What Is Data Governance?

The overall management and protection of data within an organization is called data governance. Throughout the lifecycle of data, it encompasses the processes, policies, and strategies that ensure the availability, data integrity, and security of information. 

Why Is Data Governance Important?

• Data governance helps establish clear guidelines and standards for data management. This includes defining roles, responsibilities, and processes for data handling, and ensuring that data is collected, stored, and used in a consistent and reliable manner. 
• It ensures data quality and integrity as well. In this regard, it’s necessary to implement measures to validate and cleanse data so that it’s accurate, complete, and up-to-date. 
• Data governance helps comply with regulatory requirements and industry standards. This reduces the risk of data breaches, legal issues, and reputational damage.
• Next, data governance enables organizations to manage data security in an effective manner. That’s important for establishing controls and protocols for data access, encryption, and data loss prevention. 
• Compliance with data privacy regulations (like the General Data Protection Regulation), is another reason to establish data governance frameworks. It’s required to implement appropriate consent mechanisms, data anonymization, and data retention policies. Besides managing and protecting data, data governance facilitates data sharing and collaboration within and across organizations.