Aravind Jagannathan, VP and Chief Data Officer for Single-Family, Freddie Mac, speaks with Nazar Labunets, Product and Content Marketing Manager at Ataccama, in a video interview about the organization, the three building blocks of an organizational data strategy that led to the birth of CDO 2.0, the role of CDO 2.0, organizational challenges, data modernization, and deriving business value.
Jagannathan introduces Freddie Mac as a government-sponsored entity whose mission is to make home possible. The residential side provides financing for residential single-family homes. The organization has a second business line - multifamily, which handles the commercial side, and a capital markets division, supporting the securitization and processing of the asset-liability book.
As a CDO, Jagannathan’s role revolves around data governance, quality, and data strategy which is the defensive side of data organization. He affirms being responsible for data assets within the division and the enterprise, ensuring that data is moving effectively across the ecosystem.
Further, Jagannathan enables those assets and takes care of modernizing, and the business intelligence, about analytics for the division. He also implements the industry data standards across the mortgage sector.
When asked about CDO 2.0, he explains that in terms of value generation, having a C-title at an organization is directly proportional to developing and driving value quickly. Especially in a data organization, a CDO must deal with the business product, management, and understand what works and avail opportunities.
Delving further, he recalls how he enhanced the organizational data strategy since joining in 2019. He mentions creating three building blocks that reflect evolution. The first one was called “managed content” and it covered everything from risk, privacy, information security, and data risk to standards, data quality, governance, and strategy. He maintains that CDO 1.0 focused on these.
Jagannathan believes this to be the bedrock of CDO’s origin. The second building block was called “trust your source.” It covered managing all these assets and ecosystems from warehousing to data products and ensuring that data is moving effectively and is done efficiently.
The last building block, which became the foreshadowing of CDO 2.0 is “empowering your business.” That covers the enablement of those assets, the business intelligence, and the industry data standards, says Jagannathan.
In addition, he stresses that CDO 2.0 is focused on the offensive data strategy for which he is responsible. The management is reliant on CDOs to harness the power of data, and the goal is to get enhanced analytics and better decision-making. Jagannathan states that all the building blocks and enablers are tied to ultimately showing how it is linked to the overall business strategy and business goals.
Further, there are risk indicators or metrics that show progress to management so that they know if they are getting value for money. Looking at the overall evolution of CDO 2.0, Jagannathan states that the role is not just focused on governance and compliance but is discussing analytics and trying to make data an asset for the company.
Speaking about the challenges, Jagannathan says that the defensive capability that includes standards, information security, and threats keeps on changing. Therefore, there has to be a balance between the defensive and the offensive side.
Explaining further, he states that even with artificial intelligence and machine learning, the organization must ensure that the data is protected and accurate. Referring to peer companies, Jagannathan shares that everyone is modernizing by moving into the cloud, and the company is also in its journey that will probably be completed by 2025.
With various partners across the board like Snowflake, Amazon, and Collibra, the goal is to take the ecosystem to the next generation. Sharing some statistics, he mentions having over a US$ 3 trillion balance sheet and over 11 million active loans and being responsible for creating and supporting U.S. housing finance.
Moving forward, Jagannathan breaks down data modernization into a couple of components:
Simplifying the ecosystem
Meeting the means
According to him, simplifying the ecosystem creates that efficiency, and meeting the means, implies the future around analytics becoming more predictive and prescriptive, hitting around machine learning, and AI.
Furthermore, Jagannathan states that with this, organizations will have harnessed the power of data that can happen in the new ecosystem. He affirms that this is the business line where he supports both acquisitions and portfolio side within the division.
In conclusion, it is always about deriving business value, says Jagannathan. It is not just technology for the tech side. It is the value that CDOs are generating to support sourcing, securitization, and servicing business.
CDO Magazine appreciates Aravind Jagannathan for sharing his insights with our global community.