Governing Data Stronger than The Terminator #schwarzenegger

Are there any companies these days that are not aiming to become data-driven? Personally, I feel this is something most companies say, but very few actually live in practice or even have a deep understanding of what it truly means to be “data-driven”.

Data governance plays a huge part in a successful data-focused organisation, yet many people overlook this crucial pillar entirely.?

This article won’t teach you how to implement perfect data governance practices (that would be impossible in a couple of pages), but it will help you understand what it’s all about and why you should care.?

Governance? What is it? Why should I care?

I have always been of the belief that simple is beautiful, and this is echoed throughout BI:PROCSI and the definition of data governance in its purest form is simple:?

Data governance is a set of principles and practices that ensure the highest quality of data through its complete lifecycle.

Data governance essentially is cleaner, better, leaner data, which in turn means robust analytics, and more accurate business decisions, leading to better business results.?

It’s the old RIRO principle (or GIGO if you’re from across the pond). Rubbish In Rubbish Out. Meaning if you heap rubbish data into your systems, essentially all you get out will be untrustworthy garbage which has a huge impact on the business and destroys stakeholder trust.?

Sounds extreme? It’s really not. We’ve worked with plenty of clients that, for example, have grown exponentially in a relatively short period of time. During that period, the amount of microservices has grown 20x, their CRM has been further developed by a rogue team and now produces an unbelievable amount of irrelevant data that’s hitting the data warehouse, a new ticketing system has been quickly implemented alongside the legacy one that’s still used, an acquisition’s billing records were brought into the DW in an unstructured format, teams of analysts are creating huge PDTs every day to answer business questions that were already answered 2 months ago...the list goes on, but you get the picture.

Based on this, does anyone think that accurate and timely business decisions could be made? Are the key stakeholders well-informed? With a few simple governance rules enforced, the above scenario would never happen. Boring old governance seems kind of interesting now, right??

Data Governance? - 3 Shiny Benefits

Data governance increases operational efficiency

Incorrect data leads to increased effort, or at least it leads to wasted time tracking down duplicate records or missing fields in your business’ analytical efforts. By reducing errors in your databases and providing solid databases to query, gives back invaluable time that would otherwise be used correcting existing data. We have all heard the “70% of a data professional’s time is spent cleaning and preparing data . . . “, why would we not want to reduce this? Not only is this costing unnecessary dollars, it's also (trust me from experience) not something data professionals typically enjoy doing, so let them get back to what they love and more value-add tasks! Introducing a data governance practice (it is NOT a project) delivers an opportunity for everyone to start singing from the same hymn sheet when it comes to core data definitions. Significantly increased operational efficiency is then realised over time and takes effort to grow into a living breathing culture. In short, a robust and simple data governance framework applied to your business in the right way removes the need for menial tasks and allows your teams to get back to true value-add workstreams.?

Risky Business

It is a risky game to play to have ungoverned data in your business. There are multiple security issues surrounding ineffective data governance we will highlight two primary reasons here:

1. Regulatory issues with compliance Data compliance becomes a more pressing topic each passing day, and the way in which companies store their customers’ data is taken incredibly seriously by governments and customers themselves. To make this even more difficult, the “rules” and “requirements” on how to handle this data can seem murky and unclear. To top it off, hefty fines are dished out for offenders, so regulatory compliance should be high on the agenda!?
2. How can you tell when something goes wrong? If you have dirty data clogging up your databases, it becomes increasingly difficult to identify when something goes wrong (even if you do not know what is wrong). Let’s take a scenario, how do you know if users are able to access customer banking information without strong governance enforced? It may sound dramatic, but we have found many ways to “backdoor” into this information and penalties for a breach of this kind of data are of the strictest nature. Is it worth the risk?? My first suggestion would be enforcing governance around “do you need that PII data?, really?” if so, the correct processes, tools and setup will ensure that risk is minimised and issues can be flagged immediately.

Get Some Clarity

If you take a step back and imagine what perfect data means to your business operation, you’ll probably picture that it’s all standardised, clean, and accurate, nothing ever goes wrong, and every end user is always happy. Dream on! However, steps can be taken to dramatically increase the cleanliness and timeliness of your data, the positive effects of which will be felt throughout the business. Clarity to me means two things, one it means having a clear picture of what good looks like, what it achievable and by when. Secondly, it means that your data, dimensions/metrics are as accurate as possible, data arrives in a timely fashion, deeper insights into customer behaviour can be realised quickly, and overall confidence in the data is always present from the stakeholders to name a few. This is achievable for all businesses! Governance brings clarity. Take a nice zen moment and picture it now. . . . Looks good right?

There are 4 principles to encourage and nurture:

1. Data must be recognised as a valuable and strategic enterprise asset from the top down
2. Data accountability and ownership must be clearly defined and documented
3. Data management must be enforced with internal and external rules and regulations on handling the data applied
4. Data quality should be defined, flagged and managed with consistency throughout its lifecycle with a focus on excellence?

So, your thinking now right. . . . I need to hire a whole new team, we are in a global pandemic, and my budgets have been slashed!

Nope, now take another Zen moment. With a little bit of thought and planning you can use your existing teams to achieve your governance and data quality goals. These FTEs can be broken down into three categories:?

Strategic: Data Governance Council (think Jedi’s but less cool)

Tactical: Data Custodian with Data Stewards (IT technical staff)

Operational: User Groups

BI:PROCSI have helped form and refine Governance teams within multiple organisations. If you would like any more information on how to go about this, please get in touch with any of the team.?

Remember, data governance is NOT a project, it’s a practice. Which evolves as it learns and is based on 3 key pillars:

1. People
2. Processes
3. Technology

So how do I start to approach my data governance initiative?

My advice, start small. Don’t try and change the world overnight - clarity remember.? Gain quick wins and trust will come. As Jimi Hendrix once said: ‘In order to change the world, you have to get your head together first.’ so start there.?

You can’t control what you can’t measure, so set goals that are specific, super-clear and measurable.

When you hit a goal, sing about it, measure the impact on the business and users, and use this as the foundation to smash the next one out of the park. And the next. And the next.

Define ownership. This is pretty self-explanatory, but to summarise, your governance practice will fall at the first hurdle without senior-level ambassadors and a framework. Get top-down sponsorship by helping your execs understand the importance and impact to the business of having governance enforced.?

Define or refine clear roles and responsibilities across your data estate and enforce these rigorously. Deliverables come from all areas of the business so make sure everyone is aligned on what they’re expected to do.

Review and define your operational model. Your governance framework must align to this as an extension of the model so having a deep and broad understanding of your ops model is key.

Create data definition standardisation. From agility to centralisation, you need to consider and define your business standards.?

P1s. No not the beautiful Mclaren, your critical data assets. What are they, who uses them, and what is their purpose? These should form your primary focus.?

Deploy control measures in applications, business processes and reporting functions where it is best applied.

Set measurable metrics. Think about and document how you will measure and report that your KPIs are being met.?

Communicate, communicate, communicate! You need buy-in from the get-go. Every governance initiative we’ve successfully introduced, and as any data governance practitioner worth their salt will agree, is that communication is an essential part of the practice.?

Lastly, do not underestimate the power of change management! People fear what they do not understand, help them!?

CONCLUSION

Data governance adds enormous value, reduces risk and potentially protects revenue for any business and should be a core focus for anyone determined to be a data driven organisation.?

You cannot boil the ocean (as far as I know), so start small, have a clear plan, and get buy-in from your executives

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Governance requires effort input and constant maintenance to make it live and breathe and grow, like a plant. So you won't need to hire a whole new team, but you will need to put the effort in and commit to making it work the benefits are enormous. C-level sponsorship by giving them an understanding of the impact of governance on the business goes a long way to helping get resources allocated to support a governance initiative and make it a success.?

You are not alone!?

The BI:PROCSI team are highly experienced in data governance end-to-end best practices and gets you started off on the right foot. Or perhaps you’ve already started designing your practice and have hit some obstacles along that way that have blocked you.?

Sharing is caring, so if you would like to bounce ideas off of us and share some knowledge, please get in touch with the BI:PROCSI team. We would be happy to have a digital coffee. We are geeks, at the end of the day; we love this stuff.?