Data Stewardship

Data without a named person tends to decay, because everyone assumes someone else will fix it. Stewardship assigns roles to prevent that. A data owner is a senior business person accountable for a data set, such as customer or product data, who approves who can use it and accepts the risk. A data steward works at a more practical level: maintaining definitions in the glossary, monitoring quality reports, resolving issues and advising users. A data custodian, usually in IT, operates the systems that store the data and applies the technical controls the owner requires. The roles are set out in the governance policy, and the work usually forms part of people's existing jobs rather than being a full-time post. Terms vary between organisations, so the same duties may carry different titles. When a figure looks wrong, a named steward is the person who gets the call.

A retailer's loyalty customer data was edited by marketing, sales and finance, leading to duplicates. The head of marketing becomes data owner, two analysts become stewards, and IT acts as custodian. Duplicate checks run weekly, and changes to the customer definition now need the owner's approval.