One of a company’s most important assets to protect is their data. Data is extremely important as is used to make a variety of important business decisions. In terms of how the data is used, there are several ways that a business can go about protecting it and ensuring it is of the highest quality. Two of these processes are known as management and governance. Both are very important, but also have distinct qualities that separate one from the other.

What is Data Governance?

Essentially, data governance defines how exactly the data will be treated and accessed within a broader management initiative. This is a key component for any business management strategy, and it refers to how data will be protected and preserved as an asset.

The concept of governance can best be understood as the practical application of technology, people and policies to create an appropriate way for data to be used. There are many tangible benefits to utilizing governance, and it will be primarily reflected in the data’s security.

Some of the more immediate benefits of implementing a strong governance strategy includes improving the security of the data by verifying requirements to access the data and enforcing accountability for its management.

In addition, data governance can also establish a set process to improve performance and reduce costs and inefficiencies in the process. This is all important because businesses are understanding in the modern era how important it is for an organization to understand who should access and use the data.

A proper governance framework will help ensure that security and privacy controls are put in place.

What is Data Management?

Unlike governance, data management refers to the implementation of tools to achieve the objectives that the data is intended for. The very concept of data management dates back to when computers started to become commonplace in the 1980s, and since then, businesses across the world have made it a point of emphasis to make proper data management a part of their strategy.

Management has a more broader range of functions, as management relates more to the supervision, execution and development of many data assets.

There are many aspects of data management that businesses have to consider. While it can be a tedious process, managing data in a proper manner will ensure efficiency and less errors when it is ready for use.

How Governance and Management Work Together

These two concepts are very important in order to ensure businesses protect data, and they have to work together in order to ensure maximum protection and quality.

Management procedures are required so that data can be stored in appropriate ways. In this sense, a governance framework cannot be implemented unless data classification, architecture and metadata management is already in place.

Data cannot be governed if a business cannot define what the data is, where it is stored, what manner it was collected in and how it can be accessed. Management and governance are two important processes that businesses have to undergo in order to ensure that data can be readily available for use