Introducing a data professional haunted house. Walk the halls with me and experience the horror that is doing data labor. Today’s room is “when you ask data related questions to leadership.”

Whether it’s leading a data migration, trying to get the full scope of your digital assets (e.g. typical file format types, total data numbers), or asking around for the documentation on workflows, past practices and missing institutional knowledge/peers haunt us.

  1. From an institutional strategy perspective, most leaders don’t see how digital asset management fits into their business strategy. DAM labor is the epitome of interdepartmental labor; DAM works across all hierarchy levels and departments.

  2. The systems we use to manage content/assets are often the least prioritized. Rather than positioning the tools we need to do all labor as vital to operations, many organization’s see system development (maintenance, updates, data migrations, configurations) as one-time projects with “success” or “completion” metrics.

  3. In my own career, I often come across hauntings of legacy data, workflows, and missing IT/systems knowledge. Who has admin access to SFTP onto your server? Where do we store assets? Who are the key players I work with that also work with digital assets? Usually none of this is written down and often these questions are met with silence.

A 10/10 spooky room. Will haunt us all forever.

Caw stares at a bunch of leaders fighting in a dust cloud in front of a neon-lit window. A ghost stares down at the leaders who yell: This is a top priority. Go through your colleague first. Look at the manual.

The cartoony crow, Caw, peeks behind a curtain with a scared expression. A lime light shows the words: Spring Fever. A data professional haunted house. By Dana Reijerkerk.