The Leader’s Data Manifesto was introduced at Enterprise Data World (EDW) 2017 in Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
We wrote the Manifesto hoping organizations would use it to set a high standard, debate it internally, align people up and down the organization chart, and crystallize their plans. Obviously we hope people will sign it, but doing so is subordinate to getting on with the work.
We didn’t set out to draft a manifesto. We started as a “study group” as much as anything. We wanted to understand why progress in the data space seems so slow. After all, there are plenty of great examples: in quality, governance, analytics, and so forth. But very few companies can truly claim they “manage data assets” or are really “data-driven.”
Only as we wrote up our results and next steps did it occur to us that we might be on to something more powerful than a simple report.
As we completed the analysis, the manifesto seemed a natural and logical answer to the question “So what are you going to do about it?”
As a group of data professionals that spend most of their day thinking about how best to answer that question within their own worlds, this was a collaborative way to get a broader group to rally around the cause
Data creates innovation opportunities, a growing economy; better health care; a freer, safer, more just society; and everything else we hold dear all depend on better data and men and women who can put that data to work.
Apart from data people, we feel the more important audience includes everyone who touches data. Success depends on many people from the administration staff to senior executives and the Board. We all rely on data and need to ensure it is managed and governed appropriately.
It takes courage to advance data in organizations. We want to create a data community aligned to our Manifesto and make sure our members feel supported and contribute to the cause.
