Farmers Insurance

It starts with six simple words, “We want to be Data Driven!”.  The first statement made quickly leads to “We need data governance!”.  I love to hear this, but it often leads to several Cardinal Sins of Data Governance.  Sins that if left unchecked, will limit success in achieving your goal. So, what are the cardinal sins, here are three to avoid out of the gate:

Cardinal Sin One: Data Governance is One Person’s Job

A Data Governance program indeed has a leader that develops policies, standards, and procedures; however, these are only the foundational elements of the program. 

When it comes to execution, everyone plays a part!  From business to IT, executive to the developer, customer service representative to supervisors, each plays a role in successful data governance.  Why?  Organizations are complex and dependent on individuals for data entry, monitoring, and analysis.  Thus, everyone must know how they contribute and what they need to do. 

How is this achieved, constant and continuous communication?  There must be regular communication through multiple channels sharing the program and tailored to the various audiences.  By hitting these outlets with focused stories, you increase the likelihood the message resonates, is received, and adopted! 

Cardinal Sin Two:  Data Governance is all about Data Quality

Data quality is an important and key measure of success, however, data governance is more.  Ignoring these other areas lessens the value of your program and reduces your ability to be data-driven.

What are these other elements?  It includes but is not limited to, creating business glossaries, cataloging data assets, understanding who is using data via lineage, and discovering sensitive data.  Each must have a policy, standard, procedure, and targeted communication so everyone understands their role in success. 

“Just adding additional governance tasks without eliminating responsibilities will stretch already strained resources, delay the success of your governance program, and lessen your ability to be data-driven.”

Why is this important?  Data-driven originations require understandable, findable, and usable data.  To accomplish this, the element of data governance must be enabled.  This requires you to look beyond data quality in being a data-driven organization. 

Cardinal Sin Three:  Data Governance does not Require Additional Work

This closely aligns with the first Cardinal Sin; however, this is about execution.  Not only does everyone play a part but they also must change the way they work.  This is difficult as more is asked of individuals with fewer resources and limited time.

Your data governance leader will define the policies, standards, and procedures but embedding these procedures into day-to-day work is the responsibility of leadership.  Remember, everyone, plays a part! This translates into evaluating existing work, eliminating unnecessary tasks, and ensuring time are available to adopt the new practices.  Not easy in a resource-constrained world!

Overcoming this requires continuous evaluation and finding ways to free time.  This is key.  Just adding additional governance tasks without eliminating responsibilities will stretch already strained resources, delay the success of your governance program, and lessen your ability to be data-driven. 

There you have it.  Three Cardinal Sins of Data Governance and how to avoid them. If you recognize everyone plays a part, it is not just data quality and it requires additional work, you are three steps ahead on your data governance journey and well on your way to being a Data-Driven Organization.  Best of luck in your journey!