Establish Data Governance

Establish data trust and accountability with strong governance.

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Contributors

Collibra
Global Data Excellence
University of British Columbia
Knowledge Integrity Inc.
San Diego Zoo
Beca Applied Technologies
Braun Intertec

Your Challenge

Organizations are facing challenges from explosive data growth (volume, velocity) and the need to use more new sources of data like social media (variety) just to remain in business, putting a strain on enterprise data management.
Although the need for a data governance program can be evident, business buy-in remains a real barrier. IT must create a comprehensive governance plan and socialize the value of data governance to gain buy-in.

Our Advice

Critical Insight

Data governance enables data-driven insight. Hearing the word governance can trigger thoughts of bureaucracy, but instead think of governance as a structure for making better use of data.
Collaboration is critical. The business may own the data, but IT understands the data. Data governance will not work unless the business and IT work together.
Data governance is an engine that needs fuel, and it powers the organization up the data value chain. Data governance is an engine that puts the pistons of policies and procedures, master data management, data quality, and data architecture into motion. Without data governance, these elements of data management would not be possible.

Impact and Result

Gather requirements for your data governance program by interviewing key stakeholders and identifying prevalent, data-related pains. Understand how data is created, used, and curated throughout the enterprise to gain a high-level perspective of data requirements.
Identify the organization’s current state of data governance capability along with the target state, identify the gaps, and then define solutions across a balance of planning and control activities to fill those gaps. Ensure business initiatives are woven into the mix.
Create a comprehensive roadmap to prioritize initiatives and delineate responsibilities among data stewards, data owners, and members of the data governance steering committee.
Gain complete buy-in from the business and IT stakeholders to move forward with the implementation of data governance. Effectively communicate initiatives to end users and executives to reduce resistance.

Start here – read the Executive Brief

Read our concise Executive Brief to find out why you should develop a data governance program, review Info-Tech’s methodology, and understand the four ways we can support you in completing this project.

Establish Data Governance – Executive Brief

1. Build a collaborative data governance engine plan

Gain an in-depth understanding of what organizational data is critical to the business and needs governing. Establish a concrete starting point by assessing the maturity of existing data governance initiatives.

2. Develop the data governance implementation roadmap

Create a detailed and practical roadmap based on the organization’s current and future state to show the value of a data governance program to the business.

3. Drive the data governance program engine

Put the councils, committees, policies, and procedures in place to provide the structure that the organization needs to better use its data. Set up a governance framework that will be self-sustaining through ongoing communication plans.

Guided Implementations

This guided implementation is an eight call advisory process.

Guided Implementation #1 - Build a collaborative data governance engine plan

Call #1 - Identify what data governance means to the organization.

Call #2 - Discuss the strategic plans of the business and establish a business context for data governance.

Call #3 - Determine data governance program strategies.

Guided Implementation #2 - Develop the data governance implementation roadmap

Call #1 - Discuss the results of the data governance requirements gathering assessment.

Call #2 - Plan initiatives for data governance.

Call #3 - Create a roadmap and discuss next steps.

Guided Implementation #3 - Drive the data governance program engine

Call #1 - Discuss and create the policies, procedures, roles, and responsibilities that will enable your organization to use its data for shared insight.

Call #2 - Develop a communication plan to maintain the governance program.

Book Your Workshop

Onsite workshops offer an easy way to accelerate your project. If you are unable to do the project yourself, and a Guided Implementation isn't enough, we offer low-cost onsite delivery of our project workshops. We take you through every phase of your project and ensure that you have a roadmap in place to complete your project successfully.

Module 1: Develop a Vision for the Data Governance Program

The Purpose

Identify key business data assets that need to be governed.
Create a unifying vision for the data governance program.

Key Benefits Achieved

Understand the value of data governance and how it can help the organization better leverage its data.
Gain knowledge of how data governance can benefit both IT and the business.

Activities

Outputs

1.1

Establish business context and value of data governance to the organization

1.2

Assess the value, benefits, challenges, and opportunities associated with data governance

1.3

Develop the vision, purpose, and scope of data governance for the business

Defined and holistic data governance vision

1.4

Identify data governance enablers

1.5

Interview business stakeholders

IT and business leadership alignment
Business leadership communication plan
Data governance program charter

Module 2: Assess Data Flow in the Business

The Purpose

Assess which data contains value and/or risk and determine metrics that will determine how valuable the data is to the organization.
Assess where the organization currently stands in data governance initiatives.
Determine gaps between the current and future states of the data governance program.

Key Benefits Achieved

Gain a holistic understanding of organizational data and how it flows through business units and systems.
Identify which data should fall under the governance umbrella.
Determine a practical starting point for the program.

Activities

Outputs

2.1

Evaluate the risks and value of critical data

2.2

Map and understand the flow of data within the business

Data governance scope

2.3

Identify data sources and users

Data flow diagram with identified key data sources and users

2.4

Assess current data governance capabilities

Data governance maturity assessment

2.5

Set target data governance capabilities

Business data glossary

2.6

Identify performance gaps

Module 3: Analyze Gaps and Develop Initiatives

The Purpose

Determine strategic initiatives and create a roadmap outlining key steps required to get the organization to start enabling data-driven insights.
Determine timing of the initiatives.

Key Benefits Achieved

Establish clear direction for the data governance program.
Step-by-step outline of how to create effective data governance, with true business-IT collaboration.

Activities

Outputs

3.1

Evaluate performance gaps for remediation

3.2

Develop alignment of initiatives to strategies

3.3

Consolidate data governance initiatives and strategies

Data policy templates
Job descriptions and RACI

3.4

Develop a project timeline and define key success factors

Data governance initiative plan and timeline

Module 4: Design Roadmap and Plan Implementation

The Purpose

Consolidate the roadmap and other strategies to determine the plan of action from Day One.
Create the required policies, procedures, and positions for data governance to be sustainable and effective.

Key Benefits Achieved

Prioritized initiatives with dependencies mapped out.
A clearly communicated plan for data governance that will have full business backing.

Activities

Outputs

4.1

Develop a plan of action

Data governance roadmap

4.2

Prioritize actions

Action plan

4.3

Build a data governance roadmap (short and long term)

Business case presentation
Job descriptions

After each Info-Tech experience, we ask our members to quantify the real time savings, monetary impact, and project improvements our research helped them achieve. See our top member experiences for this Blueprint, and what our clients have to say.

Client

Experience

Impact

$ Saved

Days Saved

Testimonial

Lane County

Guided Implementation

8/10

$2,647

Breakthrough

Guided Implementation

7/10

N/A

Baldwin Wallace University

Guided Implementation

10/10

$13,236

Crystal is always on point. She has command of this area and always provides valuable insight and information. I was drawn to the scoring method of assessing our position with our data governance team and the framework she provided in linking our new strategy to develop a solid data practice for our organization.

Altro Limited

Guided Implementation

9/10

$40,695

East Carolina University

Guided Implementation

10/10

$13,236

Peoples Bank

Workshop

9/10

$21,178

Allowed us a rare opportunity to spend cross-team time to discuss joint challenges in the data management arena. We had some challenges getting commitment at first, but hopefully that will improve nopw.

Ara Institute of Canterbury

Guided Implementation

8/10

N/A

very early in the process but a very good start. Analysist is obviously very knowledgeable.. Webex is painful and the fact that we do not have phones in our meeting spaces makes the phone/video combination particularly difficult (and I have explained this many times)

Easterseals-Goodwill NRM

Workshop

10/10

N/A

Andritz Inc

Guided Implementation

8/10

N/A

Barton Malow

Guided Implementation

8/10

$13,236

Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario

Workshop

10/10

$50,000

Best part was working through relevant examples, linking the workshop to real problems we face as an organization and then working out the steps to implement the solutions. Very good workshop! The worst part, was realizing just how much work we have ahead of us...

Lane County

Guided Implementation

8/10

$13,236

Lots of really great knowledge and experience. Too short and too much crammed into a very short window of time. We wished we could "pause" the conversation for a few minutes for discussion.

East Carolina University

Guided Implementation

8/10

$13,236

ArcBest Technologies

Guided Implementation

9/10

N/A

I had a very good conversation with Crystal Singh today regarding data governance. The two questions above concerning time and financial savings due to the conversation are a bit premature, in my opinion. We have not formally started down this path and the discussions to date have really been more about better understanding the underlying issues involved in governance and the right approach to take when thinking about governance. I have no doubt that the tools we discussed and the discussion we had will be valuable as move toward a more formal governance initiative.

Blessing Hospital

Guided Implementation

10/10

N/A

Kentucky COT (Commonwealth Office of Technology)

Guided Implementation

6/10

N/A

The Regional Municipality of Peel

Guided Implementation

9/10

$55,000

Beckman Coulter, Inc.

Guided Implementation

10/10

$27,135

Commitment of the Analyst to educate me on the process and direction provided for the Data Governance Initiative planned for my company.

City of College Station, TX

Guided Implementation

10/10

$6,618

Best: The advisor familiar with the topics and use cases. So the conversation is effective. The advisor cares about client's environment setting, which is usually critical to customize the solution.

The Regional Municipality of Peel

Guided Implementation

9/10

$50,000

The best part of my experience was a walkthrough of the customized slides that resonates with where we are at on the project

Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department

Guided Implementation

10/10

$125K

115

The best: Data Governance Organization

LynnCo Supply Chain Solutions, Inc.

Workshop

10/10

$132K

Lehman College

Guided Implementation

10/10

N/A

very useful insights, and very knowledgeable.

Canadian Grain Commission

Guided Implementation

8/10

$2,000

Benchmade

Guided Implementation

8/10

N/A

University of Ottawa

Workshop

10/10

N/A

First Ontario Credit Union Ltd.

Guided Implementation

9/10

N/A

Toronto Community Housing Corporation

Guided Implementation

9/10

$2,000

Larimer County, Colorado

Guided Implementation

8/10

N/A

It's always appreciated when information, knowledge and approaches gets further validated through the expert Analysts lenses at InfoTech.

Apega

Guided Implementation

5/10

N/A

Hello, I was caught off-guard because the analyst I was expecting to speak with didn't make the call. Yet this satisfaction survey was signed by Andrew Neill, as if he was the consultant I spoke with. Bizarre handling on Into~Tech's part. The session was okay, and took awhile to extract the information or answers I needed. I also learned during the session that some of Info~Tech's materials are somewhat unrealistic.