Data governance is no small task—and for those who think it is, there’s a greater than 99% chance that they’re doing it wrong. But for those who begin a data governance journey, and do it right, the payoff can be enormous.
The emerging business imperative of data governance
There are few initiatives that organisations can undertake and invest in today that can pay the long-term dividends of a strong and comprehensive data governance program.
Why?
Because the volume and potential value of data will continue to grow exponentially as we draw deeper into the age of big data.
Organisations are amassing and creating data at an unprecedented pace, and the ability to mine that data for meaningful insights continues to grow more sophisticated. These insights don’t merely represent the possibility of an improved competitive foothold—they can mean massive savings in improved efficiencies, lower costs and streamlined processes, greater automation and lesser resource spend, and even development of innovative products or services that could displace competitors and disrupt industries.
But just because an organisation possesses data doesn’t make it an asset. To be converted from raw potential to real business possibilities, businesses must know exactly what data they have, ensure its compliance with all applicable regulations, and properly organise it in an accessible framework for data consumers. Users need to know where to find it and understand its meaning and usage, so they can choose the best data set to perform a wide variety of analyses—from assessing past performance to identifying future opportunities. Finally, they need to be able to trust that data, from tracking lineage, use, and potential transformations, to confidence in the fundamental reliability and accuracy of the data itself.
They must have designated data owners that are dependable resources to answer questions and provide assistance. All of this forms the broad basis for data governance today.
This simply means that while most organisations aren’t at the very beginning of their data governance journey, they very well may have gotten bad directions or taken a wrong turn. The first step, then, is to figure out exactly where the organisation is at on the road to comprehensive data governance and exactly where it needs to go.
This whitepaper, by data integrity leaders, Precisely, explores four steps of the data governance journey, and how doing it right will pay off in the long run.
