Data Collaboration

Change the way you think about change

The 3 Steps of Data Collaboration

1
Data Liberation
2
Data Productization
3
Data Collaboration

It's time to re-set your expectations

Within an enterprise data architecture, what's in control? Is it the applications or the data? For most, it's the applications. But applications are useless without data. As a result data becomes the servant to the applications. As more applications are built, more data copies and more silos are created, leading to a never ending cycle of architectural complexity.

Moving towards collapse two steps at a time

An application led approach may seem like small steps forward for the business but in reality it's actually moving it closer and closer to collapse by complexity. Ultimately creating an unruly ecosystem of disparate applications tethered to disparate databases and repositories. 

Getting out of this cycle requires thinking “differently”.  It requires actually changing the way you change. It's realizing that a little better is not good enough and that traditional approaches should not be directing solution design. 

Change the way you change

An example to ponder. Automobile manufacturers. Some think they are moving two steps forward by making combustion engines more fuel efficient. This "progress" doesn't solve the larger problems of cost, reliability and the reliance on fossil fuels. As a result, more versions of better will continue to be needed, little by little, over and over, stuck in the cycle of the traditional.

Some are taking a completely different approach. Electricity. Solving the problems of efficiency, emissions and fuel source in one fell swoop. This approach to change has also created brand new opportunities for growth, expansion and simplification. Why? Because these companies changed the way they thought about a single problem and as a result rid themselves of ALL the problems. They now live and operate in a world where old problems are irrelevant.

The net result. All cars will be electric in less than 10 years. Different wins because it is not focused on a little better. Companies not thinking differently now, will be left behind tomorrow.

What does this all have to do with your data architecture?

Different, not better is the way forward

What exactly does different mean in this context?

Let’s first start off looking at other common data management models and solutions on the market today. Data warehouses, data visualization, data lakes, data mesh and data fabric. All good models/solutions, yet all still act as a means to move only a few steps forward.

Why? Because with all of these solutions data remains under lock and key. It’s stuck in a world where applications are still in control of the data. As a result, all of these models require heavy integrations and there remains many different versions of data, all housed in silo’s. All this splintered data is difficult to govern. Access to the people who need the data to make good business decisions can often be completely blocked.  There is nothing really "different" about any these approaches.

Data Collaboration is different.

It gets the enterprise into a new universe by first doing one thing completely different.

It integrates data without integration

A Data Collaboration Network liberates enterprise data and evolves it into a federated, fully collaborative network. Data being free, puts it in control. The paradigm of application control is flipped on its head and a new universe of how data interacts in the enterprise is created.

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How does data collaboration work in the enterprise?

What is data collaboration? It entails the collection, exchange and use of data from different origins within an organization. This interaction creates data products with data owners acting as experts for their specific data domains. The interaction of these various data set domains also results in dramatically informed insights that are solely driven by the interactions of the data itself.

Cinchy's Data Collaboration Platform enables an enterprise organization to create data in an productized manner, one in which data structures can be defined independent of any one business solution planning on leveraging that data.  The way the data is modeled is in a manner that is conducive to the business and how the business thinks about its information usage.

The Data Collaboration Platform in the enterprise can be generalized into 3 components:

Data Liberation

Application owners can make data available to access and change via the dataset network with real-time 2-way synchronization. Bridging the gap between the legacy world and the new way the business can now manage their data. Bi-directional connectivity allows data to freely flow in and out of the dataset network as needed.

Data Productization

The dataset network is composed of individual domains of interconnected data sets or data products. This environment provides the capability of being able to model, protect and control data in a manner that is democratized, where many different teams can work in a completely federated way, building out this network of information. Data product owners can create and manage data products with granular access/control policies enabling real-time data collaboration.

Data Collaboration

Project teams can use data products to access and change data to meet their project requirements without dependence on individual apps/teams. This allows the enterprise to interact with the data and further build additional application-based capabilities as needed. This is accompanied by a pre-built data browser as the main user interface, allowing users to explore, access, view, and change information subject to their level of access.

This entire package of these capabilities forms the solution known as the Data Collaboration Platform.

Collaboration requires an enabling platform

Platform Capability
Benefit for Documents
Benefit for Data
Metadata Plasticity comptab-infoalt7-icon
Links don’t break when files are renamed or moved
Queries/Links/APIs don’t break when columns are renamed or dropped
Universal Governance & Controls comptab-infoalt7-icon
Access to files/folders can be granted and revoked by owners at any time
Access to rows/columns/cells can be granted and revoked by owners at any time
Version Control & Lineage comptab-infoalt7-icon
Files and metadata changes are versioned & can be diff’ed and rolled back
Data and metadata changes are versioned & can be diff’ed and rolled back
UI for Data Collaboration comptab-infoalt7-icon
Real-time collaboration UI for users to search using metadata and access/create/add files
Real-time collaboration UI for users to search using metadata and access/create/add data
API for Data Collaboration comptab-infoalt7-icon
Real-time collaboration API for appsto discover/access/modify/add files
Real-time collaboration APIs for apps to discover/access/modify/add data

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Connected data without the effort, time, and cost of traditional data integration.