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  • Information Quality in 2008…

    So yet another year draws to a close. Usually around this time of year I try to take a few hours to review how things went, what worked and what still needs to be worked on in the coming year. In most cases that is very personal appraisal of whether I had a ‘quality’ year – did I meet or exceed my own expectations of myself (and I’m a bugger for trying to achieve too much too quickly).

    Vincent McBurney’s Blog Carnival of Data Quality has invited submissions on the theme “Happy New Year”, so I thought I’d take a look back over 2007 and see what emerging trends or movements might lead to a Happy New Year for Information Quality people in 2008.

    Hitting Mainstream
    In 2007 Information Quality issues began to hit the mainstream. It isn’t quite there yet but 2007 saw the introduction of taught Master’s degree programmes in Information Quality in the University of Arkansas at Little Rock and there have been similar developments mooted in at least one European University. If educators think they can run viable courses that will make money then we are moving out of the niche towards being seen asa a mainstream discipline of importance to business.

    The IAIDQ’s IDQ Conference in Las Vegas was a significant success, with numbers up on 2006 and a wider mix of attendees. I did an unofficial straw poll of people at that conference and the consensus from the delegates and other speakers was that there were more ‘Business’ people at the conference than previous Information Quality conferences they’d attended, a trend that has been growing in recent years. The same was true at the European Data Management and Information Quality Conference(s) in London in November. Numbers were up on previous years. There were more ‘Business’ people in the mix, up even on last year. – this of course is all based on my unofficial straw poll and could be wrong.

    The fact that news stories abounded in 2007 about poor quality information and the initial short sharp shock of Compliance and SOx etc. has started to give rise to questions of how to make Compliance a value-adding function (hint – It’s the INFORMATION people) may help, but the influence of bloggers such as Vincent, and the adoption of blogs as communications tools by vendors and by Professional Associations such as the IAIDQ is probably as big if not more of an influence IMHO.

    Also, and I’m not sure if this is a valid benchmark, I’ve started turning down offers to present at conferences and write articles for people on IQ issues. because a) I’m too busy with my day job and with the IAIDQ (oh yeah… and with my family) and b)there are more opportunities arising than I’d ever have time to take on.

    Unfortunately, much of the ‘mainstream’ coverage of Information Quality issues either views it either as a ‘technology issue’ (most of my articles in Irish trade magazines are stuck in the ‘Technology’ section) or fails to engage with the Information Quality aspects of the story fully. The objective of IQTrainwrecks.com is to try to highlight the Information Quality aspects of things that get into the media.

    What would make 2008 a Happy Year for me would be to have more people contributing to IQ Trainwrecks but also to have some happy path stories to tell and also for there to be better analysis of these issues in the media.

    Community Building
    There is a strong sense of ‘community’ building amongst many of the IQ practitioners I speak with. That has been one of the key goals of the IAIDQ in 2007 – to try and get that sense of Community triggered to link like-minded-people and help them learn from each other. This has started to come together. However it isn’t happening as quickly as I’d like, because I have a shopping list of things I want yesterday!

    What would make 2008 a happy new year for me would be for us to maintain the momentum we’ve developed in connecting the Community of Information/Data Quality professionals and researchers. Within the IAIDQ I’d like us to get better at building those connections (we’ve become good… we need to keep improving).

    I’d like to see more people making contact via blogs like Vincent’s or mine or through other social networking facilities so we can build the Community of Like Minded people all focussing on the importance of Information Quality and sharing skills, tips, tools, tricks and know how about how to make it better. I’d be really happy at the end of 2008 a few more people make the transition from thinking they are the ‘lonely voice’ in their organisation to realising they are part of a very large choir that is singing an important tune.

    Role Models for Success
    2007 saw a few role models for success in Information Quality execution emerging. All of these had similar stories and similar elements that made up their winning plan. It made a change from previous years when people seemed afraid to share – perhaps because it is so sensitive a subject (for example admitting you have an IQ problem could amount to self-incrimination in some industries)? In the absence of these sort of ‘role models’ it is difficult to sell the message of data quality as it can come across as theoretical.

    I’d be very happy at the end of 2008 if we had a few more role models of successful application of principles and tools – not presented by vendors (no offence to vendors) but emerging from within the organisations themselves. I’d be very happy if we had some of these success stories analysed to highlight the common Key Success Factors that they share.

    Break down barriers
    2007 saw a lot of bridges being built within the Information Quality Community. 2006 ended with a veritable bloodbath of mergers and acquisitions amongst software vendors. 2007 had a development of networks and mutual support between the IAIDQ (as the leading professional organisation for IQ/DQ professionals) and MIT’s IQ Programme. In many Businesses the barriers that have prevented the IQ agenda from being pursued are also being overcome for a variety of reasons.

    2008 should be the year to capitalise on this as we near a signicificant tipping point. I’d like to see 2008 being the year were organisations realise that they need to push past the politics of Information Quality to actually tackle the root causes. Tom Redman is right – the politics of this stuff can be brutal because to solve the problems you need to change thinking and remould governance all of which is a dangerous threat to traditional power bases. The traditional divide between “Business” and “IT” is increasingly anachronistic, particularly when we are dealing with information/data within systems. If we can make that conceptual leap in 2008 to the point were everyone is inside the same tent peeing out… that would be a good year.

    Respect
    For most of my professional life I’ve been the crazy man in the corner telling everyone there was an elephant in the room that no-one else seemed able to see. It was a challenge to get the issues taken seriously. Even now I have one or two managers I deal with who still don’t get it. However most others I deal with do get it. They just need to be told what they have. 2007 seems to be the year that the lights started to go on about the importance of the Information Asset. Up to now, people spoke about it but didn’t ‘feel’ it… but now I don’t have trouble getting my Dept Head to think in terms of root causes, information flows etc.

    2008 is the year of Respect for the IQ Practitioner…. A Happy New Year for me would be to finish 2008 with appropriate credibility and respect for the profession. Having role models to point to will help, but also having certification and accreditation so people can define their skillsets as ‘Information Quality’ skill sets (and so chancers and snake-oil peddlers can be weeded out).

    Conclusion
    2007 saw discussion of Information Quality start to hit the mainstream and the level of interest in the field is growing significantly. For 2008 to be a Happy New Year we need to build on this, develop our Community of practitioners and researchers and then work to break down barriers within our organisations that are preventing the resolution of problems with information quality. If, as a community of Information/Data Quality people we can achieve that (and the IAIDQ is dedicated to that mission) and in doing so raise our standards and achieve serious credibility as a key management function in organisations and as a professional discipline then 2008 will have been a very Happy New Year.

    2008 already has its first Information Quality problem though…. looks like we’ve got a bit of work to do to make it a Happy New Year.

  • The test results….

    Earlier this week I wrote about some inconsistencies in Amazon.co.uk’s apparent policy not to ship electrical goods, software or Xbox games to the Irish Republic.

    At that point, I’d only identified that the Amazon check out was flagging some Xbox games I had in my basket as being unshippable but notall of them. As I had other things on the order that I wanted, I proceeded with it, expecting to get an email or something from Amazon explaining that they couldn’t ship the Xbox game (Ratatouille as it happens) to me because it was a class of software.

    Imagine my surprise this morning when the postman delivered a package containing the game to me. Sheesh. I did notice, however, that the item description seems to categorise the Xbox game as ‘video’.

    Either Amazon have miscategorised the product (an Information Quality problem which Amazon never suffer from) or their policy on shipments to the Republic of Ireland is a nonsense.

    Electrical goods like toasters and blenders and TVs I’d understand, but software or games makes no sense at all unless there is some form of market carve up taking place. And if there is, then miscategorising products so they sneak through the net can only result in problems down the line.

  • Some inanity from Amazon… but in a good way

    Courtesy of Damien Mulley, a tale of Amazon support with a sense of humour.

    Apparently Amazon UK have a more ‘Kafka-esque’ sense of humour about things…

  • Things that peeve me on the web (a revisit)

    Vodafone have launched a Christmas e-card site with a difference called Bosco is back. On this site you can put together a custom video e-card featuring Bosco, a perennial kids TV favourite in Ireland.

    Why does this site peeve me? Well, due to the way the video is put together (pre-recorded video clips that are assembled in real-time) a lot of the process is driven by drop down menus to select names etc. This is where the problem starts.

    As people who have come to my conference presentations know, a lot of my interest in Information Quality stems from the fact that my name (Daragh) has approx 12 alternate spellings and can be either male or female. These simple facts have motivated me over the years to be a bit pedantic about my name (1 ‘R’, a ‘GH’ at the end -silent, Male). So I was a bit dismayed when I flagged my gender as ‘Male’ on the “Bosco is Back” and looked for my name, only to find…

    bosco boobo 1

    That’s annoying. To cater for the alternate spellings (such as Daragh, Darach, Dara, Daire) it would have been easy enough just to link them to the same video insert. However, it is not as bad as if I was a woman. According to Vodafone “Darragh” (and apparently all the phonetic variants thereof) is only a guys name.

    Bosco booboo 2

    Also, some of the inserts give unexpected outcomes. I was going to send my wife an e-card describing her as a “Dreamer”. Thankfully there is a preview mode which showed me what she’d see. Given that the squeaky voiced puppet would have demanded that she “stop thinking about that girl” I decided it might require more explaining at home than I could possibly manage.

    Yes, the whole thing is a bit of fun and I’m probably being overly pedantic. However it does highlight the risk of having ‘non-quality’ outcomes when you rely on drop down menus and defined lists to operate a business process. What, if instead of producing a cheezee e-card I had been applying for phone service from vodafone?

    When I get a chance I’ll post up the slides I use about “why I got into Information Quality”… research this morning has identified another 3 variant spellings of my name at least….

  • Amazon-inania again…

    So, Christmas is coming, the Goose is getting fat. I thought I’d put some euros in Jeff Bezo’s hat..

    So I decided to try to order some Xbox games as part of my Christmas shopping. I fully expected to get big “DANGER WILL ROBINSON” warnings for all the purchases given Amazon’s decision NOT to sell software or electrical goods into the Irish market for no apparent reason (which I’ve written about before here and here and here and which featured on other blogs last year… here…. and which I brought to the attention of the relevant Government Minister here). I haven’t actually received a response on this yet, over a year later. Shame on me for not chasing it up.

    Imagine my fricking surprise when I got this…Amazon Inania

    Apparently the XBox game Ratatouille is not the same class of thing as the XBox games “Cars Mater-national” or “the Simpsons”. Now, this puts Amazon across two of my pet bugbears…

    1. Nonsensical and unexplained restrictions on shipping of goods within the EU (which, in the absence of a REALLY good explanation is probably a breach of EU law)
    2. Buggered up information quality

    If all of the game titles had been restricted I’d have simply shrugged my shoulders and moved on. But they weren’t. This suggests that either:

    • The information which Amazon use to classify their games and software is inaccurate or incomplete and allows exceptions through the net (boo hiss)
    • OR (worryingly) The restriction on shipping electrical goods, games and software has less to do with the WEEE regulations in Ireland (Amazon’s nonsense excuse) but have more to do with producers seeking to create and maintain artificial market segregation. In the context of a web site selling into Ireland, that could raise issues of EU law and, if it is the case that a number of different manufacturers have made similar requests to Amazon to restrict the Irish Market, then that could be viewed as a cartel-like operation, which is apparently a bad thing.

    Not that Amazon would pander to that kind of thing. Gosh no. This has to relate to the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment regulations because they define Electrical and Electronic Equipment as:

    “electrical and electronic equipment” means equipment which is dependent on electric currents or electromagnetic fields in order to work properly and equipment for the generation, transfer and measurement of such currents and fields falling under the categories set out in Annex IA of European Parliament and Council Directive 2002/96/EC on waste electrical and electronic equipment and designed for use with a voltage rating not exceeding 1,000 volt for alternating current and 1,500 volt for direct current;

    Yes. That definitely includes inert plastic with encrypted digital information on it (aka a dvd or cd with MS Office or Halo3 on it – take yer pick). Although, if you were particularly pedantic an Xbox game does rely on “electric currents or electromagnetic fields in order to work properly”. But only if you are being RIDICULOUSLY pedantic. I am pedantic. I’m renowned for it. Even I wouldn’t stretch things that far…

    Either way it is an avoidable and undesirable process outcome, and as it is happening inconsistently it is embarrasing. . It is particularly irksome given that Amazon are basing a Customer Service Call Centre in Cork and have a Service and Operations centre in Dublin and have been applauded by our Government for their investments.. Amazon’s relocation from Slough to Ireland was caught by the BEEB…

    I’ve posted on this previously and these posts can be found under the Amazon-Inania category on this blog.

  • Support your local train service…

    As I write this I’m travelling on the new evening rail service from Wexford to Dublin. It is really good. Cleverly Irish Rail have figured out that if they run a commuter service between Wexford and Waterford (using the lines previously hogged by Sugar beet trains that are no more) then they can run a service to Dublin via a connection at Enniscorthy.

    For anyone travelling to or from Wexford this is a very much needed service. Indeed as a total package the new timetables provides a much needed piece of strategic connectivity between the South East and Dublin.

    Passenger numbers on this, the first evening service to run, are OK for an evening train. However I think that with a bit of publicity the numbers travelling on the revised routes will easily justify them. Personally it makes my life a shit load easier as I can actually get some work done and then spend and hour or two with my wife (who was on the morning bus to Dublin today).

    I will be trying out the morning service next week and will blog about my experiences live from the train… I really hope I can blog about overcrowding.

    The only drawback is that the speed of the train is slightly less than that of the bus… but with a bit of investment in the lines we could actually get a viable eco-friendly transport system out of the south-east and reduce the reliance people have on the overstretched bus services.

    Well done to who ever thought of this new schedule… and Santa, if you are listening, I’ve been really good all year and would really like to have faster trains that could get me to Dublin in less than 2hrs from Wexford.

  • I’ll review you tuesday for a book today…

    I have noticed that I’ve been neglecting book reviews recently. This is in part due to other things eating up my time (such as my day job, my family and other extra curricular things) and in part due to my not having had time to put my reviews of the books I have been reading into a human-readable (as opposed to Daragh-readable) form.

    Among the books that I really want to get reviews up for are:

    Improving Data Warehouse and Business Information Quality by Larry P. English.

    this is one of the first and best books on Information Quality that I read. It sets a clear vision and roadmap for improving Information Quality in a sustainable way which challenges us to think bigger and better… I’ll say more in the full review.

    Data Quality for the Information Age by Tom Redman.

    This is the second book I read on Information Quality (Tom calls it Data Quality). The book is quite strong on real world case studies drawn from Dr Redman’s experiences and presents another robust framework for sustainable improvements in the quality of information. Again, once I get the full review blocked out I’ll say more.

    Information Quality, edited by Wang, Pierce, Madnick and Fisher

    A more ‘academic’ focussed book, this is a collection of papers more than a consistent narrative exposition of a methodology or framework. Some sections are very academic focussed and are of limited immediate practical benefit (note -immediate) while others present very interesting approaches to presenting and measuring the importance of information quality to your organisation. Again, the review is still in jottings stage but I’ll say more when I get a chance, hopefully over Christmas.

    Quality – 2nd Edition by John Beckford

    Quite possibly the best crash course primer on the fundamental teachings of Quality Management from Crosby to Stills Nash and Young Deming to Taguchi and beyond. I’m a proud owner of both the first edition (as an ebook) and the second edition (paperback) and the coffee stains on the book are a badge of honour. Summarises core practices and principles of various Quality teachers in a succint and readily digested manner. Again, I’ll say more when I have the time to put the full review together.

  • Amazon Prime

    Amazon. The f*ckers. Yet again they decide to clumsily shaft the residents of the 26 counties of the Republic of Ireland. Their Amazon Prime service has been launched and I was all clicky-fingered ready to sign up and pay my stg£49 to get this useful service.

    However, I forgot just how crap Amazon are at geography and how they seem to be incapable of recognising that

    • ‘Northern Ireland’ is just one part of a larger island
    • Ireland is a large, literate country with reasonably high disposable incomes
    • ..and a lot of their business is actually based here (customer services in Cork, a data centre in Dublin
    • Deliveries shipped to Belfast or Derry often are transited through Dublin airport

    So, I trundled through the terms and conditions of their service. Deliver to ‘Mainland UK’, delivery to ‘Other United Kingdom Locations’ which includes the Channel Isles and British Forces Posted Overseas, but not a whit of delivery to the Republic of Ireland.

    So, I decided to see if they have any logic that prevents people in the Ould Sod from signing up, much like they have checks and balances to stop us buying software or computer games or electrical goods.

    Ehhh… nope, I’m allowed to right through to the bit where I’d have to part with cash irrespective of what address I use.

    So, Amazon will take money off me for a service that they can’t/won’t deliver (no pun intended), because they are not using information they have about me (my address) to prevent me parting with cash, or they can deliver it (ie Prime deliveries to Irish Republic) but they have bungled their Terms & Conditions because they’re idiots, like those people who claim Oscar Wilde was British.

    I’m fricking angry now. Must go have a coffee to cool off.

    Mulley – if you’re reading a Nintendo Wii will calm me down nicely.

  • Science week.. the final post…

    The quest of The Raiders of the Lost Wii draws to a close.

    What was the best invention of 2007? Invention, rather than product development is how I think of this. The Nokia N95 might be a contender, but it is simply an evolution of existing things. Likewise the Iphone. Neither are particularly unique.

    My friends’ kid the O-meister is new, novel and unique – even though he is based on features from two slightly obsolete models which have been cunningly combined.

    Perhaps an invention could be an existing thing brought about in a new way? Like how we used to cook dinners on a stove, with pots and now we just bung something that looks vaguely like food in a microwave and get back something that tastes vaguely like the slimy residue of the Slugs of Evil in return. Yummy.

    I’d have to go with Monkey cloning. Yes, cloning isn’t new. Technically we’ve been doing it the old fashioned way since the dawn of time. However there is something “Island of Dr. Moreau”-ish about cloning monkeys. However, I’m not citing this as the best invention of 2007 simply because of the possible benefits to medicine from being able to clone and ‘grow’ spare parts for the body or the range of treatments that it may make possible for illnesses such as MS (which a friend of mine struggles with) or Parkinson’s disease (which has probably robbed the world of a 4th Back to the Future movie). I’m not voting for it because it opens the possibility of cloning other higher mammals while we perfect the technology for use with humans. Animals such as whales, dolphins, lawyers and accountants. All coming close to humanity but not quite reaching it yet.

    No, I’m voting for this because, at the current level of the technology, the process is inefficient. It took many thousands of monkey eggs to make the one viable clone embryo. This means that there is scope for a lot of exciting future developments in the field of biotechnology.

    But that’s not the reason…

    …no, the reason is that it gives me the chance to remind everyone that…

    …
    …
    … “You can’t make a monkey without breaking a few eggs”.

  • Science week

    Hmmm… perhaps I should have wished for that time machine after all. I keep missing deadlines for the Science Week thing.

    Today’s question is “What invention has helpd you most with your working life”

    As my job centres on computing and computery things many people would expect me to say “the computer” or “d’Internet”. But Babbage’s calculating engine and its descendants are just fripperies when compared to other inventions that I might mention.

    Booze is another possiblity, given its ability to unlock creative thought processes so that complex problems fall away in a “moment of clarity”. But I suspect that , overall, it may have hindered me more than helped given the fuzzy headed hangovers and general making a tit of myself at Christmas Parties when I was a younger man (ie up to last Christmas).

    However, when I think about the nature of my job and my working life since mid-way through college, I realise that the majority (if not all) of my career has dealt with clearly defining and structuring problems in a way that results in clearly defined and structured solutions becoming possible. Take away my computer and I can still do that. Take away my booze and I can still do that, but I’ll have a much more muted celebration afterwards (“yippee, mine’s a tea please”). Ultimately my career has been about structure and communication.

    To that end I’d like to nominate a combination invention… the dry-wipe whiteboard and the non-permanent marker. With these I can

    • do complex analysis of problems
    • define project structures
    • prioritise work plans for my team
    • diagram for my Masters students the complex set of transactions that resulted in the collapse of enron
    • Map root causes of process failures
    • Draw funny faces
    • Write project acronyms or codenames that will never see the light of day, but which everyone in the meeting finds hilarious
    • and so many more…

    And then when I’m done or when I find we’ve gone down a dead end I can just wipe the whole lot off. When I have a notes worth doing something with they can then be transcribed to Word, MSProject or PowerPoint and a fully formed idea can then be communicated to others.

    Also, I must not forget the smell of the markers.

    A close second place would be flipcharts and post-it notes, for similar but less ecologically friendly reasons.

    Yes, there are lovely technologies out there that I could nominate. However most of them simply technologise the type of creative process that can be had with a humble whiteboard and marker.

    Just for the LOVE of GOD and ALL THAT IS FRICKIN’ HOLY please don’t use permanent markers on the whiteboard. People who do should be shot, treated with the best medical care until they are able to stand up again and then be shot a second time.