data GOVERNANCE

TEN MISTAKES
TO AVOID

when launching your data

governance program

a SAS Best Practices white paper

best
practices
THOUGHT PROVOKING BUSINESS

by
Jill DYCH &
Kimberly NEVALA

data GOVERNANCE

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

[ This white paper was originally published by TDWI. ]

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

data GOVERNANCE

table of CONTENTS
FOREWORD.............................................................................................. 4
MISTAKE #1: FAILING TO DEFINE DATA GOVERNANCE....................... 5
MISTAKE #2: READY, SHOOT, AIM: FAILING TO DESIGN DATA
GOVERNANCE.......................................................................................... 6
MISTAKE #3: PREMATURELY LAUNCHING A COUNCIL....................... 7
MISTAKE #4: TREATING DATA GOVERNANCE AS A PROJECT............ 8
MISTAKE #5: IGNORING EXISTING STEERING COMMITTEES............. 9
MISTAKE #6: OVERLOOKING CULTURAL CONSIDERATIONS............ 10
MISTAKE #7: PREMATURELY PITCHING DATA GOVERNANCE.......... 11
MISTAKE #8: EXPECTING TOO MUCH FROM A SPONSOR............... 12
MISTAKE #9: RELYING ON THE BIG BANG.......................................... 13
MISTAKE #10: BEING ILL-EQUIPPED TO EXECUTE............................ 14

data GOVERNANCE

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

FOREWORD
Good judgment
and sound
decision making
are at the heart of
data governance.

In their recent book, Judgment: How Winning Leaders Make Great Calls, management guru Warren Bennis and his co-author, Noel M. Tichy, explain that judgment is a
process and not a single event. Good judgment and sound decision making are at the
heart of data governance.

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

data GOVERNANCE

MISTAKE #1
failing to define data governance
Data governance has become a veritable rubric for all things data. Google the term and
youll come up with references to data quality, metadata, data warehousing, data ownership, and data security, to name just a few. We define data governance as the organizing framework for aligning strategy, defining objectives, and establishing policies for
enterprise information. What is really important is how you define data governance and
how your organization understands it. As nascent as it is, data governance has failed in
more than one well-meaning company because people misinterpreted its meaning, its
value, and what shape it would eventually take in their companies.
The most common definitional mistake companies make is using data governance
synonymously with data management. Data governance is the decision-rights and
policy-making for corporate data, while data management is the tactical execution of
those policies. Both require executive commitment, and both require investment, but
data governance is business-driven by definition, while data management is a diverse
and skills-rich IT function that ideally reports to the CIO.
Unlike CRM, whichafter an initial failed attemptwould simply be rebranded The
Voice of the Customer and relaunched, once data governance becomes a dirty word,
an organization rarely gets a second chance. You cant use the word governance
here, one brokerage company executive confided recently. Well have to call it something else. Attempts at euphemistic substitutes dont hide the fact that definitional
clarity and a firm vision for data governance do matter.

Data governance
is the decisionrights and
policy-making for
corporate data...

data GOVERNANCE

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

MISTAKE #2
ready, shoot, aim: failing to design data governance
...data
governance is
never exactly
the same across
companies.

As with any strategic initiative that enlists both business and IT and is process-centric
and highly visible, data governance must be designed. Designing data governance
means tailoring it to your companys specific culture, organizational structure, incumbent ownership environment, and current decision-making processes. It means articulating the value proposition for cross-functional and formal decisions about corporate
informationwhether by minimizing compliance exposure or security breaches, overor under-communicating to customers, consolidating product catalogs, or supporting
dozens of other potential business drivers. No two companies treat these issues in exactly the same way, and data governance is never exactly the same across companies.
Consider two of our clients. One client, a multinational bank, is hierarchical and formal.
Decision making is top-down. Budget sign-off goes high up in the organization for
relatively meager expenses. Executives are big on town hall meetings and roundtable
discussions. Consensus reigns.
The other client is a high-tech firm where even business execs are tech-savvy. People
come to work at 10 p.m. with a six-pack, the dog, and some really good ideas, and
start coding until 10 the next morning, when theyll toss the empty beer cans in the
recycling bin, load the dog in the back of the Subaru, and head over to the trailhead.
These guys fix their own problems and make their own decisions. Anarchy is the rule.
Data governance looks very different at these two companies. At the bank, three different governing bodies are involved in the data governance process, each with its
own checks and balances. The high-tech company relies on established yet grassroots
effort. The stewards use an online knowledge base to submit decisions for review, subject to occasional tie-breaking by executives. These stewardship units are endorsed by
divisional managers, who want to see measurements for data quality, integration, and
deployment velocity improve.
If we had arrived at either of these companies with a best practice template for data
governance, we would have been met with rolled eyes and the requisite explanations
of why were different here. The high-tech company would have laughed us out of
the espresso lounge, had we recommended a single business sponsor. Conversely, the
bank requested a formal mission statement with formal hand-off points across different committees for its governance council. In both cases, deliberate data governance
design ensured that governance supports the companys culture, organizational structure, implicit hierarchies, and way of doing business, while making sure its value is well
understood and ultimately measurable.

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

data GOVERNANCE

MISTAKE #3
prematurely launching a council
We see it all the time: An earnest visionary perceives the need for data governance.
She decides that its time for formal consensus and enlists an executive to support her
effort to convene a council of data stakeholders.
An e-mail invitation goes out for the council meeting. Its a lunchtime eventPlease
make your selection from the attached menuand nearly every invitee shows up.
The visionary begins discussing how data is an asset and that the company needs to
begin managing it as such. Heads nod. The visionary goes on to explain that the newly
formed council should meet regularly and discuss the companys prevailing data issues
and address any open problems. The follow-up meeting is scheduled.
Fewer people show up to the next meeting. Someone complains that the company has
never really defined the term customer. Someone else pipes up about bad data on
the billing system. A sidebar conversation starts on CRM consolidation. The next meeting never happens.
In this all-too-common example, data governance isnt overtly cancelled. It simply
fizzles like a damp firecracker. The problem? See Mistake Number Two. Well-meaning
people who see the need will gravitate toward the who conversation (Who should be
on the council? Who will sponsor it?) before understanding the what and the how.
Until a core team of stakeholders deliberately designs a data governance framework
(including guiding principles, decision rights, and the appropriate governing bodies), no
sanctioned, cross-functional council will have either the clarity or the mission to affect
change. There is no free lunch.

...data
governance isnt
overtly cancelled.
It simply fizzles
like a damp
firecracker.

data GOVERNANCE

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

MISTAKE #4
treating data governance as a project
The reality of data
governance is
that it should be
continuous and
systemic.

In a well-intended effort to fix whats broken, many companies will announce data
governance with much flourish and fanfare. An executive might assemble a crossfunctional team, extracting its members from existing projects, creating an ersatz data
governance SWAT team. Others will hang the Center of Excellence shingle and treat
data governance as an isolated organization of data-savvy individuals. Still others will
inaugurate a data quality task force and call it data governance. In each example, data
governance is formed as a discrete effort, when in fact it should be baked in to existing development and decision-making processes.
As those of us in the data warehousing world know all too well, when an initiative is
deemed a project, it is, by definition, finite. One data governance project we know was
positioned as an 18-month effort to get our data house in order, as if, once finished,
the companys data would be perfect and everyone could return to their day jobs.
The reality of data governance is that it should be continuous and systemic. As information needs change, data volumes increase, and new data enters the organization via
new systems or third parties, decisions about how to treat, access, clean, and enforce
rules about data will not only continue, but theyll likely also proliferate. A structured,
formal, and permanent process for making these policies and decisions should be retrofitted into the way a company develops its data and conducts its business.

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

data GOVERNANCE

MISTAKE #5
ignoring existing steering committees
A key indicator of data governance success is an environment that encourages decision-making bodies. Call them councils, steering committees, management roundtables, or advisory teams. These bodies are usually composed of individuals from across
business functions who have both the authority to make decisions and the accountability to ensure that those decisions are enacted and ultimately drive business improvements.
In instances in which the company has already institutionalized steering committees, it
would be foolish not to leverage their knowledge and clout. An executive steering committee at a medical equipment firm reviews data governance council decisions relating
to government and legal compliance and functions as an escalation mechanism. This
not only provides the trustee council with external checks and balances, but it also culturally sanctions data governance. At a retailer, the data governance council includes
a seat for a member of the business user advisory team, who arrives just in time to
review and approve a set of data correction rules.
By inviting incumbent decision-making bodies to participate in the data governance
process, you effectively institutionalize data governance as a component of corporate
policy making. You also implicitly enlist the support of a variety of individuals, and
change occurs one person at a time.

....it would
be foolish not
to leverage [an
institutionalized
steering
committees]
knowledge and
clout.

data GOVERNANCE

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

MISTAKE #6
overlooking cultural considerations
...establishing
unambiguous
decision rights is
a requirement for
governance to
thrive.

A client recently confessed that in our organization, anything-to-one is a tie. Although

data governance council members were active and engaged, seemingly straightforward decisions nevertheless caused deadlock. A lone dissenter could hold the process
hostage. Suggestions to appoint a chairperson to break ties were met with disfavor.
Participation in the process waned.
Changing entrenched organizational paradigms and behaviors is perhaps the biggest
obstacle for any governance effort. Examples include a corporate culture that stresses
consensus over clear accountability, the absence of decision-making protocols, individuals unaccustomed to making decisions, or poor communication and planning.
Common organizational constraints can derail governance before it begins.
Regardless of your organizations explicit structure and biases, establishing unambiguous decision rights is a requirement for governance to thrive. Existing cultural norms
should inform, but not necessarily dictate, how decision rights and accountability are
assigned. Effective governance often challenges intrinsic ideas about what decision
making means. Therefore, the governance program must also clearly articulate its
mission and value, develop communication plans, and plan for, champion, and reward
changeoften one business constituent or person at a time.
Remember: one size does not fit all. The design of your governance must address the
unique challenges and biases in your organization. Although change is hard, companies with effective governance processes can generate up to 40 percent higher ROI on
their IT investments than their competitors, according to researchers Peter Weill and
Jeanne Ross. When it comes to governance, patience and perseverance really do pay
off.

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Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

data GOVERNANCE

MISTAKE #7
prematurely pitching data governance
In todays environment, executives and staff alike are wary of the sweeping reforms
and lofty benefits typically promised by enterprise programs. (Remember CRM?) As a
result, even the most crucial enterprise data governance effort can start with one mark
against it. Soliciting C-level executive sponsorship, broadly evangelizing expected
outcomes, or establishing working teams without a clearly defined vision or framework
to achieve the intended solution are all fraught with risk.
In the first phase of its data governance program, a national financial services company
solicited several business and IT subject-matter experts to function as data stewards.
The stewards were tasked with identifying high-impact data issues within their domains
that governance would rectify. The stewards did an excellent job. The problem: there
was no defined procedure to validate, prioritize, or resolve the ever-increasing flood of
identified business problems whose root causes could be attributed to data issues.
In this all-too-common example, a team was assembled and significant effort expended to expose some particularly painful data sores without a method to heal them.
A majority of the issues uncovered were good candidates for governance, but the lack
of appropriate expectation-setting prior to the exercise led to frustration and mistrust.
Data governance became the proverbial dirty word, and getting business owners back
to the table to talk about how to implement governance and close the loop remained
an uphill battle.

...the lack of
appropriate
expectationsetting prior to
the exercise led
to frustration and
mistrust.

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data GOVERNANCE

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

MISTAKE #8
expecting too much from a sponsor
...there is a limit
to what even a
great sponsor
can be expected
to do.

Executive support and management sponsorship for data governance are critical. A
motivated sponsor, with a clear vision and the ability to communicate it to both senior
executives and those he manages, is an important contributor to governance success.
That being said, there is a limit to what even a great sponsor can be expected to do.
Consider this scenario: A company initiates data governance after a strategic business intelligence program fails to deliver expected results due to various data issues.
At the CEOs behest, key business stakeholders from each region are elected to a data
governance steering committee. At the initial meeting, the CEO describes his vision
for data governance, outlines some expected outcomes, and bids the group adieu.
His expectation? That the stakeholders will move the ball forward and define a plan for
execution.
Sponsors, particularly those at the executive level, believe that value lies in their support, not their participation. They are, therefore, best leveraged to communicate the
vision and objectives of data governance to their respective organizations. When it
comes to sanctioning and evangelizing the program or rallying the troops, nothing
beats an effective and engaged sponsor. Just dont expect them to do the heavy lifting
involved in data governance design.
Sponsorship for the data governance program will change over time to reflect current
business priorities and needs. The framework and process under which governance
executes should not.

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Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

data GOVERNANCE

MISTAKE #9
relying on the big bang
The mantra think globally, act locally is particularly apt when embarking upon data governance. The issues addressed by data governance are far-flung and pervasive, ranging from arbitration of cross-functional data usage to information privacy, security, and
access policies. As a result, governance initiatives attempting to address an array of
enterprise needs in one big bang are quickly squelched by role confusion, prioritization
debates, emergency development projects, and a general backlash of the incumbent
culture.
Add the inevitable kinks to be worked out in any new process, regardless of how considered the design, and failure inevitably follows.
To avoid these risks, successful programs begin with a series of tightly scoped initiatives with clearly articulated business value and sponsorship. In the case of one pharmaceutical company, a state compliance reporting project served as the initial proving
ground for governance. As state reporting issues were resolved, the director of compliance unveiled the programs success to other decision makers in their respective
areas. The success of the initiative was related to the effectiveness of data governance,
thereby encouraging participation among additional stakeholders and helping to enlist
new sponsors.
As the old saying goes, Rome wasnt built in a day. Neither is a mature enterprise
data governance program. While an incremental approach takes time, not to mention
patience, it engenders business support by demonstrating the value of governance in
a context relevant to each stakeholder or sponsor. Most important, a phased approach
establishes data governance as a repeatable, core business practice rather than a
standalone once and done project.

...successful
programs begin
with a series of
tightly scoped
initiatives with
clearly articulated
business value
and sponsorship.

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data GOVERNANCE

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

MISTAKE #10
being ill-equipped to execute
To be perceived
as valuable, data
governance must
be measured...

Most companies do a good job of implementing governance policies within the scope
of an initial business process or application release. However, the need for ongoing
maintenance and auditing is frequently overlooked or underestimated. Because data is
constantly being generated, new applications are added, business processes change,
and users come and go, data management becomes a full-time endeavor. Anyone who
has been involved in a massive, one-time data clean-up or conversion project, only to
have dirty data reappear over time, understands this all too well. Vigilance is required
to monitor compliance with existing standards, enforce new behaviors, and ensure that
old habits dont creep back into common usage.
We define data management as the tactical, day-to-day execution of data governance
policies. For example, a typical data governance policy may mandate that sensitive customer data be stored in secure formats and available only to authorized users. Implementation of an appropriate storage algorithm and ongoing maintenance of
user permissions are data management functions typically handled by resources in IT,
security, or by a formally designated data management group. Such a group should be
equipped to tackle these issues as the business continues to evolve.
Data governance and data management are symbiotic by nature. The most relevant or
vital data governance policy is of little merit just sitting on a desk. To be perceived as
valuable, data governance must be measured, ultimately demonstrating positive outcomes and hard payback. To do that, you must be able to manage data in a structured
and tactical way.

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Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Launching Your Data Governance Program

data GOVERNANCE

This has been a SAS Best Practices white paper. Thank you for reading.

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about the authors

JILL DYCH is an acknowledged speaker, author, and blogger on
the topic of aligning IT with business solutions. As the Vice President of SAS Best Practices, she speaks, writes, and blogs about
the business value of analytics and information. Prior to joining SAS,
Jill was a partner and co-founder of Baseline Consulting, where she
combined the roles of best-practice expert, industry gadfly, key client advisor, and all-around thought leader. She has led client strategies and market analysis in the areas of data governance, business
intelligence, master data management, CRM, and big data.
KIMBERLY NEVALA is responsible for industry education, key
client strategies, and market analysis in the areas of business intelligence and analytics, data governance, and master data management.She has over 15 years experience advising clients on the
development and implementation of strategic customer and information management programs and managing mission-critical projects.She is the co-author of the first eBook on data governance,
The Data Governance eBook: Morals, Maps and Mechanics.

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