Data is an asset, and like any enterprise asset, it must have an owner who is accountable for its definition, quality, security, and availability. Data ownership precedes any attempt to monetize or exploit data and analytics capabilities.
Data ownership should not reside solely with IT. Assign ownership to business domains – finance, HR, marketing, operations – who understand the meaning and lifecycle of their data.
Apply Responsibility-Accountability-Consulted-Informed (RACI) models to critical data elements to define roles across the data lifecycle, including creation, modification, use, sharing, and deletion.
Data owners must actively participate in governance councils, helping define standards, approve changes, resolve conflicts, and sponsor data quality initiatives.
Provide owners with data catalogs, lineage diagrams, profiling reports, and access audits so they can monitor and take action on their data responsibilities.
Make data ownership part of leadership performance objectives, tying clean and governed data to operational excellence, compliance, and innovation KPIs.
Where ownership is unclear, data often becomes unusable or risky. Use data classification and mapping to flag orphaned data sets and escalate ownership gaps.
When ownership is clear and supported, organizations can trust their data and unlock its full potential – responsibly and strategically.