Mahmoud Yassin, Senior Data Manager at Booking.com, speaks with Derek Strauss, Chairman at Gavroshe, and CDO Magazine Editorial Board Member, in a video interview about his approach to data governance, making governance more engaging, and how organizations should approach their data governance journeys.
Starting the conversation, Yassin describes data governance as an important pillar of the ecosystem around data management. He mentions using the “PPTD Framework” (People, Process, Technology, and Data) while driving change.
He further breaks it down as the following:
The people who should be accountable for the data. It starts with agreeing on and defining the rules for data that supports the organization.
Defining a process that safeguards governance while still empowering people
The supported technologies required in the organization to have seamless data governance
The data strategy is a critical part needed for complete governance
Yassin mentions data governance as a tedious routine task that needs to be done, like brushing teeth.
In terms of assigning data responsibilities to the various levels of the organization, Yassin says that there has to be a balance between the business and data teams. While certain aspects need to be pushed towards the data producers, the IT side can act as an enabler for self-service IT making it easier for the business to adopt it.
Speaking further on the governance aspect, Yassin discusses the “Shift Left” approach which means to enable governance during the early stages of data creation. This can help avoid hassles during the analytical stages and all the steps till the business intelligence dashboard.
When asked about how organizations should approach data governance, Yassin says that they should not try to solve everything at once. He urges data teams to classify data into critical and noncritical data elements. For a bank, the critical aspects could be the ones that introduce business, reputational, or operational risk.
Flagging critical data elements and analyzing them better can be a way to introduce better governance in waves, concludes Yassin.
CDO Magazine appreciates Mahmoud Yassin for sharing his insights and data success stories with our global community.