You know, in the business of Information Technology, we often throw terms around without really having a solid definition of what we're talking about. And much of the blame for this situation rests right at our own feet. But we are also working in a field where things change so rapidly that keeping up can be difficult, so perhaps "blame" isn't the correct word. Maybe we are just moving so fast trying to keep up with things that we don't have the time to devote to defining things properly.
At any rate, as these thoughts were whizzing around my mind I got to thinking about data governance and data management. Now here are two terms that are being thrown aroud a lot lately and just what do they mean? Well, I thought I'd take a stab at differentiating them here. If you agree or disagree or just want to chime in with a thought of your own, feel free to post a comment!
First of all, both data governance and data management are important disciplines that are very much required in order to do justice to treating our corporate data as the valuable asset that it most surely should be. But maybe it is too early for me to state that? After all, I haven't even defined these terms, so how the heck can I unequivically state that they are required? I guess I am ahead of myself... so let's back up.
I assume that everyone here knows what "data" is, so I won't go down the path of defining it here. So, let's define the word that is different in each of these terms. According to Wikipedia:
Governance is that separate process or certain part of management or leadership processes that makes decisions that define expectations, grant power, or verify performance. Frequently a government is established to administer these processes and systems.
On the other hand, Wikipedia defines management as:
the act of directing and controlling a group of people for the purpose of coordinating and harmonizing the group towards accomplishing a goal beyond the scope of individual effort. Management encompasses the deployment and manipulation of human resources, financial resources, technological resources, and natural resources.
So what can we divine about data governance and data management from these two definitions? Well, it would seem that there are similarities, but the purpose of data governance seems to be more high level, that is, it sets expectations. Data management is more goal-orientated. Therefore, it would follow that data management practices and procedures would be enacted within an organization to further the goals and expectations of the organization with respect to data. These goals and expectations are under the control of data governance.
Let's use an example to help clarify what I mean. Perhaps our organization determines that data quality is important. This decision should be under the auspices of the data governance group. Defining exactly what this means and what the organization is prepared to do to ensure the quality of their data is a job for the data governance team. Acting upon these goals, then, would be the job of data management. This could entail:
- Interfacing with database administration to ensure that data quality is a part of every database design (rules, constraints, triggers, etc.)
- Embarking on a data profiling project to uncover data quality problems and
- Analyzing the data quality problems that are found and determining how best to correct them - and avoid them
- And so on
Basically, it seems to me, that data governance and data management, in tandem, are attacking what data administration was charged with when that term was more popular a decade or so ago. It always seemed to me that data administration groups rarely received the support or authority needed to actually be able to carry out their charge. Perhaps now that we are separating the duties we will have a fighting chance of treating data appropriately...
Or maybe I'm just dreaming? What do you think?