Definition
Data administration is the process of managing a firm’s data to ensure consistency, usefulness, and reliability. Data administration may involve multiple stakeholders across the company, such as the legal and compliance department, business units, or IT.
The main duties include quality management, security, governance, database management, and data modeling. Effective data administration facilitates compliance with relevant applicable regulations and standards, as well as informed decision-making. Furthermore, it enables organizations to respond swiftly to data security threats, including data theft, loss, breaches, and other malicious actions.
Data Administration Approaches
- Data governance: Creating a formal framework guarantees effective and uniform data management inside an organization. The framework comprises policies and processes for data privacy, security, quality, and lifecycle control.
- Data modeling: Designing and constructing data models helps the company structure and arrange the data effectively for its requirements. In addition, it aids in the identification of possible data quality problems and the establishment of relationships among diverse data organizations.
- Data integration: Combining data from multiple sources and structures assists a company in gaining an extensive and efficient perspective of its data assets.
- Master Data Management (MDM): This assists in improving data consistency and quality throughout the organization.
- Data safety: Applying security measures helps the company safeguard data from loss, theft, or unauthorized access. This involves creating access controls, data backup, encryption, and retrieval processes.
- Data quality management: This includes defining data quality standards, applying procedures to detect and correct data quality problems, as well as tracking data quality metrics to ensure comprehensive, accurate, and reliable data throughout the firm.