Action produces information “Action produces information. If you’re unsure of what to do, just do anything, even if it’s the wrong thing. This will give you information about what you should actually be doing.” – Brian Armstrong, co-founder of Coinbase This is the great thing about data and why I’ve been in this business so long. […]

Why a single source of truth is so beneficial… The holy grail of data management is the “single source of truth.” As I like to characterize it, when someone asks “Where is the data about X?” everyone knows the answer and everyone gives the SAME answer. One of the most common challenges I hear from my […]

Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should I’ve worked in and with associations for well over 37 years now. And one of the things I’ve always loved and appreciated about association staffers is their willingness to do whatever is needed to get the job done. But the problem is this “Yes, we can!” attitude can also […]

Data doesn’t need to be perfect to be useful “Your data doesn’t have to be perfect to be useful.” – (Borrowed with permission from Intellidata’s Slice newsletter.) In my experience, many associations hold themselves back from cleaning up their data, because they are overwhelmed with where to start, and they also think success can only be achieved […]

Don’t just clean data, clean reports and queries One of the reasons I exhort my clients to keep their data as clean as possible is because, over time, “dirty” data causes users to doubt the accuracy of all the data in the system. And when users doubt the data, they’ll start using their own systems […]