The Best Way to Establish an Enterprise Data Governance Program in Your Organization

Retail, medical, nonprofit and just about every other professional field now relies on data as the primary driver of processes and procedures at all levels. As the influence of Big Data continues to grow exponentially, along with the impending permanent connectivity of all machines that is the Internet of Things, the need for a comprehensive enterprise data governance program is critical. Not only does it ensure your organization maintains regulatory compliance, it also serves as a check on the way you use your customer’s data.

Do the processes you have in place for enterprise data governance meet your organization’s values and principles? Do you have business data management software that can be integrated into your system and configured to the specific and ever-changing compliance requirements of your industry? The right kind of business data management software can help your organization avoid compliance issues and reduce the associated costs by plugging into your existing IT systems. The following is a way you can create, implement, and maintain an enterprise data governance program tailored to your organization.

Align Your Data Governance Goals with Regulatory Compliance

Before researching the software you should implement for your data governance program, your organization should take a comprehensive approach of looking at your overall data governance structure as it relates to each of your processes. Data quality should be the first area considered, as the risk of penalties and fines can have more than a monetary impact, negatively affecting customer satisfaction and the strength of your brand.

As the regulatory requirements shift, your data governance program should be able to make real-time operational adjustments. Once you get the basic guiding principles established, know that enterprise data governance is an ongoing process that should be updated continuously and applied across any existing silos in your business.

Establish Requirements for Data Quality and Accuracy

At its core, enterprise data governance is a dedicated process guiding the management of data as a shared enterprise asset. Employees and stakeholders (starting from the top down) in your organization need to first agree on the level of quality expected as well as the specific rules and regulations applying to each piece of data. Next, you should implement procedures that ensure all employees comply with these policies. Notifying the appropriate parties of any new definitions, formats, and regulatory requirements is essential to maintaining a proactive, robust data governance model.

Implement Data Governance at the Start of New Processes

Every single new process comes with new data that has to be accounted for and governed. Apply the enterprise data governance principles you have established at the beginning of any new initiative or reconfiguration. An accountability infrastructure where stakeholders know their role in each step of the process ensures your data governance program is applied uniformly throughout the organization. This helps maintain a high level of data quality while saving you time and money if any one process falls through the cracks.

Update Your Data Governance Program Constantly

Once you have enterprise data governance in place, you are just getting started. A significant investment in the follow-through will allow your organization to avoid potential inefficiencies and annoyances. Adhering to your data governance program is key to maintaining data security, continuity, and availability. Data belongs to the enterprise, and the stakeholders and employees are merely stewards of the data, all answering to the same data governance program.

Black Oak Analytics employs High Performance Entity Resolution (HiPER), an entity identity information management (EIIM) system, and functions as a data management and integration tool for organizations trying to streamline understanding of their organizational data assets. Having access to, and being able to view all of your company’s data is more easily attainable with a highly configurable data integration tool that can plug in to your existing IT ecosystem. Once entity resolution has been applied to your existing data assets, data governance can then help guide business decisions moving forward.

If you are interested in learning more about data governance or our data management and integration software, contact Black Oak Analytics today.

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