Creating a Data-Driven Enterprise with DataOps

Chapter 4. Building a Data-Driven Organization

The previous chapters define what a data-driven organization is, and they discuss the importance of building one to remain competitive. Now, we’ll spend some time talking about the practical steps needed to build a data-driven organization.

In our opinion, a data-driven organization should possess three things:

• A culture in which everyone buys into the idea of using data to make business decisions

• An organizational structure that supports a data-driven culture

• Technology that supports a data-driven culture and makes data self-service

We cover the first two points in this chapter and discuss the roles and responsibilities of the employees who form the vital cogs in the engine that drives the data-driven organization—from data producers, to data scientists, to engineers, to analysts, to business users.

The next chapter devotes itself to the technology needed to support a data-driven culture.

Creating a Self-Service Culture

The most important—and arguably the most difficult—aspect of transitioning to a data-driven organization that practices DataOps is the cultural shift required to move to a data mindset. This shift entails identifying and building a cultural framework that enables all the people involved in a data initiative—from the producers of the data, to the people who build the models, to the people who analyze it, to the employees who use it in their jobs—to collaborate on making data the heart of organizational decision-making. ...