📘 What Sparked This Thought
Ever been in a meeting where Marketing, IT, and Legal all have different “truths” about the same dataset or same report?
I’ve seen this play out too many times — not because people don’t care, but because governance is treated as a gatekeeper, not a team sport.
💡 My Understanding
Data Governance works best when it’s a shared responsibility.
It’s not “IT’s problem” or “Legal’s checklist.”
It’s a company-wide agreement that:
- Data is a strategic asset.
- Everyone is a steward.
- Decisions on data require multiple perspectives.
When governance is siloed, it feels like red tape where no one knows what is happening.
When it’s collaborative, it becomes an enabler.
🔍 Real-World Example: The “Data Steward Huddle”
A financial services company set up monthly cross-functional “data huddles”:
- Marketing brought customer engagement data
- IT brought infrastructure & lineage reports
- Risk brought compliance updates
- Ops brought feedback from the ground
Instead of long governance documents nobody read, decisions were made in the room, with everyone understanding the “why.”
🔄 Practical Moves Toward Team Governance
✅ Build a data governance council with diverse roles.
✅ Rotate meeting facilitators to keep perspectives fresh.
✅ Use plain language over technical jargon.
✅ Share quick wins so people see impact, not just rules.
✅ Key Takeaways
- Governance isn’t a one-person job — it’s a network.
- Cross-functional trust is the real governance currency.
- Meetings should produce actions, not just agreements.
🤔 Questions I’m Still Thinking About
- How do you make governance meetings the meeting people want to attend?
- Can governance KPIs be tied to business outcomes instead of policy completion rates?
💬 Final Thoughts
The best governance frameworks aren’t written in policy binders.
They’re built in conversations, decisions, and trust.