Data governance helps have the right data with the right quality to the right person at the right time at the right cost. This is efficiency. It is safe to say that if an organization has poor data that it affects the organization’s efficiency and productivity. Staff spend more time on finding, cleaning, and reorganizing data than on actual data analysis. It is the inefficiencies, misunderstandings and redundancies that occur before decision makers get together that are the real cause of underperformance, and which need to be fixed first. In this blog post, learn the many ways that data governance helps with an organization’s efficiency.
Search and Knowledge Base
It is inefficient if the staff of an organization is wasting time searching for any kind of information. A critical part of data governance is to have all data governance-related content in a knowledge base that is accessible and easily searchable. Having one knowledge base as one source for information saves on search time, eliminates duplication, and reduces confusion. This knowledge base contains specifications of reports, business glossary entries, data quality rules, reference data lists, and data system inventory items. Save staff time for access requests as the data system inventory information on how to access data system is easily accessible. Document the integration between data systems so that when changes are necessary these changes will be more easily made. Better information in glossaries, data system inventories and report specifications will allow for better decision making which is always more efficient. Having specifications in one place will save time when a similar report or dashboard is necessary as the existing specification can be copied and modified. Often a knowledge base can be initially loaded from other sources to get the minimum amount of content necessary to be used and then modified to fit the organization.
Eliminate and Know What You Have
It is inefficient for an organization to manage redundant systems, software data packages and processes as it is a waste of staff time (and possibly money). Data governance allows you to know what you have regarding data systems so that redundant systems can be found. Eliminating multiple request and ticketing systems will save staff time as no additional training on these redundant systems will be necessary. When an organization eliminates data silos, unnecessary data systems and redundant processes their is a saving on training costs, licensing costs and time spent on management of these items. Data governance includes assessing the data, the content about the data, the data systems, the data quality, the processes and the people you have in place. With this assessment you can see what is not needed and take the appropriate action.
Trust in Data, Data Quality and Decision Making
It is inefficient if the organization's staff does not trust the data they are using. This affects decision making. Data governance improves data quality which improves trust in data. Data governance provides for data policies, data quality assessments and data quality rules which improves data quality and trust in data. Time and money are being lost by organizations when data analytics must be reworked due to data quality issues. Employees are spending time resolving issues related to preparing data for analysis. To close the data trust gap, data governance focuses on how data is collected, stored, analyzed, and reported. Having data quality rules in place will improve data quality as staff will know what items need to be fixed before they impact decision making.
People and Subject Matter Experts
It is inefficient if an organization's staff do not know who to contact if they have a data-related question or issue. Or if it takes a long time finding the knowledgeable person. A key element to data governance is data stewardship. A staff member needs to know who to contact and how to contact when they have a data related question or request. Let the subject matter expert solve the issue instead of someone who does not have the training or knowledge to handle the question or issue.
Monitoring and Notification
It is inefficient if surprises happen, and someone in the organization must drop everything to resolve. Data governance provides monitoring and notifications when data related issues occur. It is very helpful when a data rule automatically notifies the appropriate person when there is a data quality issue. And monitoring of reference data changes will allow for the fixing of items before a change becomes a fire drill fix which is expensive and frustrating. Hard to be efficient if an organization does not know about it. Also, managers can review the progress of data requests, a part of data governance, so that they are being handled efficiently.
Process
It is inefficient when staff in an organization have data requests (such as a new report, a new definition, change in an integration, or notification of a data quality issue) and there is no easy way to submit the request. A data request process, an important part of data governance, allows for better tracking of data requests. The requests get routed to the appropriate person (data steward) and can be monitored by management.
Data governance lets an organization know what it has. There is one version of the truth. Data governance provides data lineage which answers the question of where did that data come from. Data governance lets you make changes quickly and find information quickly. Data governance gives organizations a better understanding of its data so that it can be used more efficiently. Data governance gains more trust in data and therefore better decision making happens. We hope that in this blog post you learned the importance of data governance regarding your organization’s efficiency.
IData has a solution, the Data Cookbook, that can aid the employees and the organization in its data governance, data intelligence, data stewardship and data quality initiatives. IData also has experts that can assist with data governance, reporting, integration and other technology services on an as needed basis. Feel free to contact us and let us know how we can assist.
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