Improving Data Warehouse and Business Information Quality: Methods for Reducing Costs and Increasing Profits

PART One

Principles of Information Quality Improvement

“Back of every noble life there are principles that have fashioned it.”

–GEORGE HORACE LORIMER

The three chapters of Part One describe the fundamental principles of information quality. This is not theory. These are very real and practical principles, even though they are foreign to many organizations. They provide the basis for understanding the background to information quality improvement as a management tool. They are the basis for the processes of information quality improvement described in Part Two, “Processes for Improving Information Quality.” Without understanding the principles of quality improvement, implementing the processes may be a hollow and empty exercise that performs the actions but lacks the soul. This may result in loss of motivation for any information improvement initiative, no matter how well intentioned.

Chapter 1 describes the business case for information quality improvement. The bottom line is that poor data quality is just too expensive for organizations in a competitive or tight economy. It describes why information initiatives, such as data warehouses, so often fail.

Information systems organizations are in crisis today, a crisis caused by using information technology in ways that add complexity to information processing and information management based on industrial-age paradigms. This compounds information quality problems by creating redundant databases.

Chapter 1 presents many examples of ...