Roger Yeh

This week, I attended the FIMA (Financial Information Management) Data Management conference in Boston. While I have heard of this conference, I have not attended in the past. I was excited to hear what the industry experts had to say over the course of two and a half days. The opening remark was given by Peter Serenita, Group CDO at HSBC. He talked about the evolution of his own role—the Chief Data Officer (CDO)—across industries and companies. 

I recently received an email from Hubway, the bike-share program here in Boston. The subject read “Join the 2017 Hubway Data Challenge presented by Microsoft – over $7,500 in prizes.” Now for a little bit of background information, I am a regular user of Hubway. I live next to a docking station, so to get to work every day I take it to the nearest subway stop, which also has a docking station. I do this again on my way back home each night. On the weekends, I sometimes take it to the gym, which conveniently has two docking stations within walking distance. On a few occasions, my wife and I will bike from Fenway Park after a baseball game to the closest Red Line subway station to avoid the foot traffic. Let’s just say I use it a lot.

Master Data Management (MDM) is a huge buzzword in boardrooms around the world. Organizations today collect and generate massive amounts of data, and the belief is that MDM is required to make any sense of it. Many see MDM as this magical solution that allows business users to leverage business data. And they’re right. But that’s like saying you would hire Shaquille O'Neal just so he can help you replace light bulbs in high ceilings or clean the gutters.