Being an Information Manager...

Data Management in de Project Lifecycle

Project managers give me a surprise on a regular basis. I know that the main aim of their work is to deliver what was agreed, but that does not dismiss them from responsibility for the quality of the deliverable.
It may be a bit of a rough remark, but most project managers have a 'tunnel vision'. The project needs to be delivered, on time, on budget. But this can be bad for data management


So what do I recommend to project managers before they begin?

• Do a lot of 'front-loading' - i.e. before the project begins it is important that the DM deliverables are defined and that the planning takes care of delivering them during the solution architecture phase (the high level design) and beyond. If you miss them at an early stage - it is hard to recover ...
• Ensure that you as a project manager also understand the project in its 'data context'. This includes understanding the related other systems, but also responsibilities like data ownership
• Agree resources for taking care of the data management element. Data architects, or data analysts are useful resources

And then during the project it is a matter of ensure that the scope - agreed during the front-loading - is delivered!

Labels: architecture, project management

posted by Evert Ruijs @ 1:19 PM