A small study may yield some clues as to why Singapore and Australia respondents cited better outcomes than their global counterparts.
Through a survey of 300 senior executives across mid- to large- sized enterprises in Q4 2022 and Q1 2023 to understand organizations’ progress on their data management journey and their perceptions on data quality, respondents from Australia and Singapore (defined as representing the Asia Pacific region) were leading the charge.
This may be a function of the chief executive officers in the two countries setting the data objectives, and also due to more involvement by chief digital or data officers therein.
Globally, while data was a clear focus are for the C-level respondents, there were still some that were struggling with usable data in terms of execution. One of the reasons cited for bad data in APAC included “inconsistent taxonomy in different operations”. Globally, respondents cited “a lack of governance and monitoring” as the main factors leading to bad data.
Overall, 95% of respondents believed that their organizations would be more competitive, more innovative, and able to make faster decisions if their data quality were two times better — and data management was crucial to getting to this point.
| Asia Pacific findings | Global findings |
| 1. How did CEOs play a role in setting and owning the organization’s data objectives, in comparison to chief digital or data officers? | |
| For majority of the respondents from Singapore and Australia, 58% had the CEO setting the data objectives (58%), but 60% cited that the chief digital and data officers owned these functions (60%). | 46% of respondents cited that the CEO set the data objectives, while 35% cited the CEO owned the functions. The chief data and digital officers played a smaller role in the overall management of data objectives. |
| 2. Most respondents had a centralized, company-wide data management strategy | |
| 70% of respondents had fully implemented data management and 90% had a centralized company-wide data management strategy. | Globally, 73% of respondents had implemented a centralized company-wide data management strategy. |
| 3. Cross-functional, centralized governance was accelerating | |
| 60% of respondents in Singapore and Australia cited a governance office or team that supported cross-functional data governance, and 46% cited having a proactive governance model. | 44% of companies globally cited having a governance office or team that supported cross-functional data governance, while 19% of respondents were still in the process of defining their governance framework. |
| 4. Usable data remained a challenge | |
| 58% of respondents cited that up to 50% of their data was bad or not consumable. | 80% of respondents cited that they trusted their data, with 60% of that data being actually usable. |
According to Gary Chua, Managing Director (Asia Pacific & Japan), Syniti, which carried out the survey: “Rapid digitalization has created a proliferation of data, and businesses still struggle to connect their data management to business outcomes. The good thing is that the (respondents were) responding to calls to implement clear governance and data strategies. Those polled in Singapore and Australia are model examples, with stronger data governance and overall management globally.”
