Internet of Things and Information Governance

Information governance will enable enterprises to utilize IoT to its maximum potential. Organizations tend to underestimate data and its governance. With the rise of IoT, interconnected devices are generating data like never before!

This explosion in data and information can sometimes be overwhelming for enterprises. A huge amount of data or information does not warrant its relevancy. Therefore, simply storing chunks of unorganized data will in no way help organizations move forward in their respective landscapes. It is crucial that organizations, along with their overall strategies, pay close attention to the framework for information governance and view it as a critical success factor.

What is Information Governance?

Information governance is as “a set of multi-disciplinary structures, policies, procedures, processes, and controls implemented to manage information at an enterprise level, supporting an organization's immediate and future regulatory, legal, risk, environmental, and operational requirements.” A valuable asset in business, a systematic information governance strategy and its successful implementation help organizations gain a holistic overview of their operations and manage their information reserves methodically. It encompasses all the areas of information security and strikes a balance between extracting value from information and keeping potential risk from information at bay.

What is the Need for Information Governance in IoT?

Data is growing rapidly and its traditional methods of storage aren’t any good today. Records and documents, data storage, retention, and management have now entered the digital domain. The benefits of data have been felt by various industries in the form of enhanced operational efficiency and increased revenues. However, vast availability of data poses several challenges as well, such as added enterprise investment and expenditure, loss of time and resources, data breaches, and an increase in security and privacy risks. Now, with the arrival of IoT, various interconnected IoT devices have added to the existential challenges of data storage, retention, and management.

As data continuously increases in volume and complexity, it is crucial that data is managed in an organized manner. For businesses, haphazard information governance can have a negative impact on decision-making and facilitate bad outcomes. Therefore, the need for having a strong information governance framework and strategy becomes crucial. As information governance helps revamp the processes, roles, standards, and metrics of an organization on a regular basis, it provides for an efficient use of data and information to achieve business goals and objectives.

How can you Incorporate Efficient Information Governance?

The foremost step to incorporate efficient information governance is to differentiate between relevant and irrelevant data. Data that can be used to serve your business purposes is the data that should be retained. Precautionary measures must be taken to store vital and confidential information in secure places. Enterprises must learn to link data that is valuable, especially that which gives them visibility into the diverse functions of their business units and departments. Besides, organizations must keep their legal, security, and regulatory concerns at the forefront and garner insights from data that helps in solving issues related to these.

Furthermore, it is important to remember that an organization’s employees are vital to good information governance, as they are responsible for extracting insights from data and driving profits from them. More often than not, malicious insiders are responsible for dragging an organization to the dumps. That is why it becomes all the more important to have a team of skilled and talented professionals. Organizations must strive to constantly update themselves with business, legal, and technological advancements, as information related to these fields tends to change regularly and has a huge impact on business.

Information governance seamlessly aligns technology with business regulations and aids in mitigating risks. However, the prime benefit of information governance lies in enhancing transparency amongst organizations. There is no doubt that it is the duty of an organization to formulate an information governance strategy and bring about its execution diligently.