Assignment

ORGANIZATION CONSULTANTS

Enterprise Content Management and Data

Governance Policies and Procedures Manual

Week 4: Evaluation of Data Governance

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[Pick the date]

This manual contains the policies and procedures for the formal management of the organization and the storage of an organization's valuable content and documents that are related to business processes. The manual also outlines the formal policies and processes that enforce data quality, management, and policies, and business process management and risk management.

Table of Contents

Project Outline and Requirements (Week 1) ................................................................................................ 1

Organization Description .......................................................................................................................... 1

Content Requirements .............................................................................................................................. 1

Content Categories ............................................................................................................................... 1

Associated Regulations ......................................................................................................................... 2

Data Protection ..................................................................................................................................... 2

Implementation Life Cycle (Week 1) ............................................................................................................. 3

Stages ........................................................................................................................................................ 3

Requirements ........................................................................................................................................ 3

Planning................................................................................................................................................. 3

Development ......................................................................................................................................... 3

Review ................................................................................................................................................... 3

Implementation .................................................................................................................................... 3

Follow-up .............................................................................................................................................. 4

Time Line ................................................................................................................................................... 4

Information Infrastructure Evaluation (Week 2) .......................................................................................... 5

Evaluation of Content Capture ................................................................................................................. 5

Evaluation of Content Management ......................................................................................................... 5

Evaluation of Content Storage .................................................................................................................. 6

Evaluation of Content Preservation .......................................................................................................... 6

Evaluation of Content Delivery ................................................................................................................. 7

Evaluation of ECM Relationships .............................................................................................................. 7

Information Infrastructure Improvements (Week 3) .................................................................................... 8

Content Management Process Improvement .......................................................................................... 8

Sales Process ......................................................................................................................................... 8

Content Management Tools Improvement .............................................................................................. 9

Customer Management System ........................................................................................................... 9

Data Governance Evaluation (Week 4) ....................................................................................................... 10

Data Quality ............................................................................................................................................ 10

Data Management .................................................................................................................................. 10

Data Policies Management ..................................................................................................................... 10

Business Process Management ............................................................................................................... 11

Risk Management ................................................................................................................................... 11

Data Governance Improvements (Week 5 TBD) ......................................................................................... 12

Implementation Plan (Week 5 TBD) ........................................................................................................... 13

Enterprise Content Management and Data Governance Policies and Procedures Manual

Organization Consultants Page 1

Project Outline and Requirements (Week 1)

Organization Description Organization Consultants consults with businesses to help them manage organizational change. Consulting services include planning and managing growth, rightsizing, and reorganization. Benefits include better organizational agility, a better understanding of how they are organized, and better planning for the future. Organization Consultants has served clients for 10 years from its California office and currently employs 75 people, including 40 organizational consultants. Approximately half of the consultants operate from remote locations throughout the country and in 5 international locations. These consultants work from their homes and through Internet-based connections to the home office.

Content Requirements Although Organization Consultants is highly qualified in organizational planning, it is not good at managing its own data during a stage of rapid growth for the company. The company has determined it needs a qualified consultant who can develop an Enterprise Content Management (ECM) and Data Governance Policies and Procedures Manual to help the company improve its management of important company data. Proper resources have been allocated for the project, and several key goals have been set:

1. Evaluate the enterprise information infrastructure and content management processes for the company.

2. Develop processes for enterprise content management. 3. Design the enterprise information infrastructure for the company. 4. Evaluate the data governance policies and procedures of the company. 5. Develop data governance policies and procedures for the company.

As a first step in the process of evaluation, the content requirements for the company must be identified. The content requirements will include the major categories of content and regulations that might apply to the organization’s content. A review was conducted, and the following results were obtained.

Content Categories The following major content categories were identified through a review of existing documents, databases, and interviews with the information technology (IT) manager:

Unstructured Content

Unstructured content includes any data held and processed by the company that do not have a formal format or data storage mechanism. This content may be important to the company and should be formally identified, stored, and protected if deemed to be important to the operation of the company.

• Electronic Unstructured Data o E-mail, instant messages, text documents, spreadsheets, meeting recordings, etc.

• Electronic Forms • Paper Documents/Forms

Structured Content

Structured content includes information that is formally stored and processed by the company. The following major categories of structured content were identified:

• Accounting Database: Includes all company accounting information • Human Resources (HR) Database: Includes employee records, payroll and benefits information,

organization structure information, and employee training plans and records • Client Database: Includes client information, clients’ organizational information (organization

charts), employee structure and personal information, pay status, training information, company plans for up- and down-sizing, and consulting reports

• Support Database: Includes support tickets and knowledge database • Web: All content for the company’s Web site, including the Web site proper and all associated

databases

Associated Regulations Some of the regulations regarding data held by the company will depend on the client organizations it consults with. The nature of this organizational consulting provided to clients will often require access to and storage of sensitive HR information from the client company, which could fall under the auspices of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and/or the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act.

In addition, some clients may have information that is protected under security regulations. This might be typical of government agencies, some of which are clients of the company. There will also be, depending on the client, contractual obligations to protect certain data according to the client’s requirements.

Data Protection Data protection includes security and data archiving. Sensitive data must be properly protected, and the company’s data must be properly stored for disaster protection purposes.

Implementation Life Cycle (Week 1) One of the key aspects of a successful project is the identification and use of an implementation life cycle. This section of the report will describe the life cycle to be used for this project and will present the major tasks and time line for execution of the plan.

This project is considered to be a linear project without the need to cycle between stages, so a standard waterfall life cycle will be used. The stages will include the following:

1. Requirements 2. Planning 3. Development 4. Review 5. Implementation 6. Follow-up

Stages Each stage of the project is described below. It will be important for the project participants to understand these phases so they each will contribute and participate appropriately.

Requirements Each of the major content areas of the company will be examined and documented. Storage requirements will be determined, and security requirements will be identified.

Planning The complete project will be planned in detail with all participants and tasks identified with an associated time line.

Development The ECM and Data Governance Policies and Procedures Manual will be developed by the consultant with the assistance of appropriate company personnel.

Review Key personnel—including the chief executive officer (CEO), chief information officer (CIO), IT manager, HR manager, client support, and company consultants—will review the draft manual and assist in modifications to produce the final manual.

Implementation Implementation will require several activities:

• Development of the ECM and Data Governance Policies and Procedures Manual • Development and testing of systems, infrastructure, and supporting materials to support the

plan • Development and administration of training for all stakeholders who will use the systems,

policies, and procedures • Rollout to live systems

Follow-up Follow-up will be conducted on an ongoing basis. Key systems will be reviewed to determine if the policies and procedures are working efficiently and sufficiently to meet the goals for the plan. Changes to the systems, policies, and procedures will be made as needed.

Time Line

• Requirements: Weeks 1– 4 • Planning: Weeks 5–6 • Development: Weeks 7–12 • Review: Weeks 13–15 • Implementation: Weeks 16 –24 • Follow-up: Ongoing after implementation

Information Infrastructure Evaluation (Week 2) Evaluation of an ECM system involves the evaluation of many areas of a company. Whether the system is currently formalized with specific infrastructure and software applications in place to implement the ECM strategies, or the organization is treating content in an informal way, the evaluation must address the core components of ECM system architecture, as follows:

• Capture • Management • Storage • Preservation • Delivery

Evaluation of Content Capture Content capture is the process of transforming content from existing sources into formats that are usable by the ECM system. Content can come from many sources, including original development, paper documents, external databases, and files. The first step in the content capture evaluation is to list the content sources for the organization. The list of content should be limited to the content that is necessary to operate the business processes. Ancillary content is not part of the analysis, although it ultimately may be included in the system for convenience. The content list should include the source, format, use, and method of capture. Notes regarding the appropriateness of content capture should be made at this time as part of the evaluation.

Example Content List

Content Item

Source Format Use Method of Capture

Customer Data

Sales SQL Database

• Sales • Marketing • Accounting • Support

Customer data are collected during the initial contract development process. The method is an interview with a client by a sales representative. Data are currently manually entered on sales forms and then transferred to database by data entry personnel.

Evaluation of Content Management Content management concerns how content flows through the organization. A good evaluation of content management will begin with an understanding of the businesses processes that require the use of content (which is usually almost every business process). Business processes should be identified and documented using flowcharts or other business process documentation tools. The content listed in the previous step should be mapped to the processes. During this step, deficiencies can be identified and ideas for improvement suggested.

Example Process List

Process Content Comments Sales Process Sales Database The current process uses paper

forms and requires transfer of data to customer database by data entry personnel. If sales personnel were equipped with apps for their smartphones, this information could be entered directly into the database.

Evaluation of Content Storage Content storage is the hardware infrastructure where the content is physically stored and how the content is organized. As with other phases of the evaluation, the first step is to document the existing system. Network diagrams are a good place to start so physical storage can be identified and content can be mapped to the storage.

Example Storage Map

Evaluation of Content Preservation Content that is valuable to a business will be used for the business processes and will, at some point, be phased out or replaced with newer content. The value of some content may remain high, and this content must be protected. Content preservation ensures content is stored in a format that can be retrieved later without relying on specialized software or hardware. During an evaluation of an ECM system, the content that must be preserved should be identified first. Once again, it is helpful to use the information collected in the Content Capture Evaluation phase to determine the content preservation

list. The next step is to examine how content is currently preserved. It will become immediately apparent if the right content is being preserved.

Content Preservation List Example

Content Preservation Method Comments Customer Database Backup to on-site storage This is dangerous if a disaster

occurred and secondary system was destroyed. Off-site storage of critical system backups is needed.

Evaluation of Content Delivery The evaluation of content delivery can follow a process similar to other parts of the evaluation. The first step is to use the content list developed in the Capture phase, processes identified in the Management phase, and the diagrams identified in the Storage phase to illustrate how the various types of content are delivered.

Example Delivery Evaluation

The customer database system delivers reports on demand through the organization’s Intranet. The reports are not user-configurable and are currently not suited for delivery on mobile devices. The data also cannot be accessed remotely, which represents a gap in information delivery for sales and support personnel.

Evaluation of ECM Relationships The prior parts of the ECM evaluation process were related to each other in many ways, but the final part of the evaluation specifically examines how the components of the ECM are working together. A review of these relationships will help identify issues that may not be apparent in other parts of the evaluation.

Example ECM Relationship Evaluation

One of the major flaws in the ECM systems is the treatment of the customer database. Although this database is used extensively by many parts of the organization, access is limited to online delivery through the Intranet. Further, security is weak, and content can be accessed and modified with little restriction. Processes are not in place to ensure proper approvals have been made before this content is added or modified, and errors have resulted. Some of this information is sensitive and should be protected by proper security systems.

Information Infrastructure Improvements (Week 3) The purpose of this section of the report is to examine the existing content management documented in the previous project and to document the improvements that will result in a better overall enterprise content management system. The improvements will include the areas of data management processes and data management tools.

Content Management Process Improvement This area of the report will review each of the processes identified in the Information Infrastructure Evaluation section and identify strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities for improvement.

Note: This area would benefit from the use of flowcharts or other process diagrams to demonstrate current and improved processes.

Sales Process The existing sales process is shown in the following diagram. Note how the process begins with manual forms, and the customer information is transferred to a data entry clerk who then enters the information into the customer database. There is no connection between the sales personnel and the customer database, so the information is not available for further use in any other sales-related process except through some marginally useful printed reports that are distributed once per month.

Strengths

Lower cost data entry clerks perform data entry, and they probably make fewer typing errors.

Weaknesses

Data are entered twice. Data are not controlled. Data are not accessible by sales personnel after entry into the system.

Suggested Improvements

Sales personnel should be connected to the process at both ends so they are able to make the data entry themselves and also access the data for their needs. This process would have more control over the data because the sales personnel are authorized to make those changes, and providing access to the data would allow sales personnel to make better use of the available information. The improved process is shown below.

Content Management Tools Improvement This area of the report will review each of the tools identified in the Information Infrastructure Evaluation section and identify strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities for improvement.

Customer Management System The sales process was analyzed in the previous section of the report. The suggestions made to improve the process could be fulfilled by the implementation of a new customer management system. The existing system does not support the kind of secure and flexible access needed and also does not support a flexible data query and reporting system to allow sales personnel to work effectively with the customer data.

Data Governance Evaluation (Week 4) It is important to understand that data governance is the management of the policies used to administer the key areas of enterprise content management (data quality, data management, data policies, business process management, and risk management). This section of the report will examine the data governance currently in place in the organization in the listed areas. Data governance in this organization is not well-documented and is informally implemented. Interviews and reviews of existing documentation and processes formed the basis of the discoveries in the following sections. As shown, there are many informal policies and procedures in place currently, but very little oversight and management of these policies and procedures.

Data Quality Data quality is concerned with the management of data to ensure the data are accurate. There are currently only informal policies in the organization to address data quality. The IT staff understands there are issues with the main data sources in the organization, and there are occasional efforts to clean up the databases, but no formal plan is in place. There are no policies in place regarding the management of the data quality effort.

Strengths Weaknesses • The IT staff understands the importance of data

quality. • The data entry system has good error checking in

place to prevent duplicate data entry.

• No formal policies are in place. • There is no oversight of data quality policies and

procedures. • The IT staff is not trained in data quality

management. • Tools for data quality management are not in place.

Data Management Data management is concerned with the storage and handling of data through the life cycle of acquisition and retirement. The organization currently has reasonably good data management practices in place, although the formal policies and documentation of the processes are weak.

Strengths Weaknesses • The IT staff has good knowledge of data

management. • Data management best practices are currently

followed in many, but not all areas.

• No formal policies are in place. • There is no oversight of data management policies

and procedures.

Data Policies Management Data policies management is concerned with the management of the policies that are created and used for content management throughout the organization. Although it is important to establish ECM policies, it is equally important to ensure these policies are appropriately approved when created or

modified. Lack of data policies management will render the policies useless because of unauthorized and/or undocumented changes. The company currently has weak data policies management in place. New policies are frequently created by the IT department or upper management and typically approved in the same area without oversight and proper documentation.

Strengths Weaknesses • IT staff makes reasonable decisions regarding data

policies. • No formal policies are in place. • There is no oversight of data policies’ and

procedures’ creation or modification. • There is no change management system in place. • Policies are not well-documented.

Business Process Management Business process management is concerned with the management of creation and modification of processes that are used to operate the business where enterprise content is used. The organization currently has no formal system in place to identify and manage business processes. Business processes are informally developed, and there are no resources allocated to examine this area of the company.

Strengths Weaknesses • Many of the business processes in the company

were developed by experienced people and seem to work fairly well.

• There is no formal business process management in place.

• There is no oversight of business process management.

• There are no tools in place to help design and organize formal business processes.

• There are no resources available to address business process management.

Risk Management Risk management is concerned with the protection of enterprise content from security threats or natural disasters. The organization currently has reasonable back-up systems in place, but the backups are not off-site. Security measures have been implemented but not formally studied, and there is currently no disaster recovery plan in place.

Strengths Weaknesses • IT staff has implemented reasonable security

measures. • Data backup (on-site storage) is in place.

• No formal policies are in place. • There is no oversight of risk management policies

and procedures. • There is no formal review of security needs. • There is no formal data back-up plan. • There is no formal disaster recovery plan.

Data Governance Improvements (Week 5 TBD)

Implementation Plan (Week 5 TBD)