A few weeks back I noted that one of the objectives on an inventory process for reference data was data harmonization, which meant determining when two reference sets refer to the same conceptual domain and harmonizing the contents into a conformed standard domain. Conceptually it sounds relatively straightforward, but as
If you work in a data quality team then chances are you’ll experience that awkward moment when someone in your organization asks the obvious question: "So what does a data quality team do?" Most people (outside of data quality) find this a relatively straightforward question to answer, but it always
My previous post pondered the term disestimation, coined by Charles Seife in his book Proofiness: How You’re Being Fooled by the Numbers to warn us about understating or ignoring the uncertainties surrounding a number, mistaking it for a fact instead of the error-prone estimate that it really is. Sometimes this fact appears to
In one of my prior posts, I briefly mentioned harmonization of reference data sets, which basically consisted of determining when two reference sets referred to the same conceptual domain and transforming the blending of the two data sets into a single conformed standard domain. In some cases this may be
If you’re involved in some way with data quality management then you will no doubt have had to deal with the completeness dimension. This is often one of the starting points for organisations tackling data quality because it is easily understood and (fairly) easy to assess. Conventional wisdom has teams
In his book Proofiness: How You’re Being Fooled by the Numbers, Charles Seife coined the term disestimation, defining it as “the act of taking a number too literally, understating or ignoring the uncertainties that surround it. Disestimation imbues a number with more precision that it deserves, dressing a measurement up as absolute
There are really two questions about reference data lineage: what are the authoritative sources for reference data and what applications use enterprise reference data? The criticality of the question of authority for reference data sets is driven by the need for consistency of the reference values. In the absence of
Whilst it’s nice to imagine a world of perfect data quality the reality is that most organisations will be dealing with data quality defects on a daily basis. I’ve noticed a wide variation in the way organisations manage the life cycle of defects and nowhere is that more apparent in
In my previous post Sisyphus didn’t need a fitness tracker, I recommended that you only collect, measure and analyze big data if it helps you make a better decision or change your actions. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to know ahead of time which data will meet that criteria. We often, therefore, collect, measure and analyze
If we look at how most data quality initiatives start, they tend to follow a fairly common pattern: Data quality defects are observed by the business or technical community Business case for improvement is established Remedial improvements implemented Long-term monitoring and prevention recommended Move on to the next data landscape
