A model for data quality assessment

Abstract

One of the major causes for the failure of information systems to deliver can be attributed to data quality. Gartner’s figures and other similar studies show the failure rate hovering at a plateau of 50% for data warehouses since 2004. While the true cause of poor data quality can be attributed to a lack of supporting business processes, insufficient analysis techniques, along with protecting oneself with the introduction of data quality firewalls for incoming data, the question has to be raised as to whether a data quality assessment of the existing data would be worthwhile or plausible? This paper defines a data quality assessment model that enables a methodology to assess data quality and assign ratings using a score-card approach. A by-product of this model helps establish ‘sluice gate’ parameters to allow data to pass through data quality filters and data quality firewalls.