by Angela Guess
Loraine Lawson recently interviewed Rob Karel, a Forrester Research Principal Analyst regarding his view that “the business should take ownership of master data management.” Karel noted, “It’s less a question of who owns MDM as it is who owns the data of the business. MDM is just an enabler, a set of technologies with the end goal of delivering trusted master data to business processes, decisions and customer interactions and experiences. So the question is who owns those business processes, decisions and customer experiences? Does IT own them? Never. So who owns MDM? Those that care about the data. Why does it matter? If IT owns MDM, they own the definition of quality and usefulness, but they don’t own the consumption of the data so there’s a disconnect.”
When Lawson asked if it’s up to IT to convince the business to take ownership of data, Karel responded, “Yes, because they are in a unique position to understand and embrace the dependencies that the business has on the data much better than many business folks. Here’s why: IT, at the CIO level, often has a view of the business that the business doesn’t have because many business leaders are very division-focused. They’re very focused on their range of responsibility, whereas a CIO is often responsible for many levels across the enterprise, often globally. So IT is often in a unique position to recognize the interdependencies of data across the business than many biz leaders might be. So IT gets it first.”
Karel commented that it can be very difficult to convince the business to take ownership “because data is a very technical-sounding thing. To the business, data equates to databases, programming and technology and things the business is very uncomfortable discussing.”
photo credit: Sugar Pond
