Leveraging a Continuous Improvement Program to Introduce and Maintain Data Quality

Many organizations have had some form of continuous improvement program; it is part of the organization's culture. Huddle boards, problem-solving methods, and Gemba walks are useful, but when business processes rely so heavily on data, those tools alone cannot solve data quality problems. This presentation will discuss how one state agency leveraged an established continuous improvement culture to implement basic data quality practices required by a state-wide policy, with minimal investment of time and effort to the business. This is an example of using an existing, vital, widespread business program to introduce valuable data quality concepts for immediate return. Highlights include:

• Educating the business on the need for data quality
• Introducing the business to data quality rules, dimensions, thresholds, and stakeholder input for forming those things
• Integrating quality rules, dimensions, and thresholds into standard work
• Using automated basic metrics (with or without a data catalog) to track data quality rules in standard work to improve and maintain quality for critical data elements

Speaker: Lisa Williams  

Lisa Williams has served as manager of the Office of Data Management at the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) since 2017. ADWR is the steward of Arizona’s water and ensures long-term, reliable water supplies to support the continued economic prosperity of the State. Lisa holds the EDM Council DCAM certification. Under Lisa's stewardship, ADWR performed the state's first Data Management Maturity (DMM) Assessment and created a Data Center of Excellence at ADWR. Lisa's other accomplishments include implementing an Enterprise Data Warehouse and data catalog, data quality processes, and data governance. She partnered with Jeff Wolkove to deliver a comprehensive DMM assessment to the Dept. of Health Services. She has presented at national and regional conferences such as DGIQ, the Arizona Digital Government Summit, and the Public Sector Network. Prior to moving into Data Management, Lisa spent the first 27 years at ADWR as a water resource manager.