I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Mark Humphries, a seasoned practitioner who has combined both process improvement and data quality management tactics to create some really impressive bottom line benefits for his employer.

One of the key points Mark brought out in his interview was the difference between "process improvement folks" and "data quality folks." He cited subtle differences like clothing - which I hadn’t really considered before - but more importantly, he noted that data quality practitioners often use quite negative language to describe improvement opportunities.

I’ve been dwelling on this over the last few days, and I have to agree that as an industry we do seem to be driven towards the use of negative words and descriptions when communicating data quality.

I remember in one engagement identifying significant defects in a provisioning system for a utilities process. The issues were evidently causing serious bottom-line losses and I communicated this to the stakeholder. I was dismayed and frustrated when they failed to act on the problems, but in hindsight my language and communication were definitely biased towards the negative. Mark’s words now ring in my ears, and given the opportunity to roll back the years I would love to approach that meeting again and put a more positive spin on the situation.

The reality is that every data quality defect is an opportunity. If you’re recovering stranded assets or slashing lead times, then you’re creating profit opportunities in exactly the same way you would by streamlining your business processes or optimising your service channels. Take apart that next data quality presentation and dissect your language. How could you transform the story into one of opportunity and optimisation instead of defects and finger-pointing?

What do you think? Are we data quality practitioners too fond of communicating the doom and gloom of data? I welcome your views and experiences.