★ wanayoo — archive 1999 http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/isb/datadmin/s35.htm

Management Guide to Custodianship

[ Updates in 1999 ] | [ S35 Table of Contents ]

Please note: this document was originally published in January 1993. It will be revised in 1999, in conjunction with a review of the ministry's Corporate Information Custodianship policy. Definitions may change due to changes in context and improvements in ministry understanding (e.g. through projects such as INCOSADA, decisions at the Data Custodian Council, etc). The fact that there are actually changes in understanding is excellent -- the only problem is, given other pressing issues and priorities, we end up struggling to keep complex documents like Guide S35 up to date, continuously.

Updates Coming:

Once all updates are complete and Guide S35 is again officially released, the publication date below will be changed. There are a number of areas that will be updated in 1999:

clarifying the language used to describe the Data Custodian and Application Custodian roles;
clarifying responsibilities for business training vs. application training between the Data Custodian and the Application Custodian;
clarifying the responsibility of the Data Custodian being to define the structure and standards for data, versus the responsibility of the data collector for collecting data accurately to the Data Custodian's standards (e.g. adding a District Manager role);
clarifying Data Custodian responsibility for identifying positional accuracy required for spatial data, and whether they (the DC) will accept less than the standard;
adding suggestions for how the Data Custodian might audit the accuracy of entered data;
adding, or referencing, the Corporate Data Categories (Local Corporate, Extended Corporate, and Full Corporate data);
possibly reference the Data Custodian Council;
possibly clarify how to define which program should be the Data Custodian (for those few cases where there appears to be relatively equal interest in a set of information from multiple programs -- e.g. perhaps "factors for choosing a Data Custodian" such as >50% attributes within an entity, setting policy, etc);
include assessment as being integral to change management:
- assessment of impacts of proposed policy change with respect to existing systems or and data management, and assessment of effectiveness of proposed system changes given policy instability
- assessment of impacts and implications should be viewed in relation to requirements and benefits of the proposed changes (either policy changes or system/process changes)
- assessment should involve and be the joint responsibility of policy (/business) specialists (e.g. RTEB, FPB, CEB, etc) and systems specialists (IMG)
further define the Steward role, including internal and external data.