, you’ll see the interaction between application and database at various activities or user tasks. Generic data flow for an ATM would look like below.
Activity Diagram
An activity diagram shows the system and user behavior while executing a process. Usually, an activity diagram shows explain multiple processes on a single chart since many of them are connected and output from one process acts as input or trigger for another process. Below are the activities for the cash withdrawal process from an ATM-
- Insert card
- Enter pin
- Select option for cash withdrawal
- Enter PIN (validation)
- Enter amount (On successful validation)
- Press enter
ER diagram
Entity-relationship (ER) diagram are used to display how an entity is related to other entities and attributes in a system. An ER diagram has 3 major components:
- Entity
- Relationships
- Attribute
User Interface (Wireframe/Mockups)
A wireframe is a visual representation of business requirements. IT teams also call them prototypes. It may have static or advanced HTML pages with user interactions. A typical wireframe consists text boxes, drop down, checkbox, radio button, messages box etc.
