Policy guidelines to improve data governance in university college of Agroscience Malaysia : a case study

Abstract

This research aims to study the current state of data governance and identify the factors influencing it at the University College of Agroscience Malaysia (UCAM). Data governance refers to the overall management of the availability, usability, integrity, and security of the data employed in an organization. An industry best practice and sound data governance program include a governing body, a defined set of procedures, and a plan to execute those procedures. Generally, unless formally addressed, there is an inherent poor data governance in organizations. Particularly at UCAM, apparently there is insufficient allocation of resources to support data governance. There seem to be failures to set up an effective team of ICT Personnel, lack of IT awareness among staff including data security in the workplace and an absence of complete documentation related to Information Security policies. This study employs mixed method to collect information from users using quantitative method via questionnaires, and qualitative method via interviews. In case any gap is found between the current state and the best industry practice, this work also propose a guideline to establish the policies needed to address the gap.