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Rethinking Data-Driven Leadership
After reading a piece a while back on why people “don’t trust data, they only trust other people,” I found myself agreeing — but also seeing another side to the story.  In my experience, leaders don’t trust data directly — they trust the story data helps them tell. Sometimes that story reinforces what they already […]


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Author: Christine Haskell

Thoughts on the DAMA DMBoK
Many years ago, I contributed material on Database Development and Database Operations Management to the first edition of DAMA International’s “Data Management Body of Knowledge” (the DAMA DMBoK).i Now that work has begun on the Third Edition of the DMBoK, I’d like to share a few thoughts and critiques on the DMBoK for consideration. Some […]


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Author: Larry Burns

The Role of AI in Mitigating Next-Generation Cyber Threats
The digital age has witnessed an exponential increase in data creation and interconnectivity, resulting in unprecedented challenges in cybersecurity. Businesses, governments, and individuals are perpetually at risk of cyber-attacks ranging from data breaches and financial theft to espionage and infrastructure sabotage. While necessary, traditional cybersecurity measures are often reactive rather than proactive, struggling to adapt […]


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Author: Srinivasa Bogireddy

Legal Issues for Data Professionals: Preventive Healthcare and Data
This column addresses the role of data in the field of healthcare known as “preventive healthcare.” Preventive healthcare is undergoing changes as data increases its scope and the role it plays in healthcare.  What Is Preventive Healthcare and Its Data?     For the purpose of this article, traditional healthcare refers to patient care received from a […]


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Author: William A. Tanenbaum

AI and Business Transformation: Balancing Innovation and Control
AI is no longer just a concept or a futuristic tool. It’s here and it’s likely already integrated into many aspects of your business, potentially in ways you might not even realize. AI’s potential to transform how we operate, deliver services, and optimize workflows offers significant benefits, but it also comes with responsibilities — and […]


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Author: Ben Hunter III

Is the Scope of Data Governance Enough?
Data governance has long been the backbone of responsible data management, ensuring that organizations maintain high standards in data quality, security, and compliance. According to Jonathan Reichental in “Data Governance for Dummies,” the scope of governance extends well beyond data ownership and stewardship. It encompasses metadata, data architecture, master and reference data management, storage, integration, […]


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Author: Myles Suer

Continuous Delivery for Data Pipelines: A Practical Guide
What Is Continuous Delivery?   Continuous delivery (CD) refers to a software engineering approach where teams produce software in short cycles, ensuring that software can be reliably released at any time. Its main goals are to build, test, and release software faster and more frequently. This process typically involves deploying every change to a production-like environment […]


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Author: Gilad David Maayan

The Data-Centric Revolution: The Year of the Knowledge Graph
Signals are converging and leading me to believe that 2025 is the Year of the Knowledge Graph. But before we get carried away with this prognosis, let’s review some of the previous Year of the Knowledge Graph candidates and see why they didn’t work out.  2001  The first candidate for the Year of the Knowledge […]


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Author: Dave McComb

Beyond Paper Policies: Building a Living Data Policy Framework
Data policies serve as the guardrails for how organizations manage their most valuable asset: data. Just as communities establish guidelines for shared community spaces, data policies provide the framework for how teams access, utilize, and govern their collective and shared data resources.  These policies aren’t merely bureaucratic exercises. They establish the rules of engagement for […]


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Author: Subasini Periyakaruppan

AI’s Newest Employee: Who Bears the Burden of Your Digital Co-Workers?
Digital co-workers are no longer hypothetical. AI-driven agents (“Agentics”) are creeping into every function, every decision process, and every interaction within organizations. In some ways, they are the executive dream — they don’t need coffee breaks, demand raises, or call in sick. And yet, they’re reshaping work in ways few leaders are prepared to handle.  […]


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Author: Christine Haskell

Data Is Risky Business: Is Data Governance Failing? Or Are We Failing Data Governance?
In January, CDO Magazine carried an article by a consortium of authors including Dr. Tom Redman, John Ladley, Dr. Anne-Marie Smith, and others. The eye-catching headline: “Data Governance is failing — here’s why.” The article sets out the results of a Force Field Analysis study carried out by the authors to try and understand why, […]


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Author: Daragh O Brien

A Data Value Manifesto
If you haven’t already heard, a number of organizations have laid off their CDOs and CDO groups and data teams because of a perceived lack of significant or measurable business value. In addition, a recently released report from MIT Sloan delivers some very depressing numbers about the efficacy of CDO groupsi:  The average tenure of […]


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Author: Larry Burns

Living the Ungoverned Life
Organizations often assume they have data governance under control, but in reality, many are simply reacting to data chaos rather than actively managing it. This isn’t due to negligence or a lack of concern — rather, it’s because they don’t recognize that governance is already happening, albeit informally and inconsistently. Every day, employees make critical […]


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Author: Robert S. Seiner

The Serviceberry Mindset: How Nature’s Gift Economy Can Reshape Data Governance
The Death of the Data Silo Is Not the End of the Problem For years, we’ve heard that breaking down data silos is the holy grail of business transformation. We’ve been told that better pipelines, integrated analytics, and AI-driven decision-making will finally unlock the full potential of enterprise data. But here’s the question no one […]


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Author: Christine Haskell

Reimagining Data Preparation for High-Impact Decision-Making
Data often arrives from multiple sources in inconsistent forms, including duplicate entries from CRM systems, incomplete spreadsheet records, and mismatched naming conventions across databases. These issues slow analysis pipelines and demand time-consuming cleanup. Organizations now use machine learning-assisted data preparation to address these challenges, which automatically standardizes formats, detects anomalies, and applies business rules.  Data […]


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Author: Ainsley Lawrence

The Art of Lean Governance: Moving Beyond Governance Buzzwords and Bling
This column will expand on a Systems Thinking approach to Data Governance and focus on process control. The vendors of myriad governance tools focus on metadata, dictionaries, and quality metrics. Their marketing is a sea of buzzwords and bling — bells and whistles. Yet, where is the evidence of adding actual business value, defined as […]


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Author: Steve Zagoudis

Celebrating a Year of Excellence: EDM Council’s Data Excellence Program
The EDM Council’s Data Excellence Program has reached a significant milestone: its first anniversary. The program is proving to be a game-changer in the data management landscape for promoting commitment to best practices and data excellence at the organizational level. Designed to recognize and support organizations dedicated to elevating their data management capabilities, the program […]


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Author: EDM Council

What Are the Benefits of a Citizen Data Scientist Initiative?
The importance of Citizen Data Scientists has become a focus for the wise business executive and manager. Understanding Citizen Data Scientists and how they can supplement analytics and help the organization to be more successful can be a real competitive advantage for a business, whether that business is in a local market, a global industry, […]


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Author: Kartik Patel

Empowering Data Stewards: Building a Forum That Drives Value
Data steward forums are catalysts for organizational data wisdom and cultural transformation. When executed thoughtfully, they become your strongest asset in building a data-driven organization. However, their success hangs delicately on implementation — the difference between fostering lasting engagement and watching enthusiasm fade lies in the fundamental framework you establish from day one.  1. Building […]


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Author: Subasini Periyakaruppan

The State of Data Governance
In 2024, our research at Dresner Advisory Services revealed that only 32% of organizations have a formal data governance organization in place. This statistic highlights a critical gap, especially as machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) are increasingly integrated into operations, expanding business reliance on data and analytic content. Despite the growing importance of […]


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Author: Myles Suer

Data Speaks for Itself: Data Quality Management in the Age of Language Models
Unsurprisingly, my last two columns discussed artificial intelligence (AI), specifically the impact of language models (LMs) on data curation. My August 2024 column, “The Shift from Syntactic to Semantic Data Curation and What It Means for Data Quality,” and my November 2024 column, “Data Validation, the Data Accuracy Imposter or Assistant?” addressed some of the […]


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Author: Dr. John Talburt

Empowering Organizations Through Data Literacy, Governance, and Business Literacy
In my journey as a data management professional, I’ve come to believe that the road to becoming a truly data-centric organization is paved with more than just tools and policies — it’s about creating a culture where data literacy and business literacy thrive.  Data governance, long regarded as a compliance-driven function, is now the backbone […]


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Author: Gopi Maren

Identifying and Addressing Data Overload
Increased data generation requires modern businesses to manage vast volumes of information. All this data holds immense potential for insights and informed decision-making, but its value depends on effective utilization. Without the right tools, frameworks, and strategies, even established companies risk being overwhelmed by data overload.  Let’s take a closer look at data overload and […]


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Author: Irfan Gowani

Data Professional Introspective: Your Organization Can’t Create an EDM Strategy
Some countries successfully create long-term strategic plans. For example, China’s first 100-year plan was aimed at the elimination of extreme poverty by 2020. In 1980, there were 540M people living in extreme poverty; by 2014, there were only 80 million. The second 100-year plan, targeted for 2050, calls for achieving 30% of global GDP, to […]


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Author: Melanie Mecca

Decentralized, Centralized, and Federated Data Governance
In my discussions with CIOs over the last several years, they have repeatedly told me that they strongly dislike traditional data governance. And asked at times, could they just be data custodians. When I asked why, they said they either forced it top-down on their organization, and everyone disliked them for doing it; or, IT […]


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Author: Myles Suer

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