Does your company, department or team struggle with data quality and accuracy?

“We rarely struggle with data quality/accuracy.”

Whenever I hear this assertion, it tells me something. It does not tell me that I have found a rare company whose data collection and data management practices have reached near-perfection. It tells me that I have found yet another company that has accepted poor data quality as the best that can be hoped for given whatever imaginary constraints that prevent progress. I see this as a leadership failure. The employees who generate, capture and maintain data may not reach an extremely high standard, but they will certainly live down to a low standard. Our advice: Challenge your people to take quality benchmarks, develop processes for quality improvement and set makeable goals until the company’s culture will not accept a shrug.