Hub Solution Designs

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
I’m really looking forward to speaking at next week’s Decisions, Information and Governance conference in Las Vegas, sponsored by The Palladium Group.
And I spoke earlier this week at the New England Oracle SOA Users Group, talking about Master Data Management as a [...]

Filed under: Best Practices, CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy, Uncategorized | Tagged: analytics, BI, business intelligence, CDI, Customer Data Integration, data, DIG2008, information, Master Data Management, MDM, service oriented architecture, soa | 1 Comment »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
In this article, we’ll give some perspective on the current state of the Master Data Management (MDM) market.
Well-meaning skeptics have raised doubts about whether MDM initiatives have long-term viability, sufficient ROI or in fact, are just another system. This skepticism is, of [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: BPEL, BPO, CDI, Customer Data Integration, data stewardship, enterprise software, IBM, Initiate Systems, market, Master Data Management, MDM, Oracle, outsourcing, Purisma, SAP, Siperian, soa | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
I was interviewed recently at the Spring 2008 MDM Summit in San Francisco.
DMRadio (which broadcasts weekly on DMReview.com) did a broadcast from the exhibit floor, featuring:

Marty Moseley from Initiate Systems
Christopher Dwight from Oracle
Dan Power from Hub Solution Designs
Justin Magruder from Freddie Mac
Richard [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, MDM Summit, Master Data Management, Politics, Strategy | Tagged: CDI, Customer Data Integration, DMRadio, DMReview.com, Initiate Systems, Master Data Management, MDM, Oracle | No Comments »

Master Data Management (MDM) initiatives often seem to begin with the CIO and consequently, the implementation takes on a strong technology focus.
But in today’s article, we want to suggest an approach that’s more likely to succeed in the long run – tying the MDM project to solving an important business problem, and then [...]

Filed under: Best Practices, CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Politics, Strategy, business case | Tagged: business drivers, CDI, Customer Data Integration, marketing, Master Data Management, MDM | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
In a bid to position themselves as leaders in the Master Data Management space, several vendors position their MDM platform as a complete solution.
The truth is that these claims are somewhat misleading. Some claim that Data Governance (a critical component of an [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: business problems, CDI, Customer Data Integration, data governance, Data Quality, Master Data Management, MDM | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
I just attended a great session by Haidong Song from Oracle in the MDM track at the COLLABORATE 08 conference, being put on this week in Denver by the Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG). 
I’ve known Haidong for several years, from my “previous life” [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: Acxiom, CDI, Customer Data Integration, D&B, data, Master Data Management, MDM, Oracle | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Today, we’ll talk about some criteria you can use to evaluate Master Data Management vendors.
Before you go into “evaluation mode”, it’s important that, on the business side, you first have your MDM strategy chalked out.
And on the technical side, you should have mapped [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy | Tagged: data, data governance, Master Data Management, MDM, software selection | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
As SOA (service oriented architecture) initiatives gain popularity, let’s look at how MDM (master data management) and data governance can dovetail with a SOA strategy.
SOA, although technically a type of IT architecture, is more of an integrated approach to building high-level services [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy | Tagged: applications, business, data, Governance, Master Data Management, MDM, service oriented architecture, services, soa | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Building a “Single Version of the Truth” can be more expensive than you expect, and documenting and measuring its ROI requires careful thought.
Good planning is more necessary than ever in an uncertain economic climate. The result of inadequate planning can be misdirected [...]

Filed under: Assessment, Best Practices, CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Readiness, Strategy | Tagged: business case, CDI, Customer Data Integration, data governance, Data Quality, Master Data Management, MDM, planning | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
We’re really looking forward to the MDM Summit conference in San Francisco, which runs from Sunday, March 30th through Tuesday, April 1st.
This is a very exciting space. Over the past few years, we’ve seen the mega-vendors like Oracle, IBM and SAP get more [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, MDM Summit, Master Data Management | Tagged: Aaron Zornes, business, Master Data Management, MDM, MDM Summit, SourceMedia, technology | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Hub Solution Designs, Inc. was incorporated in September 2007. At this point in our history, I thought I’d spend a few minutes reflecting on what we’ve done so far and where we’re headed.
Clients: we’ve been lucky to get off to a strong start [...]

Filed under: CDI, Company, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: data, Master Data Management, MDM, OAUG, Oracle, Oracle Applications User Group, Relationships | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
I was reading a whitepaper by Aaron Zornes today (”2007-2008 Scorecards for Data Governance in the Global 5000 Enterprise” and came across an interesting quote:
“Although many organizations have improved end-to-end business processes through CRM implementations, the challenge of developing a unified [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Politics, Strategy | Tagged: CRM, data, Data Quality, ERP, Governance, information, integration, Master Data Management, MDM, people, processes | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
We just published the March issue of our monthly newsletter on MDM Best Practices. 
This issue has a great article on “How to Write an RFP for Master Data Management” by Ravi Shankar of Siperian.  We’ve also got a new team member who [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: Newsletter | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
I don’t want to interrupt the flow of Maureen Butler’s great series on “Building the Business Case”, but I just spoke to Julie Langenkamp, Editor-in-Chief at DM Review, and I’ve agreed to become a monthly columnist for their online edition. 
The column will run [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: column, DM Review | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
When it comes to building the case for an Information Management strategy, cost reductions alone may generate enough benefits to justify your business case, or they could further enhance your economic arguments.
Here are some examples of where you may uncover potential cost [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Pragmatic, Strategy | Tagged: business, business case, cost reduction, costs, customer, data, management, marketing, reporting | 1 Comment »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
When you’re building the business case for an Information Management strategy such as MDM, CDI, Data Governance, or Data Quality, start by articulating the business problems or opportunities. By building a compelling case and getting executive sponsorship, you’ll have a stronger chance [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy | Tagged: audit, business, business case, compliance, management, reporting, risk management, risks | 2 Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Some client quotes at the end of a recent site visit:
“It’s not possible for one person to have all the necessary expertise, so we underutilize a lot of the tools.  We struggle for the fixes, for the process; we don’t know next [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy | Tagged: client, quotes, site visit | 1 Comment »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
As the early adopters of Master Data Management are starting to move beyond their single data domain implementations and branching out to other domains, we’re seeing the timely arrival of MDM hubs capable of handling data from multiple domains.  So, what are [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy | Tagged: centralized, data, federated, hubs, MDM | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Metadata management is often overlooked, misunderstood or assumed to be taken care of automatically as part of an MDM initiative. While it’s true that databases can generate metadata reports based on a logical data model, there’s a lot more than that to [...]

Filed under: Assessment, CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management, Readiness | Tagged: BPM, Business Process Management, EAI, Enterprise Application Integration, Naming | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
I’m very pleased to announce that Maureen Butler is joining us as a Senior Consultant. She brings significant SAP information management, marketing, supply chain, organizational design and change management expertise to the team.
Prior to joining the firm, she was Director, Customer Information [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy | Tagged: Company, Consultants, SAP | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
At Hub Solution Designs, our MDM partnership strategy is pretty straightforward.
We are a management & technology consulting firm focused exclusively on Master Data Management and Data Governance.  Our strategy is to partner with all of the leading MDM vendors, because there is no [...]

Filed under: Assessment, CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Readiness, Strategy | Tagged: D&B, IBM, Initiate, Oracle, Oracle Applications Users Group, partnership, Purisma, SAP, Siperian | 2 Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Another one-pager today on our MDM Software Evaluation & Selection service offering.
Please let us know if you have any feedback for us on it.
Also, we’ll be announcing a new team member later on today, and we’re very excited about her joining us!

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management, Strategy | Tagged: one-pager, service offerings, software selection | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
We published another one-page document today on our Business Case Creation & ROI Analysis service offering. Please let us know what you think …

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: business case, one-pager, ROI analysis, service offerings | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Today, we published two one-page documents on our Educational Workshops and Readiness Assessment service offerings on our web site.
Please let us know what you think of them …

Filed under: Assessment, CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management, Readiness, Strategy | Tagged: educational, one-pager, service offerings, workshops | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Most data quality initiatives consist of processes, procedures and technology, with the goal of achieving a desired level of quality in corporate data.
While companies sometimes did data quality projects prior to the emergence of MDM, I cannot stress enough how important it [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: Metadata | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
It never rains but it pours. It looks like we’re going to be doing two speaking engagements in March & April - at the Spring 2008 MDM Summit in San Francisco, CA, and the Oracle Applications Users Group COLLABORATE 08 conference in [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Governance, MDM, Master Data Management, Politics, Pragmatic | Tagged: Oracle Applications Users Group | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
A Squidoo “lens” is a view of a particular topic like Master Data Management. It’s an easy-to-build web page that can point to
• blogs
• favorite links
• RSS feeds
• Flickr photos
• Amazon books
• etc.
So when people are looking for information [...]

Filed under: Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: data governance, Data Quality, lens, Master Data Management, MDM, Squidoo | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
In past issues of this blog, we’ve discussed aspects of the People, Process and Technology issues related to a Master Data Management program. In this article, we’ll touch on an equally important aspect – the underlying information.
Having decided on the domain [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, Master Data Management, MDM | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
We’ll resume the discussion on simplifying an MDM initiative down to its two core elements.
On enrichment with external or “third party” content, things tend to go two different ways here. Either your industry and company’s requirements require a large number of external [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: CDI, Customer Data Integration, data governance, Data Quality, Master Data Management, MDM | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
As we’ve written before, we think there are five essential elements in successful Master Data Management initiatives:
(1) some type of MDM Hub
(2) some form of middleware & business process management
(3) enterprise data quality capabilities
(4) enrichment with external content
(5) data governance
But let’s try [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: CDI, Customer Data Integration, data governance, Data Quality, Master Data Management, MDM | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
Customer Data Integration (CDI) was declared “done” by industry analyst Aaron Zornes at the recent CDI-MDM Summit conference in New York.
Most leading edge companies implementing CDI have the technology, business processes, and data governance in place. So for some MDM practitioners [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management | Tagged: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Master Data Management, MDM, PIM, PLM, Product Information Management, Product Lifecycle Management | No Comments »

digg this | del.icio.us | Reddit | Stumble It!
This morning, Tim O’Sullivan and I attended David Loshin’s session on “Data Profiling, Data Governance, and Data Quality for Master Data Governance”.
I really enjoyed it. Being a self-admitted “data geek”, it was a great review, and I learned a few new [...]

Filed under: CDI, Customer Data Integration, Data Quality, MDM, Master Data Management | No Comments »