Master data

Master data represents the business objects that contain the most valuable, agreed upon information shared across an organization. It can cover relatively static reference data, transactional, unstructured, analytical, hierarchical and metadata. It is the primary focus of the information technology (IT) discipline of master data management (MDM). Master data represents the business objects that contain the most valuable, agreed upon information shared across an organization. It can cover relatively static reference data, transactional, unstructured, analytical, hierarchical and metadata. It is the primary focus of the information technology (IT) discipline of master data management (MDM). Master data is usually non-transactional in nature, but in some cases gray areas exist where transactional processes and operations may be considered master data by an organization. For example, master data may contain information about customers, products, employees, materials, suppliers, and vendors. Though rare, if that information is only contained within transactional data such as orders and receipts and is not housed separately, it may be considered master data. As previously stated, master data is a single source of common business data used across multiple systems, applications, and/or processes. Yet other data types and distinctions exist: Curating and managing master data is key to ensuring master data quality. Analysis and reporting is greatly dependent on the quality of an organization's master data. Master data may either be stored in a central repository, sourced from one or more systems, or referenced centrally using an index. However, when it is used by several functional groups it may be distributed and redundantly stored in different applications across an organization and this copy data may be inconsistent (and if so, inaccurate). Thus, master data should have an agreed-upon view that is shared across the organization. Care should be taken to properly version master data, if the need arises to modify it, to avoid issues with distributed copies.