How do Data Stewards Help?

Who “owns” the data? Why do Data Stewards help?

Data Stewards help resolve the perennial question who “owns” the data. Discussions about ownership are probably unhelpful because they imply the ultimate form of responsibility and accountability for data. One party or another is trying to exert influence or avoid accountability.

Maybe it will help to ask what data ownership in an organisation implies. It may be that all those queuing up to claim ownership soon disappear once they understand the implications. I suggest ownership implies managing compliance, privacy, access, lifecycle (create, read, update, delete), maintaining a data glossary and even determining access permissions. The range will be determined by the situation but while ownership does not mean performing all these tasks it does imply responsibility and accountability for them.

Typically, an end user department, let’s say Marketing, will claim to own “their” data but will then shy away from rolling their sleeves up and getting into the detail. Typically Marketing want the IT department to take responsibility for the managing the data. The IT department in turn may complain that their users are unwilling to take business decisions necessary for effective data management. Once the Marketing data moves from being prospects to being customers then other departments Customer Support or Finance all have a stake in the same data. 

In fact, the organisation owns the data and it should be shared and exploited by all. Data Governance provides the framework to allow data management to work for everyone.

The Business Data Steward represents a set of business users, acting as trustees rather than owners of the data. The Data Steward is a subject matter expert bringing an understanding of the business context, users and processes to the wider data management activities. Their role is to champion their area of the business to the rest of the organisation. 

At the same time, the Business Data Steward takes the policies and procedures back to the users. This will ensure regulatory compliance, privacy policies, access control and security remain consistent. At the same time helping driving change and improving data quality.

Most of the key business functions will have a Business Data Steward(s) HR, Finance, Marketing, Sales, Product typically working together within a governance structure. Each will be contributing their understanding of how data flows and how it is used within their part of the organisation.

In case of corporate data – responsibility may be given to a role without individual silo interests (such as a Domain Data or Co-ordinating Data Steward).In a typical organisation there will not be many separate truly corporate-wide data sets this will not be a large burden and it remains a collaborative effort.

A well constructed data/information governance structure will give everybody a voice allowing for consultation while each data element will have people responsible and accountable for it. This will include all aspects of the capture, storage, sharing and even deletion of data.

This question of “ownership” should no longer be a contentious issue. Data governance addresses the real questions of responsibility and accountability for data.