Regulation As Driver

What regulation, in your view, is most impactful for data management at this time?

Choosing a single "most impactful" regulation is difficult as they have all changed how we operate, usually profoundly, and will continue to affect us into the future. BCBS 239 has raised data governance to a board-level priority; legal entity identifiers, required for an increasing number of purposes and jurisdictions; and KYC/AML, AIFMD, CCAR, EMIR requirements are bringing attention to the full set of data operational issues. However, in time, as the regulatory-driven changes are incorporated into new products and services, we may appreciate better their impact.

Is regulation in general the biggest factor driving data management or governance changes?

The financial crisis, and the regulatory response, changed everything for all things "data." Regulation has been most influential by creating a high level of urgency around data activities that were already considered important, but which may have been on a slower, more selective, or more discretionary track from a purely business value perspective. It really has brought data, as differentiated increasingly from technology, to the "top table," and has established data governance as a discipline and a profession.

Have new regulations been manageable for firms' data operations staff?

Regulation has affected how we do business, and there is a burden associated with change. While this wave of regulation has been intense, it has also challenged institutions to make more fundamental improvements, some long known, to the management of data. Some of these, such as the designation of trusted sources of reference data, and the development of formal data steward communities, promise large and durable benefits, and tangible value, both for data practitioners and our customers in our businesses.