Implementing an enterprise-wide Data Governance program sets multiple challenges for CIOs and business owners. What’s holding you back?

In today’s technology driven expanse, enterprises recognize the critical importance of their data. It is not just a strategic asset; it is also growing in volumes at an alarming rate. When left unmanaged, this sheer volume of data proves to be a costly affair in terms of storage and risky in terms of security and maintenance.

This is where data governance comes into picture. Data governance (DG) is a set of multi-disciplinary structures, policies and procedures that encompasses an enterprise’s people, processes and information to ensure high quality of business data throughout its lifecycle. It performs the overall management of the availability, usability, integrity, and security of the data employed in an enterprise.

A robust data governance program ensures that CIOs and CXOs can derive the maximum benefit out of their data and can channelize it towards achieving business goals. However CIOs and CXOs face several setbacks in executing a successful data governance program.

Planning out a governance strategy
A data governance strategy involves clear decision making, management and accountability of the enterprise data at stake. Many enterprises understand the need for a strong data governance framework, but they’re not sure where to start from. Especially when there’s heaps of historical data, and fresh data that won’t stop piling up, it becomes all the more complicated. An effective data governance needs a well thought plan that can be built with the assistance of top management and stakeholders, and consulting from industry experts.

Bringing together IT and Business stewards
A successful governance strategy is a result of a solid partnership between business and technology. In most enterprises, there’s no clear understanding between the IT and business heads.  Most DG programs revolve around the IT front, because that’s where all the data sits, but they fail to address critical business challenges. The IT and business sides of an organization need to come together and build a holistic plan that works for the optimum best.

Resource allocation
Implementing a DG program starts with appointing a committee that would be responsible for the enforcement and supervision of the project. Finding the right people, with the right understanding to carry out data governance effectively becomes a key challenge. Another key aspect of data governance is selecting the right technology or software for the best results. With so many software tools in market, going with the right governance solution is critical for decision makers.

Getting it done right
As much as setting the right goals and assigning the right roles is essential, getting it done right is very critical. Executing enterprise-wide data governance is a huge responsibility for CIOs. And even if the DG strategy is ideal, the model is perfect and the resources are experts in their areas, successful implementation is subject to other dynamic factors. In absence of a holistic platform, where all the elements of a DG initiative can be integrated, the best of the strategies can sometimes crumble down.

Compliance with DG policies
CIOs and decision makers put a lot of effort into developing data governance policies. However, over time, these policies become merely printed words and lose their value because they’re not followed in day-to-day operations. Organizations fail to ensure that their governance practices are in compliance with the standard policies, and this affects the quality of data in the long run.

Conclusion:
Good governance allows businesses to tame their data effectively, builds confidence in business data and brings value to it. Pitfalls like these can turn the best practices into the worst practices. However, when the top representatives from IT and business work together with the right software, data governance can lead an enterprise to newer heights.

We’ve reached the Information Age, where an organization’s data is its most vital asset. As data grows in volumes and structure, managing data efficiently becomes a primary business obligation. If you look at the past decade, or the decade before that, data governance was just a nice thing to have. It’s made a comeback as a relatively new and hot topic, and companies are gradually waking up to the growing importance of data governance.

Before a business can really get serious about putting data governance into practice, it must understand what it is all about. There’s no single definition to data governance, and there cannot be. Data governance is a vast phenomenon that aims at improving the quality of data in an enterprise by following the best practices in data management. In a nutshell, data governance is a set of practices that ensures that business data is accessed, utilized, maintained, managed and protected well.

As massive data gets generated every day, the threat of misuse and data breaches increases proportionately. For that, and several other significant reasons, companies are now realizing that adopting a complete data governance strategy will empower them in the long run. Here are a few reasons why data governance has become even more important than before.

Better decision making
Data is inevitably an important raw material for all business decisions and future strategy. A business that fails to manage its data efficiently, later fails at making prudent business decisions. When an enterprise manages its data formally, in accordance with data governance standards, it can clearly understand its current state of affairs. Data governance enables businesses to determine its data needs, plan policies and procedures accordingly and channelize its workforce towards better data management.

Improved Data Quality
Almost all businesses struggle with data quality issues from time to time. But there are very few business leaders who take an action to fix data quality issues. Data governance can drastically fix data quality issues and avoid errors in the future. It ensures that an enterprise’s data is accurate, complete, timely and consistent with all compliance regulations.

Protecting Critical Enterprise Data
A business that deals with sensitive customer information like personal preferences, or banking details etc. is constantly under the threat of data loss or breach. Then there’s critical enterprise data that needs to be cautiously protected. And that’s where data governance comes to rescue – safeguarding critical business and customer information in accordance with data privacy regulations. With data governance in place, companies can avoid costly data breaches and save its sensitive data in a very organized manner.

Reusability of Historical Business Data
Data growth is an alarming issue today. But what we must not forget is that even if new data comes in, old data doesn’t lose its importance. Data drives businesses, and every bit of data is critical business information and can be utilized at any time in future. For this, all historical data needs to be maintained and preserved in a usable format. Data governance builds a foundation for systematic data management, which preserves important business data diligently, making it reusable in the right format at any time in future.

Smooth Data Analytics
Developing an effective data governance framework enables capturing business data and using it from the analytics point of view. Clarity in information and effective data management ensures that data is available in the right format for better analytics. Better analytics in turn means better data reporting, and eventually better decision making from the management perspective.

These are just some of the most essential factors that are driving enterprises towards data governance practices. As long as organizations are driven by data, data governance is here to stay. It is no more just a nice thing to do; it is becoming a legal mandate and a strategic investment for all enterprises, big or small.