Our journey so far
Part 1 of this series introduced us to the concept that MDM is not about the technology, you need to get the People and Process side of the strategic triangle right before selecting and deploying your chosen technology. In part 2 we covered the relationship between Business Process and MDM and how dependent they are of each other. Now in part 3 we are going to take a look at the ‘People’ part of MDM, from a business perspective.
People and Data – LET THE PEOPLE OWN IT!
When looking at people involved in MDM you have to take an organizational view. Kinda one of those ‘helicopter views’ the consultants keep on talking about …
So to follow the theme of what I heard at DataFluxIDEAS and to set the scene I give you a couple of quotes from some rather clever people;
Tony Fisher, DataFlux President and CEO said “Data doesn’t belong to an individual or a department, it belongs to an organization”
Ian Charlesworth, key note speaker and R&D Director at Ovum said “The Business is the owner of the data – IT is the custodian of the data”
Both these statements struck a cord with me, MDM is about the people. If you want your data to be a strategic asset in your organization, you need your people to own it. I know, that sounds far to socialist a view for me, but if businesses want to be successful they need to get their Data Governance, a key cog of the MDM engine, right, LET THE PEOPLE OWN IT!
By the way, thanks to Jim for OCDQ for the quotes, I was to busy listening to write them down, well that’s my excuse anyway.
Who are the people?
I’m often asked what I mean by ‘The People’, I define them as anyone at any data touch-point across the organization, be they Business, Customers or IT.
To describe it further, I found it helped to categorize these ‘data touch-points’ into meaningful focus groups, detailed in the following graphic*
Front-Line Data Governance
Front-line Data Governance is about driving data ownership back into the business, getting every resource at every data touch-point to ‘own’ the data. Get the people involved!
The four categories of data touch-points; Author, Consume, Enrich and Publish, represent the data life-cycle across business processes. Data Custodians are at the core, providing support, guidance, education and the technical capabilities to those on the front-line. These categories are key to our MDM processes and strategy, understanding them, and the people within them is critical to successful Data Governance.
Before I continue maybe I should provide more detail on each category;
Author – Authors create data. At the start of any frontline business processes data is created, the people who create the data are Authors, resource who create new records of source.
Consume – Consumers use data, or data users. Probably the most common component in data delivery, and the reason I have a job, is the provision of quality data to ‘data consumers’ across the organization.
Enrich – Users who augment or change data. Data is amended and added to all thorough its life-cycle.
Publish – People and systems who publish data to the world. A key part in BI, e-commerce and B2B divisions, who’s role it is to publish quality data to Consumers, Enrichers and Authors.
Data Custodians – People who ‘look’ after the data. Typically IT people who are responsible for data e.g. DBA’s, Data Architects and Data Warehouse developers.
I realize that these descriptions are brief, however, if I were to get into more detail for each this blog would cause tedium, and I am very much against writing long and detailed blogs that bore the pants off both you and me, plus, I need to keep something back for my book …
Back to Front Line Data Governance
By understanding each of the categorized data-touch-points, and where they sit in your business processes, you can start to build a data governance strategy that empowers your people to own your data. Data ownership needs to be part of the psyche of every employee, a key KPI in the performance management of the organization. Drive it from every angle, entrench it in the DNA of the organization. Measure it, evangelize it, talk about it in your company report, and make data a unique selling point for your business, the ultimate strategic asset!
Final Word
As I prepare to jet off to Spain for a week of golf, sun and beer I leave you with this thought:
In defining an ‘Asset’ as ‘Something valuable that an entity owns, benefits from, or has use of, in generating income’ Who would you rather have own your data? The Business as a whole or IT in isolation?
*Categories in ‘Data Governance on the Front-Line’ evolved from a research paper provided by Gartner
Charles,
Regarding your 'Final Word'; isn't that like comparing pears to apples?
The business must be expected to know what the data should look like, and IT should ensure the infrastructure. One single ownership might ruin that balance.
Regards,
Jane
Hi Jane,
Thanks for your comments.
I agree in principal with what you are saying here. When I talk about 'The Business as a whole' I include IT, as detailed in the diagram in my post, IT are the custodians of the data, which in my mind, includes looking after the infrastructure as a key responsibility.
So what I am trying to get across here is that when we say that the business owns the data, we are talking about the entire organisation. What we need to ensure is that roles and responsibilities are defined, and the processes around it are clearly defined and communicated.
Does this make sense?
As an aside, I am going to close off this series, when I get back from lazing arround in the sun, by tying all these topics together, hopefully all will be clear then