Week 11 Clear Database 2

http://www.ign.com/boards/threads/are-you-a-meat-and-potatoes-kinda-guy.250043499/

This week my confidence is riding high! Following the Access project from last week, which I feel pretty confident about too, we focused on The Data Asset. This lesson was what I'll call the meat and potatoes of data management. Here we learned about what data is and some of the ways that data is driven. 

http://www.cu.edu.ge/?i=12566&l=1

First, what is data? Data is raw facts and figures. There is structured data, data that is organized, and unstructured data, data that is, well.....not organized. In the business context, data comes from all places. It comes from suppliers, manufacturers, and most importantly, from customers. Putting data together to answer a question or make a decision becomes information. A key source for this data comes from Enterprise Software. This software makes it easier to combine data across all business units to get a more robust picture for the company. The company can formulate a plan based on this data to carry out their business objectives. So as you can see, management of data is a vital skill that is constantly being utilized as the data changes, which could be quiet often.

Next, we learned about storing data. This is done using data warehouses or data marts. This is where data gets turned into information. Data warehouses are a broad type of system where several databases are used to support decision making in an organization. Data marts, on the other hand, are a more focused system that concerns a specific problem. Since data growth is the number one challenge for IT organizations, these tools are an important asset to streamlining data into information.

As you may be able to see, having the skill set to manage all of this information is a make or break difference. It can be something that will push your firm forward to success or pull it back into the business failure abyss. Our text book did a great job of giving us successes and failures to illustrate my point. 

Addhttp://symbolphotos.blogspot.com/2008/10/danger-symbol-sign-photos.html caption

 The final point I would like to make about this week's lesson was the danger of data. Mr. Olsen's lecture concerning this topic was very important. He said that the bigger the size of the data, the bigger the problem with breaches of that data. This has been documented very well in the media with the most recent being this week with a credit card payment processing company. Advancements in technology and the enormous amount of data tracking have become a double-edged sword. This sword is wielded for just as much evil as it is for good. As keepers of the sword, managers must be diligent not only in the gathering but also in the protection of the much sought after data and information. Unfortunately, evil dates back to the Bible. So I also feel confident in saying that it will be around for a very long time to come.



Until next week, GO GATORS!