Data Driven: Profiting from Your Most Important Business Asset [Hardcover]

Thomas C. Redman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 15, 2008 | ISBN-10: 1422119122 | ISBN-13: 978-1422119129

Your company's data has the potential to add enormous value to every facet of the organization -- from marketing and new product development to strategy to financial management. Yet if your company is like most, it's not using its data to create strategic advantage. Data sits around unused -- or incorrect data fouls up operations and decision making.

In Data Driven, Thomas Redman, the "Data Doc," shows how to leverage and deploy data to sharpen your company's competitive edge and enhance its profitability. The author reveals:

The special properties that make data such a powerful asset

The hidden costs of flawed, outdated, or otherwise poor-quality data

How to improve data quality for competitive advantage

Strategies for exploiting your data to make better business decisions

The many ways to bring data to market

Ideas for dealing with political struggles over data and concerns about privacy rights

Your company's data is a key business asset, and you need to manage it aggressively and professionally. Whether you're a top executive, an aspiring leader, or a product-line manager, this eye-opening book provides the tools and thinking you need to do that.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

*Starred Review* The self-appointed Data Doc, consultant Redman (and author of Data Quality: The Field Guide, 2000, plus two others) codifies his (and others) tremendous amount of wisdom about the value of data to business in ways nongeeks will readily grasp—and, one hopes, apply. Recognizing that the ultimate goal—to improve data quality and increase its corporate worth—demands a lot of change within American companies, he carefully positions the soft skills (that is, rewarding those who advance the cause) as critically as, say, the development of robust data and information management within the business. In fact, his entire book is laid out in the manner of a good change-leadership strategy: prove the business case (some costs of poor data quality, like today’s all-too-frightening subprime-mortgage meltdown); demonstrate its uses (like data mining and analytics); and detail the 12 barriers to implementation (for example, politics). Prefer to skim what might initially seem to be a “yawn” topic? Turn right away to the “Big Picture” at the end of each chapter, then go back to the beginning. Engaging, engrossing, and, yes, compelling. --Barbara Jacobs

Review

"By putting the right data at the center of your organization, Redman asserts, a company can dramatically reduce the uncertainty inherent in its daily business decisions, and thereby become more successful." --Industry Week, October 1, 2008<br /><br />...[Data Driven] urges all companies to make data accurate, accessible, consistent, and relevant to the task at hand whether it s scoring leads or spreading data to the sales staff.

--DemandGen Report

...promises to provide insight into new strategies for profiting from quality data.
--Datanomic

...a great addition to any data quality bookshelf. Business focused, highly readable and adds some invaluable new concepts and techniques for the profession so it comes highly recommended.
-Data Quality Pro --.<br /><br />...[Data Driven] urges all companies to make data accurate, accessible, consistent, and relevant to the task at hand whether it s scoring leads or spreading data to the sales staff.

--DemandGen Report



...promises to provide insight into new strategies for profiting from quality data.
--Datanomic



...a great addition to any data quality bookshelf. Business focused, highly readable and adds some invaluable new concepts and techniques for the profession so it comes highly recommended.
-Data Quality Pro --.

Business Books: Best of 2008; LJ's picks for long-term value. --Library Journal

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Harvard Business School Press (September 15, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1422119122
• ISBN-13: 978-1422119129
• Product Dimensions: 6.5 x 0.9 x 9.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (41 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #490,492 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Data Driven for Business Executives September 3, 2008

By Richard Hackathorn

Format:Hardcover

In contrast to several recent books on the importance of managing with data analytics, Data Driven starts with the IT infrastructure required to maintain consistent data, then focuses on data quality from the executive perspective of the hidden costs of poor data, and finally, explores how to make better decisions through proper data management.

A nice twist is a chapter on content providers who bring packaged data to the marketplace. This is a growing segment that is applicable to every business, since every business collects data that has value to companies in its ecosystem.

There is a chapter on Social Issues, which is great in intent but weak in content. Sad...

The book ends with "what to do over the next one hundred days" advice. If managers are serious about treating data as a business asset, then this chapter lays out the essentials of what to do.

I recommend this book for business executives to orient their thinking about data as a business asset and to realize what tangible actions must be done to make that a reality in their companies. I know that these are old old themes for the IT profession. However, these fundamental themes are oldies but goodies!

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Data Driven is Another Winner From Dr. Redman November 6, 2008

By Data Guy

Format:Hardcover

If you are at all involved in assuring the quality of your company's data you need to know the work of Thomas C. Redman. Redman has been working on improving data quality for years and he has written numerous articles and books on the subject. His latest book, Data Driven: Profiting From Your Most Important Business Asset is another winner.

Redman offers the basic thesis of the book right there on page one, where he states "...bad data lie at the root of issues of international importance, including the current subprime mortgage meltdown, lost and stolen identities, hospital errors and contested elections." After laying down the problem, the rest of the book tells us what we need to do to correct the problems.

Data Driven will help you to improve the methods you deploy for the care and feeding of your data and information; in other words, helping you to control and manage data using similar processes and controls that you deploy on your other assets (finances, people, structures, etc.) - a noble goal, indeed!

The writing is concise and snappy - you won't get bored reading this book. The style is engaging and it is easy to read. For example, instead of just saying what to do and how to do it, which can be boring, Redman discusses many of the arguments people use to say that data quality is impossible, and then debunks them showing that data quality is possible, if approached properly and thoroughly.

There are many good ideas, charts, and graphs in Data Driven, too. One of my favorites is on page 54, where you can find a chart of the ten habits followed by those with the best data. If you buy this book, make a poster-sized photocopy of that page and hang it up on the wall of the break room and in the data folks' cubicles. Maybe the habits will rub off on everyone as they gaze upon them everywhere.

But the best little gem in this wonderful book is the entirety of the last chapter, which is titled "The Next One Hundred Days." In this chapter Dr. Redman offers what he calls a hundred-day panorama. It is not a grand plan because most will not have the depth of understanding required to create such a plan and have it succeed. Instead, the panorama strives for breadth, not depth, with a focus on quality. Diligent readers can follow the guidance in this chapter and thereby begin the long-term process of appreciating the importance of data quality on their business practices.

And that alone is worth the price of the book... but, of course, the book offers much more and I recommend it to every IT and business professional whose job relies on accurate data.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Data Driven - We need this book! June 12, 2009

By Danette McGilvray

Format:Hardcover

Tom Redman's book fills a need in our data quality literature. It is the first data quality book I'm aware of that is entirely meant for a business audience. I can't think of anyone more qualified to write this kind of book than Tom, a respected leader in the field of data quality with years of experience. He has the ability to clearly explain ideas in such a way that anyone can grasp them. Even more importantly it gives us the words to carry the message to those we work with. Thanks, Tom!