Key Principles of Data Governance — Ed Barker // GM Defense

Ed Barker, Data Literacy Lead at GM Defense, explores data-driven culture and governance. For an organization to become data-driven, data silos must be eliminated. Fortunately, with data governance, organizations can democratize data access to employees while maintaining high data quality for confident decision-making. Today, Ed discusses key principles of data governance.
About the speaker

Ed Barker

GM Defense

- GM Defense

Ed is Data Literacy Lead at GM Defense

Show Notes

  • 01:24
    Empowering confident decision making through data governance
    Data governance provides a way to improve data quality and confidence in decision-making with data. By focusing on aspects like data quality and stewardship, businesses move away from unreliable data gathering approaches toward a structured and trustworthy approach.
  • 04:55
    Data governance and large language models
    LLMs can provide immense value, but relying on them without understanding the quality of underlying data can lead to bad decisions. It's crucial to ensure data quality through data governance practices for a high level of confidence in the LLM.
  • 10:21
    Balancing data accessibility and data governance
    The data catalog is crucial for data democratization. Granting employees in the organization access to the data, with continuous training, generates value, encourages collaborative teams, fosters a data-driven culture, and elevates data governance.
  • 14:35
    Strategies to eliminate data silos
    Breaking down data silos is crucial for a company to become data-driven. To do this, involve the people who have the data in those silos, in data governance, and make them data stewards.
  • 15:49
    Data governance and effective communication
    The role of a data governance lead requires both technical and social skills. The ability to communicate and spread the word about data governance throughout the organizations is just as vital as the technical side.

Quotes

  • "Data governance is not control. We're helping the organization have better data quality, and that better data quality gives us confidence in making data-driven decisions." - Ed Barker

  • "Just having data sit inside of a data warehouse or data mart doesn't do the organization any good. It's only value is generated when the individuals have have access to it and can use it." - Ed Barker

  • "If someone takes a data set and creates value, that's a great one time thing. But when we start to have collaborative teams, we start driving a data-driven culture, and we elevate the awareness of data governance." - Ed Barker

  • "To be a data-driven organization, you must get rid of the data silos. There's no better way to do that than take the person who's holding that data close to them in that silo and turn them into a data steward." - Ed Barker

  • "When leading data governance, you also need to be able to develop a communication plan. You have to constantly be in the face of your employees about data governance, socializing it." - Ed Barker

About the speaker

Ed Barker

GM Defense

- GM Defense

Ed is Data Literacy Lead at GM Defense

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