Data Governance

Definition: Data Governance is the structure, policies, and processes established by an organization to oversee and manage the collection, storage, and reporting of data.  The U.S. Department of Education’s definition is “Data Governance is an organizational approach to data and information management that is formalized as a set of policies and procedures that encompass the full life cycle of data, from acquisition to use to disposal.”

What it Means: : Data governance has emerged as a requirement for an organization.  An organization must maximize its return on investment in data by establishing an oversight structure that ensures policies are in place and followed to reduce collection burden, increase data quality, protect personally identifiable information, and support proper usage.

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