Chief Data Officers - one of the loneliest roles?

Chief Data Officers (CDOs) face a unique set of challenges in today’s evolving data and AI landscape. Whilst protecting and realising the value from data assets, they must also navigate the complexities of rapidly shifting methodologies and solutions - all while building the business and technical capabilities to scale the use of data solutions.

​

CDOs must have a focus on defensive strategies - ensuring that data assets and reporting are secure, accurate, and reliable. While these tasks are critical, they are often "hygiene factors" - vital, but not valued by the business until something goes wrong.

​

Therefore, defensive strategies alone are not enough. To truly succeed, CDOs must place equal, if not greater emphasis on ‘offensive’ value delivery. A generic list of potential use cases are easily found or generated. Yet the challenge is in translating these to the organisation’s strategy, aptitude and capabilities - all while ensuring that business users are taken on the journey.

 

There is also the challenge of avoiding the all too common trap of stalling at the pilot stage. The CDO needs to be able to guide the productionisation of data solutions whilst also shepherding the business users on the process and capability changes required to implement and scale the solution.

 

Working out how to balance and sequence the use cases whilst building the enabling capabilities required to scale is no easy feat and full of pitfalls. Solving this often rests squarely on the CDO’s shoulders in determining to how to approach, sequence, champion as well as deliver.

​

Digitally native businesses, or large, global corporates benefit from having made significant early investments so building experience in how to strike the balance across proving value and building technical and business capabilities. Whilst they've had the benefit of learning from their mistakes, most organisations lack these inherent advantages - yet the transformational expectations of data are the same.

 

Functions like marketing and IT are established and well-understood across the C-suite, yet the successful recipe for data and AI is still emerging. There’s often limited understanding across the leadership team of the CDO’s role and the ‘problems to be solved’ – or worse non-technical peers have a two-sentence 'opinion' on how to approach, but little beyond this. Furthermore, there is limited clarity or recognition of the critical role that fellow leaders must play in scaling the impact of data initiatives. So, the CDO needs to evangalise, educate and deliver Use case projects across the business - whilst also ensuring BAU operations run smoothly.

 

The transformational potential of data and more recently AI has raised the profile of CDOs, yet the role can be lonely compared to other leadership positions. CIOs have a portfolio of SaaS vendors with their product solution roadmaps and SLA driven performance. CMOs have their marketing agencies to create, plan and execute their advertising and personalisation strategies. But aside from learning from the talent within their teams, who is the equivalent for the CDO?

​

Technical data consultancies can help in establishing cloud data platforms, building governed data pipelines, and even supporting the productionisation of machine learning models. Yet CDOs need more than just technical support – as these are usually the easier problems to solve. They need a trusted advisor—someone who has walked in their shoes, understands their unique challenges, and can offer objective guidance – without suspicion that the advisor’s ultimate motive is to sell a large-scale technology project.

​

In crafting the right roadmap to deliver 'value at scale' from data, some questions to consider include:

• Do your business peers have a clear, grounded view on how data can step-change their KPI achievement? Is there clarity on the key decisions that can be improved by data - and which should be solved through in-house solutions versus where generic system supplied versions are sufficient?

• Are you already considering and 'forward solving' the post pilot problems - does the business understand what they and your team needs to do to take a pilot in to scaled implementation?

• Has your roadmap got the appropriate balance and sequence between identifying and delivering use cases, and building the capabilities required to scale value? Does the business have a sufficient understanding of the 'why' as well as the 'what'?
   

In solving these and many other associated challenges, who is the ‘friend’ that the CDO can call on?