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There are many ways in which you can introduce Data Governance into your organization. It may be easier in smaller organizations, tougher in larger organizations, complicated in global businesses, etc But, no matter how you go about introducing it, remember this critical point for all your positioning, meetings, and messages: In order to succeed in getting data governance funded, started, or in keeping it alive you must either Make Money, Reduce Cost, or Mitigate Risk.

Making money can come in a number of ways. It can be from a sales perspective, where better data ensures your sales force is targeting the right customers or leads. From marketing, a good formula to look for may be, if we improve the quality of X, we can expect the response rate to improve by Y, which results in an increased income of Z.

Reducing cost can be as simple as eliminating cleanup jobs (jobs meaning either staff and or pesky but necessary programs), eliminating the need to support one-off systems, or freeing up FTEs and Project Managers to work on other projects (which is also a money maker).

Mitigating risk includes keeping people out of jail and the news. This day-in-age I dont need to tell you that financial reporting must be correct. Data Governance is absolutely needed to ensure that you are in compliance with Sarbanes-Oxley, Basel II, and any other compliance items that fall on your company. Dont let people forget that. Data Governance is pro-active and reactive Youll be mitigating risks just as well as being the project manager for correcting many known data risks (or worse yet, violations).

Michael S. is the author of the Data Governance Blog, available at http://www.DataGovernanceBlog.com

// posted by wgvx @ 6:38 PM