Data Executives

President Signs Open Government Data Act of 2018 Washington, D.C. – On January 14, 2019, President Trump signed into law the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking (FEBP) Act (H.R. 4174, S. 2046), which includes the Open, Public, Electronic and Necessary (OPEN) Government Data Act (Title II). The OPEN Government Data Act requires all non-sensitive government data to be made available in…

Aligning Organizational Leadership Abstract: Getting support for data initiatives is not easy. Being successful requires that CDOs understand the environment and the roles that operate within it. Most importantly, CDOs need to reach out and develop trusted relationships with key leaders. This article describes critical organizational relationships and offers CDOs discrete advice for securing organizational…

Agreeing on Uniform CDO Qualifications Abstract: US federal agencies are now required to appoint a Chief Data Officers (CDO) for each organization. This is required in federal law; however, what constitutes a qualified CDO remains unclear. This paper offers explores the argument for organizations establish a formalized planning process that is predicated on data and…

Establishing the Office of the Chief Data Officer (CDO) Abstract: Establishing the CDO as a valuable organizational leader can sometimes seems like an impossible task, but it’s not. This paper offers some practical advice for organizations wanting to institutionalize the role of the CDO and standing up an office dedicated to making full use of…

The Seven Deadly Data Sins 19 min read Abstract: Organizations routinely try and solve all their problems technologically at the expense of the business. There are seven problems, known as the “Seven Deadly Data Sins”, that organizations encounter on their way towards getting the maximum return out of their data. This article presents discrete and…

What Is a Data Strategy? 6 min read Abstract: What is strategy, and more importantly, what is data strategy? This article describes three important and related concepts in organizational planning: What is strategy? What is a data strategy? How do they work together? Introduction It is important that organizations obtain specific, quantifiable value at various…

Why Does Your Organization Need a Data Strategy? 7 min read Abstract: It has become cliché that data is growing faster than ever. However, organizations have still not developed the organizational culture, practices, and policies to take full advantage of the data assets that they already have. Organizations keep looking for silver bullets that will…

How Data Scientists Turned Against Statistics 5 min read Getty Images One of the most remarkable stories of the rise of “big data” is the way in which it has coincided with the decline of the denominator and our shift towards using algorithms and workflows into which we have no visibility. Our great leap into the world of data has come…

Report to the Clerk of the Privy Council: A Data Strategy Roadmap for the Federal Public Service Executive Summary The volume of data that governments, businesses and Canadians produce is growing exponentially, animated by digital technologies. Organizations are changing their business models, building new expertise and devising new ways of managing and unlocking the value…

Listen – Do You Want to Know a Secret? by Andrew Rudin Do You Want to Know a Secret? When the Beatles released this song in 1963, the world was different. Less frantic, and more naïve. Listen/ Do you want to know a secret/Do you promise not to tell?, whoa oh, oh Let me whisper in your…