Data project process documentation

Having a standard process around the business is nice. However, having it documented is nicer as it helps the business reduce downtime when transferring roles or skill from one person to another, when executing projects, as well as transparency for process understanding and improvements around the business.

Process flow

  • Catch up with the business requirement (BR) solicitor 
  • BR documentation by the solicitor
  • Initial BR documentation by the data analyst
  • Catch up with BR solicitor/stakeholders to manage expectations
  • Updating BR documentation by the data analyst
  • Project implementation
  • Final BR documentation by the data analyst

Catch up with the BR solicitor 

  • Get an overview of the value to be created
  • Get overview of areas of the business that will be impacted

BR documentation by solicitor

  • Having a worded request written down could immensely enhance understanding and remove possible grey areas. The documentation should contain:
    • The background of the request
    • How the previous process was carried out?
      • Who does what?
      • Documents for previous or similar processes
      • Data sources
      • Data security
    • Key link to the reference documents on the previous process
    • A clearly detailed acceptance criteria for the solution to be created 

Initial BR documentation by data analyst

Aggregating knowledge gathered from the catch-up and BR documentation by the solicitor to get an overview of the value created by the previous process and the potential value the new process could create. Meeting with stakeholders around the BR to get a more detailed understanding of the process. Create a new documentation that will be more detailed to the execution of the project. The documentation should contain:

  • The background of the request
    • How the previous process was carried out?
      • Who does what?
      • Documents for previous or similar processes
      • Data sources
      • Data security
    • Key link to the reference documents on the previous process
    • A clearly detailed acceptance criteria for the solution to be created 
  • Create a ticket on a project tracking tool (e.g. Jira or Asana) 

Catch-up with BR solicitor as well as analyst to manage expectations 

  • Meet with the BR solicitor to discuss based on your investigations, what can be achieved and what cannot at the point in time. This could be a continuous conversation

Updating BR  documentation by data analyst

  • Are there new data requirements?
  • Are there new acceptance criteria?
  • Are there new processes to document?

Project implementation

  • The fit for purpose source of truth dataset used
  • Orchestration job implemented if any
  • Transformation job implemented if any
  • Cards created if any
  • Dashboard created if any

Final BR documentation by data analyst

  • Update the BR document.
    The documentation could contain:
    • Background 
    • Previous process
    • Key links: Project tracking tool (e.g. Jira or Asana) | Previous process related documents | New process related documents | Data governance | Background reference
    • Data requirements containing the features and business logic required to achieve the BR
    • Key observations
    • Reconciliation/Change management
    • Acceptance criteria
    • Activity notes (if required)

Data quality observations

  • Is the data entered accurately, are there missing values, how frequently is the data updated?
  • Does the business logic correlate with the logic used for the features
  • Catch up with stakeholders to discuss observations

Data security

  • How was the data secured? Who had access to the data? Are the people having access to the data meant to have access to the data?
  • Can a similar or better security be replicated using a new process

Reconciliation/Change Management

  • Is the values from the newly built report equal to the previously built report
  • Is the values from the newly built report different from the previously built report due to data quality issues
    • Are the definitions of features from the newly built report what was intended by the business
  • Catch-up with stakeholders to discuss usability and impact of new process for the BI report

Document new process

  • Document the new process for generating the report using the BI tool

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