Most companies today are dealing with seemingly endless amounts of data. Whether that data stays within the company or is part of what a company offers to consumers, knowing how to access data, what data sources you have, and what you want that data to achieve are all important tasks to take on. That is why it is so important for your company to create a data catalog that is specific to your business needs.
Creating a data catalog for your business will take your goals for your data and lay out a clear plan for what you will do with it, both now and in the future. This can be a huge asset for data access and distribution within your company. Here are three tips to get you started creating your company's data catalog.
1- Define the Requirements for Your Business
Before you begin to build a data catalog for your business, you must first understand what requirements your business will need to make sure the data catalog is useful and functional for teams that have access to it. These requirements will vary for every business because every business has different goals that need to be accomplished.
Some common achievements that a company can consider when starting to build a data catalog include improving compliance, reducing the costs of computation and data storage, or enabling self-service abilities for data consumers. Once your requirements are defined, you can move on to the next step of the data catalog process.
2- Identify Your Company's Data Sources
Your company cannot build a data catalog without knowing where the data you are including comes from. A data catalog needs to be detailed in where you are getting your data and how your team will be accessing these sources. It is important to not only consider current ways of gathering and accessing data, but also to consider any future ways that your data sources may be accessed. This will help you build a data catalog that can be easily updated to reflect the current situation of your company's data.
3- Document Use Cases
When building a data catalog, you need to understand why it would be useful for your company to have. Every business will have different needs for a data catalog, and therefore, different use cases. Some of the most common use cases include data compliance management, root cause analysis, and data issue alerting that can be used in a proactive way. Just like how every company's data catalog will be different, every company's use for the data catalog will be different too.
These use cases may also evolve over time, considering what type of data is being collected and how your company uses that data changes to better meet the needs of the company and your customers.
Once you have completed these tasks, you will have a data catalog that provides you with a clear picture of your data assets, access points, and what you can do now and in the future to maintain compliance, access, and security. This will help you build trust and credibility with every consumer you work with to make your business stand out from the competition.
