While most companies recognize at some level that data is a valuable corporate asset, only a few have appointed a Chief Data Officer (CDO) to help bridge the gap between technology and business and evangelize an enterprise-wide data management strategy at a senior level.
Many CDOs tend to be part business strategist, adviser, data quality steward and all around data management ambassador. Common mandates may includes the following:
- Establishing an organizational data strategy
- Aligning data-centric requirements with available IT and business resources
- Establishing data governance standards, policies and procedures
- Providing advice (and perhaps services) to the business for data dependent initiatives, such as business analytics, Big Data, data quality, and data technologies
- Evangelizing the importance of good information management principles to internal and external business stakeholders
- Oversight of data usage in analytics and Business Intelligence
Regardless of industry, it is common for a Data Management Organization to report up through the CDO. In a more decentralized operating model, the CDO is responsible for the data strategy, but resources that are in IT, operations, or other lines of business execute that strategy. Some DMOs are established initially with the CDO just determining the strategy, and over time other aspects of data management, governance, and analytics are folded under the CDO umbrella as efficiencies and economies of scale are identified.
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