Data Contracts

Chapter 9. Shift Left: The Cultural Change Needed for Data Contracts

In Part I, we described the data challenges that organizations face today and made clear why they need data contracts to address those problems. Part II addressed the technical details of data contracts, provided a hands-on coding project that implemented data contracts with open source tools, and described three real-world implementations in industry. One undercurrent throughout Parts I and II is the emphasis on how the data contract architecture pattern is tightly coupled to a cultural change in how data is managed throughout the organization.

Part III (Chapters 9 to 12) is where we detail how to bring forth the cultural change to enable the data contract architecture, develop a strategy to get buy-in and your first data contract win, and, finally, measure the success of your implementation. We have labeled this cultural change shift left data, drawing parallels to the DevSecOps (i.e., DevOps applied to security) space, which faced challenges around security management and enforcement, much like our industry’s data challenges.

In this chapter, we want to zoom in and focus on what needs to take place leading up to and during the cultural shift left data moment within an organization. We’ll cover what we are doing to set up data contract implementation for success and gain adoption across the wider organization beyond data teams. Many of the lessons we’ll share stem from encountering and overcoming numerous ...