Why Managers Lack Confidence in Their Firm's Data

By Dennis McCafferty

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Why Managers Lack Confidence in Their Firm's Data

IT managers overseeing their enterprise's data quality initiatives struggle to deal with large data volumes, human error and a lack of data standardization.
Lacking Confidence

Only 2% of the global management-level professionals surveyed completely trust their company's data, and 82% said it takes at least six months to get a data quality initiative approved.
Trust Issues, Part I

41% said their enterprise's large data volume creates significant challenges in achieving trust in the data, while 38% cited a lack of data standardization.
Trust Issues, Part II

38% of the respondents said the immense variety of data creates major challenges in achieving trust in data, while 33% cited human errors.
Who's in Charge?

42% said the IT department is responsible for data quality in their company, while 23% said the customer service department is.
Personnel Problem

Just 17% of the respondents said their organization has a centralized data quality role, and only 29% said their company has designated data quality sponsors.
Too Many Cooks

80% reported that there are too many stakeholders involved in building a business case for data quality.
Cumbersome Approach

Nearly half of the respondents said manual processes are either the main or primary methods used to measure data quality at their company.
Lacking Capabilities

Only 21% said their organization deploys a platform approach to profile, monitor and visualize data, and just 30% said they use data quality tools to focus on discovery and root-cause
Damage Assessment

56% of the respondents said bad data leads to lost sales opportunities, and 51% said it causes inefficient processes and wasted time.
Challenges Building a Case for Data Quality Efforts

Lack of funding: 40%, Lack of knowledge and skills: 33%, Absence of a dedicated owner to drive strategy: 25%, Need to justify ROI: 23%, Difficulties in integrating business data: 21%
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Nearly all managers lack complete confidence in their company's data, according to a recent survey from Experian Data Quality. The accompanying report, "Building a Business Case for Data Quality," indicates that, despite the trust issues, it often takes many months for companies to approve data quality initiatives. Meanwhile, IT managers overseeing these efforts struggle to deal with large data volumes, human error and a lack of data standardization. Complicating matters is the fact that most organizations haven't assigned centralized data quality roles or data quality sponsors to address these issues. To effectively respond to the challenges, tech leaders and other senior executives must make a strong case for data quality initiatives—a case that will hopefully help their company overcome challenges such as a lack of both funding and qualified data quality personnel. "Implementing a successful data quality program is imperative to your organization's future," according to the report. "But building a business case for data quality is often a lot harder than it seems. Given the amount of anecdotal evidence that circulates in organizations, generating quantifiable proof of a business impact can often prove quite difficult. Yet, if you are able to successfully tie the results of your data quality program back to your business' strategic objectives, you can unequivocally articulate its value to your business leaders and win their support." More than 400 global management-level professionals took part in the research.

This article was originally published on 2016-10-21

Dennis McCafferty is a freelance writer for Baseline Magazine.

Why Managers Lack Confidence in Their Firm's Data

Why Managers Lack Confidence in Their Firm's Data

Lacking Confidence

Trust Issues, Part I

Trust Issues, Part II

Who's in Charge?

Personnel Problem

Too Many Cooks

Cumbersome Approach

Lacking Capabilities

Damage Assessment

Challenges Building a Case for Data Quality Efforts