Many organizations today are plagued by poor . data quality management According to , poor data quality is knocking companies to the ground – to the tune of $15 million as the average annual financial cost. Gartner Wasted resources and expenditures for operational inefficiencies, missed sales and untaken chances are only made worse by poor quality data. We get it, it's a . tough call So if you're still struggling with bad data, we're here to shed light on data quality and top practices to make your data sets serve . the goals Establish Meaningful Metrics By setting up a program of data quality metrics and measuring religiously companies of how critical data quality is for the organization. As for the exact metrics, your mileage can vary. can raise awareness The golden rule here is to make them applicable to the goals and you are aiming for with your data. business targets Thus, your metrics can target the accuracy, completeness, or validity of your data. You can also assess the number of redundant entries or . format-incompatible data Trust but Validate Data does not have a long shelf-life. Therefore, all data needs to be validated, i.e. checked for accuracy, clarity, and details. When moving and merging data it’s vital to check the conformity of diverse data sets to . Otherwise, you risk basing decisions on imperfect and inconsistent data. business rules may include: Example validation checks Ensuring that age is entered as a whole number. Ensuring that the email address includes the @ symbol. Ensuring that usernames include only letters and numbers, etc. This requires having the right and the right processes. tools Implement a Single Source of Truth In its essence, a single source of truth refers to practice when all business-critical data is stored in one place. the data An SSOT ensures that all team players base their decisions on the same data via a single reference point. Instead of being a specific software, it’s more of a state of mind for your company. An SSOT can be anything from a simple doc to a sophisticated data information architecture your organization leverages. A pro tip (or two): In today’s , it’s important to check that an SSOT is accessible to all team players. Also, grant independent access to the team if you’re collaborating with folks in another time zone. remote-first environment The End Getting in front of is both terrifying and exciting. data quality Probably, that is the main reason why most companies don’t give data quality the right amount of acknowledgment. But bad data is not a norm. If you are looking to , budget dollars, and unwise business decisions, you should definitely go the extra mile with your data sets. reduce the number of mistakes Subscribe to ’s newsletters via our subscription form in the footer. HackerNoon