I am (and will be) working on some Data Governance tools like Infosphere Business Glossary, Blue Print Director and Metadata Workbench. So in this blog, I wish to share my understanding of why Data Governance is required for Business Glossary.
Need for Business Glossary:
A business glossary (or data dictionary) is a repository with definitions of key terms that bring together common definitions across business and IT. Having a proper glossary will help answer questions like the following:
- What is the definition of a “customer”? Is a customer someone who has made a purchase, or someone who is considering a purchase?
- Is a former employee still categorized as an “employee”?
- Are the terms “partner” and “reseller” synonymous?
- One department in an organization refers to “revenue,” while another refers to “sales.” Are both departments referring to the same activity?
- One subsidiary talks about “customers,” another about “users” or “clients.” Are these different classifications, or different terms for the same classification?
- The term “landed cost” could mean “landed cost at store,” “landed cost at port,” or “landed cost at distributor.”
Once implemented, the data dictionary can span the organization to ensure that business terms are tied via metadata to technical terms, and that the organization has a single, common understanding.
Need to govern this data:
Business metadata is critical for end users of information. It allows these end users to be confident that the data they rely on for making business decisions is exactly what they expected. But the following can threaten the consistency of data…
- Mergers and acquisitions
- Systemic, siloed approaches to the definition of a common business vocabulary.
Therefore an effective Data Governance and stewardship program is required.
