10 Mistakes to Avoid When Writing an RFP for Master Data Management
There's a right way (taking care of all departmental data needs) and a wrong way (ignoring data governance) to write an MDM RFP. MDM vendor Siperian has identified 10 common mistakes that CIOs make and advises how to avoid them.
The history of all changes to master data and the lineage of how the data has changed need to be captured as metadata, which forms the foundation for auditing and is a critical part of data governance and regulatory compliance reporting initiatives, he notes. Even if CIOs think they don't need those financial capabilities, their marketing department may need to keep track of customers who opt in or out of marketing campaigns, for example, which could become important, Shankar says.
Mistake 10: Implementing MDM for only a single mode of operation—analytical or operational.
"You cannot look at MDM for a single use, whether it's operations or analytical reporting or campaign management," Shankar says. An enterprise MDM platform needs to synchronize master data with both operational and analytical applications in order to adequately support real-time business processes and compliance reporting across multiple departments, he says. Without the ability to synchronize master data with both operational and analytical applications, a CIO's ability to extend the MDM platform across the organization is limited, and maintenance costs will increase. And nobody wants that.
