Preach What You Practice

AI will force you to face the hidden costs of not governing your data right

Data management is hot, because use of AI has highlighted its necessity. Organisations experience that their data management practices are not sufficient to transition to AI operated business processes. Haven’t we heard about the importance of organisational data management practices before? Yes, many times. But... keep on reading

Healthcare and digital transformation: data should make healthcare more people-centred

This short article is a reflection of my thoughts running free. It is not a prediction, nor does it represent my employer’s policy or strategy. Healthcare is people work. Caregivers and nurses do this work because they want to work with people. Despite attempts to reduce the administrative burden in the care process, we... keep on reading

An end to the data fairy tale (2/2)

In the first part, I addressed the nature of data and our struggles in working with data. I concluded with the observation that despite this struggle, we keep on collecting more and more data. Why are we doing this? An above all, what are the consequences of our data hoarding? Why do we collect all this data? As... keep on reading

An end to the data fairy tale (1/2)

It has been 20 years since the DotCom crash and the introduction of the term ‘web 2.0’ in its aftermath. Web 2.0 did put focus on interaction with data. I have grown up as a ‘data professional’ in the same period. Looking back on those 20 years, I can sum it up in three bullet points: Connectivity (internet),... keep on reading

Working with data: a toy metaphor

Using metaphors is dangerous. Metaphors do not describe reality, but are a tool to create insight into complex problems. I have an ambivalent relationship with metaphors. People tend to run away with them and stretch the simplification, instead of using it as an entry into discussing the real complexities. Notwithstanding,... keep on reading

Information overflow asks for curative maintenance

Businesses and government agencies collect large volumes of data to get to needed information. In every subject discussed, data is the central underlying theme. Investments in technology are ripe with promise and low on yield. Organisations experience this squeeze. I even observe a regression: new technology and more data... keep on reading

Naked Data

It is hard to explain why data management is still an unruly discipline. Two articles I read recently which on first reading appeared to be unrelated, actually have a connection and help shed some light on the unruliness. The connection is that we work around the shortcomings of the current technologies. This lead me to an... keep on reading

LinkedIn articles

I use LinkedIn as the medium to publish short articles. This is the compilation of references to those articles. Some of them are in the Dutch language. Highlighted articles The path to data driven maturity — a maturity model for data driven organisations. On context and tacit knowledge — the obstacle course for... keep on reading

Taming the data beast

The digital company and analytics are not synonyms. The common denominator is the acquisition, transformation and use of information. Digitisation of business processes has a profound impact on how businesses are run and on where and how analytics are being used to optimize those business processes. The flood of information,... keep on reading

Data and AI in an analytical world

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has had a long history up until now, remaining in university labs for a number of years before coming of age. Today, connectivity and computing power have reached a turning point where it is viable to apply algorithms locally. This opens up a whole new set of applications, some of which will make... keep on reading