Strategy is the key to winning any game, and Data Strategy is the key to winning the Data Management game. Data Strategy is a concept in the plural, as it comprises a set of different interrelated strategies that work together to meet business strategic objectives and business data needs and solve an organization’s data pain points. Data Strategies help manage expectations of what is happening in the data arena. Describing them is an art. Thus, a canvas is needed to capture and communicate them. This book shows you what those constituent strategies should be and what goes into their canvases. It is a comprehensive guide that will take you step by step on how to produce an Enterprise Level Data Strategy. If you follow this advice, you will have a practical, agile, and easy-to-communicate (PAC) Data Strategy to keep your teams and organization aligned.

We all know that data will play an increasingly important role in all future operations.  How you personally and your organization apply data to operations will be the difference between success and failure.  Have worked in this area for many years, the time is ripe for the next step in the evolution of data strategy.  Marilu has taken this step.  As an enthusiastic adherent to the business canvas technique, I greatly admire the diligence with which she has applied this to the concept of formulating a data strategy.  There is a wealth of material in this very dense book of extremely useful tips, techniques, and guidance.  Probably the most difficult aspect of data strategy formulation centers on the challenge of meaningfully engaging various stakeholders in the necessary dialogs required to take your organizations data and applying it meaningfully in support of the organizational strategy.  The method described provides all the guidance you will need.

Peter Aiken

President, DAMA International

This is a comprehensive book on data strategies. Marilu Lopez has come up with a way to connect the data strategy to executive management that until now has been a missing piece; how to set the data strategies in motion. She doesn’t just go into how to create a data strategy as if it were a cake to be baked. Instead, she makes the reader think about what kind of data strategies are needed and how they fit into your organization’s challenges, intentions, and aspirations. The content is very credible as Marilu Lopez consistently uses and relates to academic research, literature, and thought leaders’ experiences. Thus, her PAC framework is based on today’s accumulated knowledge and takes you further from there. If you are about to take on data strategy work, you should start by first checking out Marilu Lopez’s messages.

Håkan Edvinsson

CTO, Principal Consultant, Informed Decisions

Today’s college graduates think that technology is all about choosing a technology or a technology stack in order to get work done. They don’t see that there is a larger infrastructure that they are a part of. What is needed is a book on the larger concepts that shape the IT industry. I recommend the book by Marilu Lopez as a starting place for understanding the larger framework under which IT operates.

Bill Inmon

CEO of Forest Rim Technology

You had me at “Pragmatic, Agile, and Communicable.” One of the perceptions of Data Management is that we are slow, overly complicated, and use convoluted terms and ideas. This work shows that it’s entirely possible to define a data strategy that is understandable and usable by all the stakeholders: executives, management, knowledge workers, developers, and data professionals. Marilu lays out everything you need to add data value to your organization, tailored to your industry and organizational culture. I look forward to applying the PAC Method to my future projects.

Karen Lopez

Sr. Project Manager, InfoAdvisors

For decades, data professionals have been advised to “get closer to the business” and to “connect business and data strategy,” But how? Finally, a book that answers this question! Well done, Marilu Lopez!

Tom Redman

“The Data Doc.” Data Quality Solutions