Master Data Management in Practice: Achieving True Customer MDM

How to Recognize and Gauge Maturity?

Up to this point, we have covered the planning and implementation of a Customer MDM model with particular emphasis on the business practices needed to drive the disciplines of data governance, data stewardship, data quality, and data access management. All of which are about moving from an unfocused state of data management to the highly managed and controlled state necessary to achieve true Customer MDM.

As much focus needs to go into institutionalizing and maturing these practices as is needed to initiate them. But it is necessary to first consider what constitutes a mature MDM model and how this can be gauged. This needs to be put into perspective because until a mature state has been reached, it's unlikely that you will be able to fully realize the true potential and extended benefits of MDM, such as improving the value of your data and creating an accurate and trusted customer 360° view.

Let's examine what constitutes a mature Customer MDM model and how to gauge where you are in this continuum. Evaluating maturity should start with your definition of MDM. You'll recall that in the Introduction we offered a definition of MDM. Whether you embrace the one given or another definition, achieving what has been defined and envisioned for MDM requires progress, adjustment, and control across the four disciplines on which we have been focusing. These disciplines also represent the areas where the maturity of the MDM practice can be assessed. Being ...