The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Data Maturity Assessments

Assessing your Data Maturity – Why Bother?

Data is an increasingly critical asset for organisations of all types, from public sector to private sector, from NGO to scaling-up small business. As we generate increasingly vast quantities of data, it is important for organisations to step back and get an understanding of how well they are doing in putting data to use, or are they simply generating waste data, wasted time, and wasteful business practices. This blog post delves into the essence of data management maturity assessments, their purpose, and the strategic role they play in an organisation’s overall planning and goal setting.

Understanding Management Maturity Assessments

But what is a Data Management Maturity Assessment? At its core, a data management maturity assessment (DMMA) is a systematic evaluation process used to measure an organisation’s data management capabilities against established best practices. In many ways it’s like the fitness assessment you might take at the gym before embarking on a ‘get fit’ programme.

• You’ll need to think about what your goals are. In the gym that might be ‘lose weight’, ‘improve aerobic fitness’, or ‘be able to run 10kms in under 60 minutes’. In a data maturity assessment context these goals will be your organisation’s strategic goals and objectives. You are gathering and processing a lot of data… what do you want to use it for?
• You’ll need to think about what capabilities you’ll need to develop to help meet those goals. For example, in the gym you might need to build core strength or develop flexibility. In a data context you might need to have better quality data, or be able to share data internally or externally better. The important thing to remember here is that, in the gym, your capability will never be defined as “be able to use the equipment better”. So, in a data maturity assessment your capabilities should not be defined from the perspective of technologies.
• You’ll need to think about your fitness plan and what is achievable. It’s a sad fact of the fitness industry that most gym memberships are not used after the first three months. It’s also a sad fact that many people set their fitness goals back by pushing for goals at a pace that isn’t achievable or sustainable, leading to injury or other setbacks. The same is true of data management maturity assessments: if the goals you set for improvement are too ambitious or unrealistic, you can set your transformation back.

What is the purpose of a Maturity Assessment?

The primary goal of a Data Management Maturity Assessment (DMMA) is to provide a clear and objective picture of an organisation’s “data fitness level”. This insight is crucial for planning, as it helps to align data strategies with business objectives, ensuring that data acts as a catalyst for growth and innovation rather than a stumbling block.

It is essential, however, that the “data fitness level” is not measured just by looking at one or two areas of fitness. Your fitness coach in the gym will want to look at a range of dimensions of your physical fitness as part of a holistic view of your total fitness as part of putting together a get-fit plan. Likewise, a data management maturity assessment will need to take into account several dimensions of data fitness, including organisation culture and readiness for change, to make sure your data fitness transformation is achievable and sustainable.

Maturity Assessments as a Strategic Planning Tool

My fitness coach in my gym is pretty much against me trying to run a marathon anytime soon, and they definitely don’t rate my chances of completing one in less than 3 hours in the next 3 months. I don’t have the required levels of fitness at the moment across a number of dimensions (weight, aerobic and cardiovascular conditioning, etc.). If that was my goal (it’s not) then it would not be realistically achievable, and trying it (at my current levels of fitness) could be detrimental to my health. So it’s a good thing that running the Dublin City Marathon in October isn’t one of my strategic fitness goals.

A Data Maturity Assessment provides the same insight for an organisation into what is possible and over what timescale. It allows organisations to assess and prioritise their strategic goals, and to ensure that appropriate investment is made in the key data management capabilities that are needed to succeed on the critical goals of the organisation. However, the clarity on organisational goals and high-level data strategy is an essential input! Without a clear understanding of where the organisation aims to go, it’s challenging to assess whether the current data management practices are adequate or need refinement.

But if I did want to run that marathon, I would use my fitness assessment, and regular measurement of progress against my fitness improvement plan, to ensure I had the right levels of fitness to achieve that goal. Organisations can leverage maturity assessments in a similar way as part of their strategic planning by using the results to develop a a roadmap for progression towards the required level of data management excellence is needed in the data management capabilities critical to delivering on their strategic goals.

Navigating the Maturity Assessment Maze

There are several well established frameworks that can help an organisation carry out a maturity assessment. These include the EDMC-DCAM framework (developed primarily for financial services) and the IVI’s IT-CMF. In certain sectors (such as the Irish Public Sector) there is also a move to adopt the DAMA DMBOK as a maturity assessment framework.

Critical Attributes of a Maturity Assessment Framework

It’s important to note in this context that the DAMA DMBOK is NOT a Data Management Maturity Assessment framework. It is a codification of a body of knowledge about different data management disciplines. It is not exhaustive, and it doesn’t necessarily reflect best practice or latest trends in key areas. Importantly, it lacks a key characteristic of a maturity assessment framework – a clear articulation of the practices, methods, and outcomes that are expected at different levels of maturity.

I write this as one of the contributors to the DMBOK2 chapter on Data Management Maturity Assessment and as someone who started using DMBOK as a guide in maturity assessments way back in 2010 when DMBOKv1 came out. It is possible to use the DMBOK as a reference guide within the context of a Data Management Maturity Assessment, but you need to do some work to define the objective assessment scale and identify the key practices, methods, and outcomes that are to be looked for.

This focus on objective statements of practices, methods, and outcomes is important as it is only with a good methodological baseline that you can then compare scores between different assessment periods and track progress on the maturity journey.

Keeping the Right Score

Another critical attribute to be aware of is the meaning of the score.

A maturity assessment isn’t a grade. It’s a measure of capability and capacity to execute a particular set of tasks in a data management discipline.

This is a nuance often lost on leaders in organisations. Your organisation may not need to achieve a top score on a maturity scale to be the ‘best in breed’ for the strategic priorities of your organisation. A consistent “3” on a 1 to 5 scale might demonstrate you are sufficiently solid, dependable, and competent in your management of data to sustainably deliver on your organisation’s goals!

Conclusion

Data management maturity assessments are not just a check-the-box exercise; they are a strategic tool that can guide organizations towards a more data-centric and value-driven future. By utilizing frameworks like DAMA DMBOK, DCAM, and IT-CMF, organisations can ensure that their journey towards data management maturity is both structured and effective, leading to better decision-making and a competitive edge in today’s data-driven landscape.

Remember, the journey of a thousand miles (or the Dublin City Marathon) begins with a single step – and in the realm of data management, that first step is a thorough and thoughtful maturity assessment that informs a realistic and achievable roadmap!

How can Castlebridge help?

Think of Castlebridge as your organisation’s coach helping you develop “data fitness” for whatever your goals are.

We have extensive experience carrying out data management maturity assessments in organisations of all sizes and assisting them in developing realistic roadmaps for data management improvement. Uniquely, we have extensive experience in integrating the DAMA DMBOK into data management maturity assessments. Our team have also contributed to the development of other frameworks such as the IT-CMF and the DCAM.

Get in touch to find out how we can help assess your organisation’s “data fitness” and help you put data to work to achieve your organisation’s critical strategic goals!